“Emotions in the auditorium became so intense that during the crucifixion scene, some young rowdies bolted out to the street where they assaulted Jewish-looking persons and attacked Jewish stores.”

The city is San Francisco; but the year is 1879, the occasion of the first American stage production of the Passion story. Like the Passion of our day, it caused considerable controversy, infuriating Christian clergy who considered a commercial production of the story to be sacrilege.

One evening, writes Edna Nahshon, “as soon as Jesus was removed from the cross, two police officers entered the theater and arrested eight people connected with the production, including [the actor playing Jesus], who was taken out in his halo and biblical costume.”

Nahshon, a scholar at the Jewish Theological Seminary and a historian of Yiddish theater, provides some peculiar — and valuable — perspective to the current hysteria.

The Revealer has one question: Why didn’t any journalists bring us this story? There is more than laziness to blame, we suspect. Rather, it’s a question of the frames with which reporters approach their stories. Religion writers tend to take a longer view of history, but only within the chronology of institutions such as the Church and world events, such as the reformation. That’s a straight line into official history, even as religion takes place on the backroads of the past as well as the present.

Read Edna Nahshon’s exploration…

And don’t forget to check out the New York University Center for Religion and Media conference, “Who Owns the Passion?” this Friday, at which The Revealer will be moderating a panel, “Debating the Passion,” featuring film critic Stuart Klawans, Tony Rossi of The Christophers, a Catholic media group, and Toby Miller of NYU’s Department of Cinema Studies.

Also speaking at the conference will be James Shapiro, author of Oberammergau: The Troubling Story of the World’s Most Famous Passion Play; Heather Hendershot, author of Shaking the World for Jesus: Media and Conservative Evangelical Culture; and two more terrific scholars who are also past Revealer contributors, Elizabeth A. Castelli (“Shockwave!”) and Adam Becker (“Imam Ali in Sadr City”).

Get your passions cooking for the conference with three original Revealer features on The Passion: Chris Lehmann‘s “Picturing The Passion“, Laurel Snyder‘s “Everyone’s Jew,”, and Peter Manseau‘s “Nailing the Passion.”

Oh, to hell with it — let’s just have some laffs. The New Yorker published an already legendary “behind-the-scenes” Passion document from Hollywood, as revealed by Steve Martin. This stuff is too explosive for The New Yorker‘s rather half-assed site, but some fearless muckraker has typed it up and put it into heavy email rotation. Here’s an excerpt:

Studio Script Notes on “The Passion”

Dear Mel:

We love, LOVE the script! The ending works great. You’ll be getting a call from us to start negotiations for the book rights.

Love the Jesus character. So likable. He can’t seem to catch a break! We identify with him because of it. One thing, I think we need to clearly state “the rules.” Why doesn’t he use his super powers to save himself? The creative people suggest that you could simply cut away to two spectators: Spectator one ‘Why doesn’t he use his super powers to save himself?’ Spectator two ‘He can only use his powers to help others, never himself.’

Does it matter which garden? Gethsemane is hard to say and Eden is a much more recognizable garden. Just thinking out loud.

Our creative people suggest a clock visual fading in and out in certain scenes like the last supper bit: Monday, 12:43pm.” or later, “Good Friday, 5:14pm.”

Love the repetition of “is it I?” Could be very funny. On the eighth inquiry, could Jesus just give a little look into camera? Breaks frame, but could be a riot. Also could he change water into wine in last supper scene? Would be a great moment, and it’s legit. History compression is a movie tradition and could really brighten up the scene.

Love the flaying.

Could the Rabbis be Hispanic? There’s lots of hot Latino actors now, could give us a little zing at the box office. Research says there’s some justification for it. Is there somewhere where Jesus could be using an IMac? You know, now that I hear myself say it, it sounds ridiculous. Strike that. But think about it. Maybe we start a shot in heaven with Jesus thoughtfully closing the top? (Reminder: heaven is timeless)….