the thorn 2010 and volunteering backstage!

These past couple of months have been CR-AZY! Mainly because we are apart of this production at our church, Seacoast Church off of Long Point Rd, that will change peoples lives forever. It is called The Thorn and the opening show is tomorrow night! The thorn is a dramatical portrayal of Jesus' life of his birth through the time he was crucified on the cross.

I just can't wait! My amazing husband, Mike, is in the show this year playing the younger John, a disciple. It's pretty cool because the entire perspective is told through the disciple John, when he is much much older. There are no words to describe the show, but if you haven't gotten tickets yet, you definitely need to! There are 12 shows available to come and see, so there is no excuse that you shouldn't come and see it! You can purchase your tickets here. :) Throughout the show there are dancers, gymnasts flying through the air on hoops, awesome pyrotechnics, and martial artists who have amazing talents that you will be able to see in the show!

I have a few pictures of one of the rehearsals a couple of weeks ago when they were just testing out their costumes, they even look much better now! Mike is on the bottom row with Jesus' arm around him. During this scene they hold this pose for a very long time... I don't know how they do it, I would probably laugh out loud, but they hold it and do such a great job!

I have seen the show probably about 15 times, and I get chills every time during certain parts, and sometimes I even want to cry because of how powerful it is!
My area of volunteering for the thorn is doing Jesus' makeup! We call ourselves the J team. hehe. If you have followed my blog for a while, you might have remembered last year was the first year that the thorn was at seacoast and I did makeup for all the "supernaturals" dancers.... so this year it's a little different. You can read my post about last year's thorn here!

This is Robert(in the picture below), one of Mike's best friends who plays one of the Jesus(es). {We call them our Jesi because there are two of them!}

The whole process for doing Jesus' makeup is a very long process that takes about 2-3 hours before showtime because of the scars that we put on him for the whipping and crucifixion scene.

I'll try to explain it a little bit:

1. There are the scars we put on him (They are latex, the color of his skin)

2. then we connect all the scars with stage makeup, put bruises all over his body, and make all of his flesh look really inflamed.

3. then we put a "dried blood" on the scars, his skin, and his legs.

4. next, we put a "drippy" blood on him that is melted in a crockpot to become warm, then it hardens on him.

5. Then we have to powder him down and spray him with a final seal and he has to stand in front of a fan to dry for about 10-15 minutes.

He is ready for the show, puts on his normal robe(the white one that he is wearing in the picture) and has the scars and dried blood on him under his robes all during the show up until it's time to do the cricifixion scene.

It's really fun to be backstage helping with the makeup and Jesus' costumes. There is 2 times that Jesus needs to change costumes before the whipping scene and we have to get it done in less than a minute, so it can get a little crazy trying to have all the costumes ready!

Right before the whipping scene he stands in the shower backstage (don't worry he is not naked! He has on his loincloth that he gets whipped in) and we quirt him with this "squirty" blood (There are a lot of different bloods we had to learn, I always get confused!) to totally cover his body to give the real effect of what Jesus really looked like! I know that when Jesus was crucified he was almost not even recognized as a human, if you can only imagine, so when he does get whipped in the show, we try to make it look as real as possible!

There are so many testimonies of people that came last year to the thorn that their life was changed, and even the people who are playing roles in the thorn (there are about 120 cast members) whose lives have been changed just up to this point! We have had rehearsals, auditions, and full run-throughs that have been amazing, and everyone is working so hard!

If you would like more information on the thorn, you can email me and/or go to the thorn website

www.thethorn.net