Does anyone here know anything about this film? Apparently it's about a fugitive priest (played by Paul Bettany, I think) in 14th-century England who joins a troupe of actors (led by Willem Dafoe, I think) who discover a murder or something, and in the course of solving the murder, the priest redeems himself (I think). Brian Cox, Ewen Bremner and Gina McKee also co-star. The film is directed by Paul McGuigan, whose only previous movies are The Acid House (that's the Scottish film where the dialect was so thick they subtitled it for its North American release!) and Gangster No. 1, both of which I have seen; and it is based on a novel by Barry Unsworth called Morality Play, which I have not yet read.

Don't know much, but am utterly intrigued. Here's what I found at comingsoon.com (which is NOT a website about the end times)...

SPOILER ALERT

In 14th Century England, this powerful tale of redemption follows a fugitive priest (Bettany) who falls in with a troupe of travelling actors (led by Dafoe). As they arrive in a small town, the actors encounter a woman being sentenced to death for witchcraft and murder. Discarding the expected bible stories, the actors stage a performance based on the crime. Through the performance of the play, they discover that the townspeople know the woman did not, in fact, commit the murder. The stage becomes a place where vital human truth is told. The fugitive priest comes to terms with his own crime and makes a powerful sacrifice, thereby redeeming himself.

I'm real curious. It's entirely possible the film may reject the religiosity of the day while embracing/embodying things very near the heart of the gospel - sacrifice, conscience, truth, justice. Or it may just perpetuate the same tired, nasty old lie – that Christians (townspeople) are hypocritical rotters, and the Really Noble People Who Know Better are the real heroes, leaving behind those darn Bible stories and telling The Real Truth.

This could be fun!

FWIW, Ron, I am presently on page 35 of the 206-page novel on which this film is based. Called Morality Play, the novel is by Barry Unsworth, and it's told in the first person in a way that is so deeply immersed in the thought patterns of the 14th century (or so it seems to me) that I cannot help but compare it in my mind to The Name of the Rose, which I read many many years ago. (And hey, both books apparently involve murder mysteries investigated by men of the church -- a monk in Eco's book and a fugitive priest in Unsworth's!)

Anyway, there was this passage on page 33 that I thought you might find interesting:

It was now that it came to me -- a lesson that was to be learned over again in the days that followed -- that the player is always trapped in his own play but he must never allow the spectators to suspect this, they must always think that he is free. Thus the great art of the player is not in showing but concealing.

FWIW, I am unfamiliar with Unsworth's other writings, though I do know that Pascali's Island was made into a film which I have never seen, and apparently Sacred Hunger won the Booker Prize, or so says the dust jacket on this book.

[quote]Anyway, there was this passage on page 33 that I thought you might find interesting:

It was now that it came to me -- a lesson that was to be learned over again in the days that followed -- that the player is always trapped in his own play but he must never allow the spectators to suspect this, they must always think that he is free. Thus the great art of the player is not in showing but concealing.[/quote]
I don't really get it, actually. But it sounds impressive!

[quote]FWIW, I am unfamiliar with Unsworth's other writings, though I do know that Pascali's Island was made into a film which I have never seen, and apparently Sacred Hunger won the Booker Prize, or so says the dust jacket on this book.[/quote]
I bought me a copy of the PASCALI'S ISLAND video a while ago, on the recommendation of my cousin. Didn't know there was a connection. Groovy.

Y'know, it's funny, but even though I have seen not one photo, not one frame of footage from this film, just knowing that Willem Dafoe is playing the leader of the actors is having an effect on how I visualize this character in the book. And he sure seems to fit!

He was some years older than I, of middling height, slender of body but wiry and quick. . . . His face was a narrow oval, white now with grief or cold. The eyes were beautiful, gray-green in color, set below slanting brows. . . . (page 10)

In the torchlight his face looked famished and gaunt. The high bones of his cheeks and his narrow eyes gave him the look of a wolf and this impression was strengthened by the way he leaned forward and raised his shoulders against the cold. . . . (page 56)

Here are a few other passages I like. First, from the first play that the fugitive priest performs in, which happens to be a play about the Fall (pages 51-52):

It took little more than a minute to strip off my demon's dress and put on the Fool's tunic and shoulder pieces and the cap and bells. But it was long enough for me to become aware again of Brendan's [a dead person that the players have not been able to bury, due to a lack of funds, since the priest first discovered them on page 1] presence under his heap of straw in the corner. My mask now was a plain white one, full face, with a long nosepiece like the beak of a bird. I shook my bells and struck the tambourine as I went back through the people. I was a different person now, they did not hate me. They knew me for a japer, not a demon. I understood then, as I passed through the people and shook my bells and saw them smile, what all players come to know very well, how quickly shifting are our loves and hates, how they depend on mocks and disguises. With a horned mask and a wooden trident I was their fear of hellfire. Two minutes later, still the same timorous creature as before, with a fool's cap and a white mask, I was their hope of laughter.

I was discovering also the danger of disguise for the player. A mask confers the terror of freedom, it is very easy to forget who you are. I felt it now, this slipping of the soul, and I was confused because in body I was the more restricted -- the mask did not admit much light to my eyes and I could see nothing at all to the sides.

Then this bit from after the play is done (pages 57-58 ):

"God and the Devil are personages," he [Martin] said. "God is a judge, Satan is an advocate. Judging and pleading need different ways of speech. In that difference is the true play, if someone could be found to write the true words."

"Well, certainly, there is reason to that," said Straw, whose view of things was formed by his feelings of the moment and changed direction as rapidly as did these.

Springer's eyes were beginning to close as he felt the first heat of the fire. Weariness smoothed his thin face. "What can words do?" he said. "God and the Devil both know how the story ends." He spoke slowly, like a sleepy child. "And the people know it too," he said.

"They know how the story ends," Martin repeated, also speaking slowly, in what might have seemed mockery at first, but his eyes were fixed and on to his face had come a half-startled expression, as if at some recognition.

He was about to say more but I did not wait, I had eben distressed to hear him speak of our Father in Heaven as a circumscribed being, the more so as I follow William of Occam, the Great Franciscan, in believing that God dwells beyond the reach of our reason, in absolute liberty and power. "No words can bring us to the nature of God," I said. "Our language is human, it is we who made the rules of it. It is the sin of pride to think that our human language can lead to knowledge of the Creator. And to speak of the person of God as you have done is to break the Seventh Commandment."

That strange quickening look had gone from his face now. He was looking at me with pity for my understanding. "We are talking of plays, brother," he said. "It was the Church that first made God a player. The priests played Him before the altar and do so still, as they also play Christ and His Holy Mother and others, to help our understanding. As a player He can have His own voice, but He cannot take the voices of others. The Father of Lies has more privilege, who can borrow the tongue of the Serpent."

"It is damnable to speak of God in such a way, as if He were no more than a voice among other voices."

And there's a fantastic section on pages 72-76 in which Martin proposes coming up with a new play based on the murder that took place in town before they got there, which stirs a huge debate:

It was Tobias who brought the sounds back again; they came with his voice. "Play the murder?" he said. On his face was an expression of bewilderment. "What do you mean? Do you mean the murder of the boy? Who plays things that are done in the world?"

"It was finished when it was done," Straw said. He paused for a moment or two, glancing around into the corners of the barn with his prominent and excitable eyes. "It is madness," he said. "How can men pay a thing that is only done once? Where are the words for it?" And he raised both hands and fluttered his fingers in the gesture of chaos.

"The woman who did it is still living," Margaret said. "If she is still living, she is in the part herself, it is hers, no one else can have it."

I had never heard Margaret speak before in any matter concerning the playing, but Martin did not reprove her; he was too intent on the argument. "Why should it make a difference?" he said. "Cain killed Abel, that was a murder, it is something that happened and it only happened once. But we can play it, we play it often, we play also the manner of its doing, we put a cracked pitcher inside Abel's smock to make the smash of his bones. Why cannot we play this town's murder, since we find ourselves here?"

Tobias was shaking his head. "There is no authority for it," he said. "It is not written anywhere. Cain and Abel are in the Bible."

"Tobias is right," I said. I could not keep silent though it meant going against him. What he proposed was impious and I felt fear in it. In this I sensed a difference from the others. They were astounded because the idea was new but they were not troubled in soul, except perhaps for Tobias -- though this would come later to all. "In Holy Writ there is sanction," I said. "The story of Cain and Abel is completed by the wisdom of God, it is not only a murder, it has its continuing in the judgment. It is encompassed within the will of the Creator."

"So is this one, and so are all the murders of the world," Springer said, and his thin face -- face of the eternal orphan -- already had the light on it of Martin's idea.

"True," I said, "but in this oen there is no common acceptance, God has not given us this story to use, He has not revealed to us the meaning of it. So it has no meaning, it is only a death. Players are like other men, they must use God's meanings, they cannot make meanings of their own, that is heresy, it is the source of all our woes, it is the reason our first parents were cast out."

But already, looking round at their faces, I knew that my argument would fail. They were in some fear perhaps, but it was not fear of offending God, it was fear of the freedom Martin was holding out, the license to play anything in the world. Such license brings power ... Yes, he offered us the world, he played Lucifer to us there in the cramped space of the barn. But the closer prize he did not need to offer, it was already there in all our minds: the people would flock to see their murder played. And they would pay. In the end it was our destitution that won the day for him. That and the habit of mind of players, who think of their parts and how best to do them, and listen to the words of the master-player, but do not often think of the meaning as a whole. Had these done so, they would have seen what I, more accustomed to conclusions, saw and trembled at: if we make our own meanings, God will oblige us to answer our own questions, He will leave us in the void without the comfort of His Word.

There is more, but work beckons. Very interesting stuff. I am sure you have had to deal with at least some of these issues over the years, yes, Ron?

[quote]...Very interesting stuff. I am sure you have had to deal with at least some of these issues over the years, yes, Ron?[/quote]

Thanks for the samples. I was keen on seeing the film - now I'm VERY curious, and having to decide whether to read the novel before or after viewing the film.

The odd thing though is that, no, none of these issues resonate with me at all. Isn't that strange? The only thing that struck a familiar note at all was the comment that many players don't think about the overall meaning of what they're performing. I've found that to be true, though it's not true of me. Maybe that's why I started my own company? Because it matters to me what I act in?

Just a few more basically spoiler-free thematically-inclined quotes before I return this book to the library. First, from page 116:

In the silence that followed upon this, [Martin] looked around at our faces. "We will go and find out something more," he said. "The play we gave was the false play of Thomas Wells. Tonight we will give the true one. And so we will shout it to the people. And tomorrow, when we leave for Durham, every one of us shall have money enough for a month."

Money enough for a month. For poor players that is money enough for ever. It comes to me sometimes again, his triumph as he held up the purse with both hands, in the very gesture of the celebrant priest. How far did he believe what he told us? He talked of true and false but he did not mean these words as they are commonly meant. He wanted a play with strong scenes, one that would disturb the people and send them away changed. Is that a true play? And he wanted money. He won us over, but to win us over was his role. He was prompted in the lines that he spoke, as were we all. Some fascination of power led us to imprison ourselves in this Play of Thomas Wells.

Much later, on page 186, the fugitive priest meets the visiting Justice:

"So," he said, "a priest who is a player is not so infrequent, especially among priests who get advancement, eh, Thomas?"

"No, sir."

"A player who is a priest, I grant you, that is rarer. . . . "

And then, on pages 196-197, there is this exchange between the fugitive priest and a woman that he met through the players:

At this she smiled a little but without much softening and after a moment she came and kissed me. "Go back to your Bishop, you were best," she said.

"Well, that is doubtful," I said. "As for this question of being admitted to the company and having a part to play, you can take comfort from the story of the Devil and Player, do you know the one?"

She shook her head and yawned, in a manner not encouraging. Nevertheless, I persisted, because I thought there might be consolation in it for her.

"It took place before there were players, if we can imagine such a time. The Devil was casting about the world and he came upon a man of very virtuous life and sought to tempt him. He tried all manner of blandishment, the lusts of the flesh, the treasures of the world, fame and dominion. All of these the man steadfastly rejected. The Devil was at his wit's end and could think of nothing more but to offer to make him a player. The man saw no harm in this and agreed and so he lost the bout and his soul was forfeit because a player borrows bits and pieces from the souls of others and in this pastime his own soul loosens and slips away from him and it is an easy matter for the Devil to scoop it up. And this had been the case with players ever since."

Margaret's response to this story confirmed me in my view that women have no head for abstract thought.

"If Stephen escapes hanging," she said, "tell him Flint is big and strong and has both his thumbs and plenty of gristle in them."

I promised to do this and she lay down again to sleep. I sat on the straw with my back to the wall and tried to think of what the Justice had told me. The Lord must already have had the message, perhaps it was somewhere about him while he sat watching our play. Martin had mocked him in the mask of Superbia and sought to bring him into the Play of Thomas Wells. But that note, which I had not read and never would, had forced no him a part in another play, that in which the Justice was a player and the King also, a larger play in which the suffering of the innocent was of no importance except as a counter to bargain with. And as my eyes grew heavy with sleep I wondered if there were not some larger play still, in which Kings and Emperors and Popes, though thinking they are in the center of the space, are really only in the margin ...

SPOILER WARNING

And last of all, a quote from the final two pages of the book -- though of course, there is no guarantee the film will end this way:

"This is the King's justice," I said. "What of God's?"

[The Justice] turned his horse, smiling still. "That is more difficult to understand," he said. "It is not the King that visits us with pestilence. You have been useful to me, Nicholas Barber, and I would help you if I could. Have you thought more of my offer to restore you to the good graces of your Bishop?"

In truth I had not thought much of it, having had little time for reflection. But as I looked up at him in this first light of day I knew what my answer should be, and it was what the Play of Thomas Wells had taught me. I would not go to Lincoln again, unless it was as a player. I knew little of the world, as the Justice had seen, but I knew that we can lose ourselves in the parts we play and if this continues too long we will not find our way back again. When I was a sub-deacon transcribing Pilato's Homer for a noble patron, I had thought I was serving God but I was only acting at the direction of the Bishop, who is the master-actor for all that company of the Cathedral. I was in the part of a hired scribe but I did not know this, I thought it was my true self. God is not served by self-deceiving. The impulse to run away had not been folly but the wisdom of my heart. I would be a player and I would try to guard my soul, unlike the Player in the fable. And I would not again be trapped in a part. "I am grateful, my Lord Justice," I said, "but I will remain a player now."

There's a few more paragraphs, and I really badly want to quote the last one, but I shan't, to avoid giving away TOO much.

QUOTE

Money enough for a month. For poor players that is money enough for ever.

This is definitely true.

QUOTE

\"So,\" he said, \"a priest who is a player is not so infrequent, especially among priests who get advancement, eh, Thomas?\" \"No, sir.\" \"A player who is a priest, I grant you, that is rarer. . . . \"

Not unrelated: I've often noted how many actors have seriously considered either the professional ministry, and how many pastors and lawyers have been attracted to the stage. There are some very powerful links between these professions.

QUOTE

a player borrows bits and pieces from the souls of others and in this pastime his own soul loosens and slips away from him and it is an easy matter for the Devil to scoop it up. And this had been the case with players ever since.\"

This is also true.

QUOTE

Margaret's response to this story confirmed me in my view that women have no head for abstract thought.

And this is indisputable.

Ron

P.S. Sheeesh!

The Reckoning

Paul Bettany is like a young Cadfael in this movie that boasts two of the craggiest visages ever to grace the screen: Dafoe and Cox.

Ooh, ooh--this movie is based on Morality Play by Barry Unsworth! It's a fantastic book.

I'm editing my post, because I didn't have time to read the full review before I posted the first draft. I was excited (obviously) that one of my favorite books had been filmed with a good cast, but after reading the full review, I'm a little less thrilled.

Nevertheless, this one may be a keeper, despite the philosophical slogging at the end. Thanks for the heads-up!

Saw it today. Certainly wish it was a better movie. It has some things going for it. But the thought process just seems a bit too modern for 1380.

BTW, can anyone explain the woman's bare back with a jeweled cross hanging down it that's ont he poster? I don't remember that image at all.

Darrel Manson wrote:
: Saw it today. Certainly wish it was a better movie.

Yeah, I caught it this morning and I know what you mean -- the first half sticks fairly close to the book, but then they start introducing all sorts of changes. Just as, in my review of Secret Window, I griped that the film had forgotten that the original book was all about the nature of writing, so too I suspect this film has forgotten that the original book was all about the nature of play-acting (and how life and religion in general contain elements of same).

SPOILERS

I was especially disheartened by the mob action at the end of the film, which is nowhere to be found in the book -- on one hand, I guess it satisfies the audience's craving for immediate justice, but on the other, it just seems to give in to that movie cliché whereby we must, must, must see the villain die. I mean, c'mon, we already knew he had the plague.

: But the thought process just seems a bit too modern for 1380.

Any particular scene you're thinking of? I imagine it's the conversation between Bettany and Cassel in the church, but I could be wrong about that.

: BTW, can anyone explain the woman's bare back with a jeweled cross
: hanging down it that's ont he poster? I don't remember that image at all.

Well, we do see Bettany's lover's bare back in the opening montage, so I guess they just added a cross to it -- do we ever see a JEWELED one in the film?

QUOTE

I was especially disheartened by the mob action at the end of the film, which is nowhere to be found in the book -- on one hand, I guess it satisfies the audience's craving for immediate justice

Well, Movieguide counts that bit as a major plus... so much so that they give away a major twist of the movie in the subtitle of their review! Reminds me a bit of the way they treated The Widow of St. Pierre...

Jeffrey Overstreet wrote:
: Well, Movieguide counts that bit as a major plus...

Seriously? Mob vengeance is better than divine justice or legal justice? And this is a Christian film critic that is making this assertion? Wow.

In fairness, though, the original novel does have more, um, ambiguity or even skepticism, so I can see why some Christians might like the film more.

The Orlando Sentinel speaks up about prejudice against Catholic priests in film.

Man, I wish this would become more of a media event. This is a story that needs to get more press. Now that the gauntlet has been thrown down in the anti-Semitism debate, it's time to wake people up to the way they regularly abuse the clergy and the priesthood in mainstream entertainment and art.

This film opens in Vancouver today.

SPOILERS

Question: does the film ever explain why, after the other boys have just vanished, this current boy was found dead on the road? In the book, I believe it is made very plain that this boy's body was brought back outside because the person abusing the boy realized the boy had the plague, and did not want to dispense with him the way he had dispensed with the others ... but in the film, the person abusing the boy does not find this out until very, very late in the story.

Have I got this right, or am I misremembering these plot points? And if I have got that right, then my question remains: does the film ever explain why this boy's body was brought back into the open, when it could have just disappeared like the other boys' bodies did?

QUOTE

The Orlando Sentinel speaks up about prejudice against Catholic priests in film. Man, I wish this would become more of a media event. This is a story that needs to get more press. Now that the gauntlet has been thrown down in the anti-Semitism debate, it's time to wake people up to the way they regularly abuse the clergy and the priesthood in mainstream entertainment and art.

Veering off from The Reckoning (which I think tends toward abuse to Catholic priests, but still has a priest who is the hero), I saw a review in the current Commonweal of the film Boxed (apparently a festival film that never picked up a distributor). It is deals "tame" priest in N. Ireland (those who come to safe houses to hear the confession of those about to be executed by warring factions) and one priest who is mistakenly brought to do this who isn't "tame". It is a matter that there are good and bad priests and clergy. There are good and bad politicians as well, but they are usually treated badly in films as well (at least fictional ones, and very often historical ones). But those who fulfill their calling don't make good drama.

Why pick on clergy? (I don't think it's limited to Catholic priests, but they do catch the brunt of it.) Because they are the easiest to show a contrast between expectation (rightly or wrongly) and reality.

On further consideration, I'll expand on my post above.

Often the (ab)use of clergy in this way may just be lazy writing. It is the easiest shorthand for hypocrisy. I think that's probably the case with films like El Crimen del Padre Amaro.

There are times that the writer doesn't just use that shorthand, though. In The Third Miracle, which was mentioned in the Sentinel article, there priests who are cynical, schmucks, faith-challenged, pompous; but also those who are just trying to do the best they can in the ministry before them.

The Apostle turns the shorthand on its head. The expectation is that Sonny will be Elmer Gantry incarnate. But what we see is that there is truly a man of faith (struggling and imperfect as he may be) whose goal in life is to serve God.

The Orlando Sentinel wrote:
: He is, McGuigan says, "a priest who has seen [the Bible's] words, and they're
: just words because he doesn't believe them. And yet priests, because of
: who they are and how they live, are supposed to believe and be believed."

Huh, somehow I did not get the impression that the priest in the book was an unbeliever, just a sinner. Though I do recall thinking that some of the book's priest's objections to doing a non-biblical play were transferred to the other characters in the film.

SPOILERS ON

What makes this even more interesting, though, is that the fugitive priest in the book, after hiding with the actors, does reject his clerical "role" in the church in the end, which some may construe as a rejection of Christian faith on some level or other, but the priest in the film comes to "redeem" himself or "atone" for his sin by dying for the sake of truth.

SPOILERS OFF

Darrel Manson wrote:
: The Apostle turns the shorthand on its head.

I love to show that opening clip, of the roadside conversion, on the rare occasion when I speak in classrooms or Sunday schools -- a lot of people don't realize just how self-centred the Duvall character is in that scene, and yet, there is a quick cut near the end of that sequence which suggests that Duvall's and his mother's prayers are having an effect despite his flawed motives.

Went to see The Reckoning last night with my friend Donna. High marks, generally, for medieval authenticity. Wonderfully atmospheric lighting. Paul Bettany, Willem Dafoe were fine. Wish Gina McKee had had more to do.

Both Donna and I had read Morality Play, but not recently. Neither of us could remember exactly how the book ended, but were pretty sure it was different from the movie. I've just checked, and am now even more dissatisfied with the movie ending.


:SPOILER:


The mob attack on DeGuise seems not only pandering to the audience, but also somewhat unlikely. Nicholas's death may seem something of an atonement, but seriously--can he atone for his own sins? Or has the movie prepared us to see him as a Christ-figure? I think not. The book's ending is more hopeful and, I would say, more Christian:

QUOTE

[Nicholas narrating] God is not served by self-deceiving. The impulse to run away had not been folly but the wisdom of my heart. I would be a player and I would try to guard my soul...

:END SPOILER:

The other thing one misses in the movie is Unsworth's writing style. In each of his novels he seems to create a style suited to that particular novel, and in Morality Play he subtly imitates in prose the alliterative style of 14th century poets such as William Langland and the author of Sir Gawain & the Green Knight. Very neatly done.

SPOILERS

BethR wrote:
: The mob attack on DeGuise seems not only pandering to the audience,
: but also somewhat unlikely.

Fervent agreement on both counts.

: Nicholas's death may seem something of an atonement, but seriously--
: can he atone for his own sins?

Theologically, no, but dramatically, I suspect that we maybe are supposed to think that that is what is going on here. The thing is, his death in the film doesn't really accomplish anything, to the best of my recollection -- it's something that happens after he has exposed DeGuise's sin, and is thus kind of gratuitous. So even dramatically, it is not much of an atonement.

: The book's ending is more hopeful and, I would say, more Christian . . .

Quite possibly. What I like about the book's ending, actually, is the way it continues to express concerns about the nature of play-acting -- it ends with Nicholas wondering if the master player will continue to be interested in the woman they have saved, now that she is free; it suggests the master player's interest in her stemmed precisely from the fact that she had been caged, chained, and could thus easily be given a "role" in his mind. The way the film tells the story, the players have more or less "saved the day", which makes them look more heroic.

SPOILERS (How long do we have to keep these up?)

PTC wrote:

QUOTE

The thing is, his death in the film doesn't really accomplish anything, to the best of my recollection -- it's something that happens after he has exposed DeGuise's sin, and is thus kind of gratuitous. So even dramatically, it is not much of an atonement.

Exactly. That's what I was getting at.

QUOTE

What I like about the book's ending, actually, is the way it continues to express concerns about the nature of play-acting -- it ends with Nicholas wondering if the master player will continue to be interested in the woman they have saved, now that she is free

Another good point, and another element completely missing from the film, along with the poster's completely gratuitous cross hanging down the woman's back, which definitely is not in the movie in any way.

Now that this film has finally opened here in my neck of the woods, after seeing the movie, I was impressed by the authenticity of the look and feel of the time period, and in the performances by the cast. From the excerpts from the book that were posted on this thread, I am now wanting to read it, to further explore the themes about the roles of play-acting and how they relate to real life. Too bad the movie didn't explore these things further.

The film does use a "priests and other religious people behaving badly" theme that seems to be used as a cheap hook to market the film (witness the poster of the woman with a cross hanging down her bare back, ooh, look, here's another movie about a priest caught in adultery. Was this really necessary). After a while, aren't people going to get tired of seeing yet another movie that tells us how the corrupt the Catholic church has been?

One thing that struck me about the film is that the film seems to take a point of view that the Passion plays produced by the theater troupe were mere entertainment. But, it was only when they started doing plays not based on the Bible, but on "real life", that their plays had real impact in the lives of the townspeople. I wonder if this is intended as a jab at "Christian" art that entertains the choir but has no real impact in the world at large.