Wherein the Bible gets the Broadway treatment
You can't be a Biblical patriarch without favoring one son over your others and thus instigate a violent and ruinous sibling rivalry. You just can't.
To wit. Jacob singles out his favorite son Joseph by giving him a swanky coat (of the "amazing technocolor dream" variety). His other sons get jealous. Then Joseph has two dreams in which he is being bowed down to. This doesn't help the situation. Joseph is kind of a spoiled blabber mouth to tell you the truth.
In reaction, his brothers plan to kill him. One of them, Ruben, asks that they simply throw Joseph down a water tank and leave him alive. This sounds good enough to the other brothers, so this is what they do.
For Joseph though, things turn from bad to worse when the brothers see a caravan approaching and they decide to sell off their smug sibling to the merchants ("Hey, at least we didn't kill him!" is their logic).
They then take Joseph's robe (coat, or whatever), dip it in goats blood and show it to their father Jacob to trick him into thinking that his favored son was mauled by some wild animal.
Genesis in Pop Culture: Joseph's story is plot to the musical, "Joseph and the Amazing Technocolor Dream Coat". I've never seen it, but it looks pretty incredible. Here's a track list of the songs:
* Overture (not on the recording)
* Prologue
* Any Dream Will Do
* Jacob and Sons
* Joseph's Coat
* Joseph's Dreams
* Poor, Poor Joseph
* One More Angel in Heaven
* The Journey to Egypt (Bill Kenwright Touring Version Only)
* Potiphar
* Close Every Door
* Go, Go, Go Joseph
* Entr'acte (not on the recording)
* Pharaoh's Story
* Poor, Poor Pharaoh
* Song of the King (Seven Fat Cows)
* Pharaoh's Dreams Explained
* Stone the Crows
* King of My Heart (2007 London staging and subsequent UK tour only)
* Those Canaan Days
* The Brothers Come To Egypt
* Grovel, Grovel
* Who's the Thief?
* Benjamin Calypso
* Joseph All the Time
* Jacob in Egypt
* Finale: Any Dream Will Do / Give Me My Coloured Coat
* Joseph Megamix (for curtain call in some big productions)
And here's a clip from a recent TV production starring Donnie "A Little Bit Rock 'n Roll" Osmond.
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1 comment:
Hey this can't be the last post? Why would you stop there? I've been following a Genesis Bible study course which told me to look for a map and, would you believe, your blog came up as a source of a map. I was also born a Catholic but never read the bible, so I found your research most interesting - maybe lapsed Catholics share an irreverent sense of humour.
Any chance you might continue the blog? Or did some life event make you reconsider?
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