Passion play Rainbow Stage takes biblical rock opera to its outdoor stage By: Ben Waldman Posted: 5:52 PM CDT Wednesday, Jun. 24, 2026

What’s the buzz at Rainbow Stage? We’ll tell you what’s-a-happening.

For the first time in its seven-decade history, the country’s longest continually operating outdoor theatre company is producing Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s Jesus Christ Superstar, one of the most admired rock operas ever made, fashioned in the 1960s after “the greatest story ever told.”

The musical, which began as a concept album before reaching movie theatres in 1973, has been on director Sharon Bajer’s mind for decades: director Norman Jewison’s swaggering version was the first movie musical the Winnipeg performer saw rerun on television.

“I thought it was just so strange,” says the British Columbia-raised Bajer, whose first musical theatre role was in Jesus Christ Superstar in Grade 9, playing a leper. “Growing up, I always had a vision of doing it outside, so when Rainbow approached me about directing it, I thought, at least we’re going to be outside in the elements.”

When it came time to choose her cast this spring, the director broke her leg during the audition period. But the job wasn’t too challenging, the fully healed director said Tuesday under the dome in Kildonan Park, because within the city’s performing arts community, she already had some idea which voices would be Judea-bound.

For the role of Mary Magdalene, Bajer cast Dutchess Cayetano, who earlier this season flashed her straight-acting chops as the countess in Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre’s run of Murder on the Orient Express. For Cayetano, a Winnipeg-raised Filipino performer, the role is the most prominent yet on Rainbow Stage, following her work in Frozen, Rock of Ages and Ma-Buhay.

“Carrying the weight of such an iconic role I don’t find burdensome,” says Cayetano, who studied singing under legendary Winnipeg vocal teacher Joy Lazo. “But knowing that it is such an iconic role, I really wanted to make sure I respected the original while bringing a new take.

“Mary is very vulnerable and compassionate, and she helps bring us down to earth with her humanity.”

Cayetano, whose parents encouraged her to go for the lead, felt the vocal performance sat well within her register, which is rich and emotionally dynamic.

“Mary doesn’t really sing rock. She gives you a fresh ear and experience when she comes onstage,” says Cayetano.

But for the rock, director Bajer had essentially earmarked Nathaniel Muir as her Judas Iscariot as soon as he walked in the door.

“When Rainbow approached me about directing it, I thought, at least we’re going to be outside in the elements.”

Muir, whose first role on Rainbow Stage was in 2022’s Wizard of Oz as the Cowardly Lion, has typically played cuddly or buffoonish roles, including the bumbling chef Louie in The Little Mermaid.

“The kids are excited when the chef comes back,” says the Westwood Collegiate grad.

“I don’t think that’s going to happen with this one. Judas is a very polarized character: it’s often that everybody’s all together with Jesus, and Judas is up on the stairs, sulking and being upset about what’s happening. It was a weird thing: the first few times we ran the show, I would feel bummed after. It almost felt like I was left out of the fun, and that’s definitely not what happens when you’re playing a comedic character — you’re getting such love from everybody around you and in the audience. So that’s been a big difference: having to sit in the darkness of a character I’m not very used to.”

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t like it.

“Musically, I’ve never felt more connected to a show and to a character, because this is very ’70s rock,” says Muir, who fronts a local rock band called the Love Letters. “It makes me think of the Led Zeppelin record II, which came out (in 1969, the year before) the Jesus Christ Superstar concept album.”

But when it came time to find the production’s personal Jesus, Bajer’s search went national before landing on a vocalist to inherit the earth: Connor Meek.

“We cast him from a self-tape and we were just blown away — not only by his voice, but I was looking for a Jesus that could exude kindness because we are dropped into the centre of this story with Jesus already conflicted. So we never really get a chance to know him at the beginning. There’s a lot of time when he’s quite still at the start, but Connor just has this presence about him, and then he opens his mouth to sing,” she says.

Now based in his native Calgary, Meek attended Toronto’s Randolph College for the Performing Arts before starting his career about a decade ago: his first professional role of note was as a crooner in a touring show of nostalgia rock called Cruisin’ Classics: A Night at the Diner.

Since a pandemic hiatus halted his cruise-ship performance career, Meek has had gigs in theatres in Ontario, Newfoundland and Alberta, all the while auditioning from a distance for Rainbow Stage.

Playing Jesus “is a dream role for me,” says Meek, who took a lot of inspiration from Deep Purple’s Ian Gillan, who sang on the original concept album. So Meek sent in a tape and slowly watched the viewcount on the private link creep up.

The next thing he knew, Meek — who wasn’t raised religiously — was learning the lyrics and researching the book.

“In preparation for this, I read the New Testament, just to make sure I knew everything that was going to happen,” says Meek, who gave two thumbs up for the audiobook version. “It’s known as the greatest story ever written, and it’s a privilege to play one of the most iconic characters in literature.”

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