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The Roman Catholic Mime Collective

Reviewed by Neal Weaver

Arthur Edward Productions at the Eclectic Company Theatre

Through Dec. 30

This group calls itself a collective, but it seems to include only one performer: David Nott as a highly revisionist Jesus Christ. The bearded, bushy-haired Nott, clad only in bunchy white diaper, draped with a yellow shmatta, and wearing the traditional white-face of the mime, gives us Jesus as a sort of supernatural Peck’s Bad Boy. We see him as a preening, self-regarding celebrity, plucking out his chest hairs and presenting them to his fawning fans, serving up joints along with the loaves and fishes, egging on the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, cheating at hide-and-seek, and drunkenly groping bar patrons and getting slapped for his efforts.

And it’s pretty hard to generate laughs from a situation as gory and horrendous as the crucifixion, even for non-believers.

There seems to be a desire to shock, but the presentation comes off as too trivial to be shocking. As critic Clive Barnes once observed, the only people who really enjoy blasphemy are lapsed Catholics.

Most of the jokes are lame, the laughs are few and far between, and Nott’s mime work is so vague that it’s sometimes hard to figure out what’s happening.  All in all, a highly unrewarding evening of theater.

Arthur Edward Productions at The Eclectic Theatre Company, 5312 Laurel Canyon Blvd., Valley Village; variable schedule through Dec. 30. (818) 508-3003, eclecticcompanytheatre.org