Edinburgh Fringe 2025
JEEZUS!
Alpaqa
Genre: LGBTQ+, Musical Theatre, Queer Comedy
Venue: Belly Button at Underbelly, Cowgate
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
A hilariously queer and irreverent two-handed musical following the coming of age, in every sense, of an altar boy called Jesús, who is truly in love with Jesus, during repressive religious and political years in Peru.
Review
Jeezus! is already the worthy winner of an Edinburgh Untapped Award 2025. It labels itself as “A blasphemously bold and unrepentantly queer musical that collides Catholic guilt with Latin heat” which is indeed what it does with energy and in a style that for once warrants the description ‘as camp as Christmas’. It is written by Sergio Antonio Maggiolo who is also one of the two performers. He wanted to exorcise the trauma of growing up queer in conservative Catholic Latin America, and decided to do this through a camp musical comedy, and he has succeeded very impressively. He and his fellow performer, Guido Garcia, who is also the Musical Director, sing their way through a dozen or so songs, all with original lyrics, and mostly with original music too (except for the effective use of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana at a couple of heaven versus hell moments).
Neither Maggiolo nor Garcia have the strong, vibrant, resonant voices that we are so used to hearing soaring in West End musicals, but it does not matter at all, because the energy, commitment and comedy of the musical numbers and of their performances embody the passion of the show. A musical actor for hire in these roles would struggle to capture the fervour and glee with which they perform their own material, clearly and rightly proud of what they have created and what they are saying, and it is infectious. Authenticity triumphs over technique every time in theatre and these guys live and breathe the many blasphemous claims in the play, including (without giving away key plot points but trying capture the tongue-in-cheek innuendo) that, according to Catholic teachings, Jesus spent his life mostly in the company of men who adored him and were devoted to him, and that on most crucifixes he has such a hot body he clearly worked out. Their conclusion: that’s all pretty gay.
We don’t do spoilers in these reviews but their own publicity states that “Falling for Jesus is a mortal sin. But damn, it feels good!” This gives a pretty big sign post to who our hero, good Catholic South American altar boy Jesús (pronounced hayzuss) preparing for his Confirmation, is going to have as his heart’s desire. Having been aroused by images and depictions of Jesus, our Jesús’s Catholic guilt surfaces, leads him to confession, but he develops (rather too suddenly, but hey, it’s an hour long musical with a detailed storyline to get through) an unrepentant queerness that he struggles to keep quiet about.
The hour is punctuated by a Biblical/ecumenical name introducing each scene on the large screen, beginning with Genesis and leading up to Jesús’s Confirmation. This is what he has been working towards despite being side-tracked and indoctrinated by the church and the dictatorial Peruvian state, causing him continual confusion and dilemmas. This is what makes JEEZUS! so different from most camp, John Waters style musicals; here they are not afraid to cite the brutal results of right wing Governments or the damaging and contradictory doctrines of the Catholic faith that make no sense and hinder the lives and development of queer people. Yes, these points are made quickly and briefly, but it is a whistle-stop, rollercoaster camp musical, so there’s no time for long sermons or didactic monologues from characters, and it is all the better for that.
I am sure some devout Catholics would be outraged by this musical comedy, especially the last twenty minutes, when a particularly sacred character appears and is anything other than a straight white male, but this mischievously blasphemous, heart-pounding mix of live music, wicked comedy, sharp socio-political observation and Latin sass is a refreshingly original and camply profound hour that is perfect for the Edinburgh Fringe. Director and Co-Creator Laura Killeen has enabled the two performers not only to fill the stage but use every corner of it, with changes of pace and energy that many productions ignore.
Two aspects are worth noting. The genre is camp reality, for the first two thirds, and then suddenly becomes magical/supernatural. In other shows, this switch of genres would jar, but here we are in the territory of Family Guy, a cartoon-like adult romp that does not collapse when you suddenly throw in totally new elements or dramatic conventions that we weren’t expecting. Lastly, some may spot the glossed-over potential problem of the age of our main protagonist, Jesús. He’s a young teenager, and quite an innocent one earlier in the play, and as the story progresses his sexual awakening and the climax of the play involve him in very adult acts. If the many productions of Romeo and Juliet worldwide each year can be performed without problem, despite Juliet being just 14, I think this camp, romp through the homophobia of the Catholic church which does not advertise the specific age of our teenage hero, can be forgiven, without the need to attend confession.
