Some shows shrink on a second viewing. This dazzling South African version of the medieval Chester mystery plays, seen briefly at Wilton's Music Hall last summer, works just as magically in the West End.
Not only has the cast, now totalling 40, virtually doubled but the spectacle expands to fill the space.
But why at the end did the audience leap to its feet? Was it simply a gesture of liberal piety? I don't think so. For a start I believe the audience is responding to the power of the original plays and their retelling of the Christian story from the creation to the crucifixion and resurrection.
Even in a secular age, we find a mythical resonance in the account of Cain's fratricide, of Noah's comically recalcitrant wife, of Abraham's readiness to sacrifice his son and in the New Testament story of betrayal, redemption and rebirth.
The show appeals to ancestral Christian memory. But we are also reacting to the rich inventiveness of this version created by Mark Dornford-May and Charles Hazelwood and performed in English, Afrikaans, Xhosa and Zulu.
The linguistic cocktail, in fact, becomes a vital part of the overall meaning. Herman Hardick's white Pilate interrogates Vumile Nomanyama's black Christ in English: Christ's response comes in his own tongue which immediately sets up racial and cultural differences and turns him from a divinity into a political symbol of persecuted peoples everywhere.
But the style of the production instantly engages rather than alienates. Noananyama transforms himself from Deus to Jesus by the simple device of stripping off a coloured robe and revealing a pair of blue jeans. His disciples register their shared faith by an extraordinary knee-and-thigh slapping dance. A bale of straw stands for Bethlehem.
And, back in the Old Testament, a retractable picket fence symbolises Noah's Ark and a cascading water sprinkler the flood. In short, the production enlists our imagination rather than pre-empting it.
Charles Hazelwood's musical direction and Joel Mthethwa's choreography also turn this into a piece of total theatre in which speech, song and dance harmoniously unite.
The cast beat upturned dustbins and oil-drums attached to the boxes. Jesus attracts his followers with a recorder. The post-flood happiness is evoked through You Are My Sunshine and the a cappella choruses raise the roof.
But like the performances, which include a capering, scarlet-suited Lucifer from Andries Mbali and a moving Mary Magdalene from Ruby Mthethwa, everything is put to the service of an idea: a re-telling of the Christian story in terms of a modern South Africa facing its own desire for truth and reconciliation.
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