CLEVELAND — It's a special return to Cleveland for "Jesus Christ Superstar," as the Broadway show is back at Playhouse Square to finish what they started nearly two years ago.
"Cleveland, Cleveland, Cleveland," Tyce Green, who plays Annas, said. "I will say right away that it's weird being back because you have this weird sense of 'Were we actually here before?'"
It was after only two performances in March of 2020 that the actors, musicians and production company of "Jesus Christ Superstar" got the news.
"I know exactly the steps that I was sitting on when they were like, 'We're shutting down," Aaron LaVigne, who plays Jesus, remembered. "I just remember all of these things."
"We were like, 'Okay, this is kind of crappy, but I guess we'll go home for a couple of weeks and then we'll be back,'" Green said at the time.
That brief recess turned into 18 long months of shelving the production until the group was finally able to reconvene and get the show back on its feet.
"Nothing fundamentally changed about our show, so that was the very helpful thing," Green explained. "We were working together to put back the thing that we had created a while back."
Their tour returned in Portland, Oregon, where at long last they were able to welcome in an audience. Now, they've returned to Playhouse Square in Cleveland, where everything originally went dark.
"It's something that, for the most part, we're all embracing," LaVigne told 3News. "If I'm too worried about what happened before, then I can't focus on the joy and the beauty of what's happening in the moment. I think, for me, I'm just excited to be here, and it feels like a new experience."
"The audiences in Cleveland are unbeatable," Green added, "so that's exciting."
There are a few new names in the playbill, but many of the same cast members from before are bringing this rock opera to life on stage until Feb. 20.