Review: SINGLE WIDE SAVIOR at the TAMPA FRINGE FESTIVAL

"I done got Saved!" --from SINGLE WIDE SAVIOR

"He's awesome! He's good lookin'! He's Jesus, Bro!" --from the SINGLE WIDE SAVIOR postcard

For three consecutive years, Dave and Brook McGinnis have been favorites at the Tampa Fringe Festival with their successful SINGLE WIDE SAVIOR, but this is the first time that I got to experience their special brand of humor in the setting of a rural revival. A mostly improvised affair, no show is exactly the same, so you can see this more than once and get a different kick out of it each time. They have one more performance (Sunday, May 14th at 8:45), and I can attest (witness) that this is one Fringe show that'll be good for the soul no matter where in the religious ocean you sail (or even if you don't sail at all).

As we entered the new Fringe Theatre space on 7th Avenue in Ybor City, we're greeted by "Christ's personal stage manager," the overenthusiastic Mae Mags (Brook McGinnis), who dons a JESUS LOVES YOU t-shirt. She brags about her dress crocs and tells us Jesus' Sermon on the Mount was actually "a three-day bender." She gets the audience to participate in a country gospel singalong as she introduces us to the true star of the show: Jesus as played by Dave McGinnis.

McGinnis' Jesus is not your pained Pieta replica nor your strong Prince of Peace found in some religious pamphlet. He's not a painted-faced clown (a la Godspell) nor is he singing Andrew Lloyd-Webber tunes from the Garden of Gethsemane in Jesus Christ Superstar. No, this Jesus is a shlumpy soul, an everyday Bubba in a tattered bathrobe, socks and a backwards baseball cap. "This is the Word of Me," he tells the audience. "Thanks be to Me!" And then he stands on one leg, arms stretched, and poses briefly, wobbly and perhaps drunkenly for what looks like a pantomime crucifixion.

Jesus talks about the band in the Hereafter featuring Freddie Mercury, David Bowie on backing vocals, Keith Moon on drums, and Prince on lead guitar. Talk about heavenly! And then he adds: "I now got Gordon Lightfoot too!"

Standing in front of "The Pool of Wisdom" (a tiny plastic little kiddie swimming pool filled with the likes of a plastic duck and a stuffed frog named Herbie), Jesus preaches "the wisdom of life, love, mechanics and DC and AC welding both have their place." He reads out questions randomly chosen from the audience, the winner of which (voted by the crowd) receives a "Koozie for the Lord," which turns out to be "a Coors cooler of awesomeness."

The questions, for which McGinnis can expound upon with his special brand of improvisational mastery, range from "How are you holding up?" to "How will A.I. impact religion?" "We are viewed as cosmic cash machines by the denizens of the universe," he says at one point. Sometimes his mostly extemporaneous preaching goes on too long, a roundabout ramble that often seems to go nowhere, but that's the point and part of the charm. (He offered a truly frightening take on A.I., that the danger will only happen when Artificial Intelligence realizes their existence and then decides, out of their own newfound free will, to say no to human demands.)

One question anonymously asked, "Why am I your favorite?" And after a long rant, including one about a black lab defecating, Jesus says: "I am the Lord; I don't play favorites."

There's nothing truly offensive here, though purists and Fundamentalists may get their finely coiffed hair ruffled and think that Jesus is being mocked here. But there's so much heart and soulfulness in the message that, no matter your religious leanings (or lack thereof), you will find something to embrace and love. If anything, it may mock down-home religion, Southern Barbecue style, in the same way that Waiting for Guffman mocks community theatre...yes, with some bite but mostly with love and understanding.

Our Southern Jesus ended the sermon with one of the sweetest messages of love I have seen on the stage, how to find your true path to happiness:

1. Go to the pound and get yourself a dog;
2. You take that puppy home and give that puppy the best life; what does that puppy think of you?
3. Think how that puppy lovingly thinks of you...AND EARN IT!

After watching SINGLE WIDE SAVIOR, and after that glorious message, I went home to my own dog, my beloved Boston Terrier, Ike. He sat on my lap and I petted him, still thinking of that last message that "Jesus" gave us at the end of the performance. It may all be an improvisational just-for-fun Fringe show, but that's a theatrical moment I strongly take with me...and probably will for years to come.

The last SINGLE WIDE SAVIOR performance at the 7th Annual Fringe is Sunday at 8:45 PM at the new Fringe Theatre in Ybor. Amen!