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- guardian.co.uk, Thursday August 10 2000 01.05 BST
Was Jesus the Messiah? Or was he a charismatic cult leader and canny politician who realised that the prophecies of the Old Testament would never be fulfilled and therefore offered himself up as a sacrifice, the architect of his own martyrdom? Somebody certainly died on the cross. But was that somebody the Son of God and did he really rise from the dead three days later? Or did he just have exceptionally good PR and the far-sightedness to brief his disciples before his death to spread the news of his resurrection on the grounds that "witnesses will die, but legends last for ever"? If you try hard enough, you can make people believe anything, however illusory.
If this makes Messiah, Steven Berkoff's new play at the Assembly Rooms, sound cynical, it is not. It is beautiful and it is blasphemous, often both at the same time: there is a wonderfully erotic account of Mary's impregnation that throws the Immaculate Conception and the idea of the Virgin Mary into severe doubt. Far from being cynical, this is a transparently sincere and often sharply funny examination of what we believe and why we believe it. It encompasses both the art of spin doctoring and also our fragile human need and ability to make huge leaps of faith. This is Berkoff back on seriously good form.
The duality of the piece is illustrated no better than in the presentation of Doubting Thomas - the disbeliever - as just another PR put-up job and a ruse to increase the potency of the myth of Jesus, rather than diminish it. Yet even as it points this up, this show calls upon the audience to suspend our disbelief so that we become totally convinced that the people that we see before us are not a bunch of actors but Jesus, his disciples, Satan or Pontius Pilate.
Throughout, Berkoff - who writes and directs but has wisely resisted the impulse to cast himself either as God or the devil - plays with the idea of religion as theatre and theatre as religion. This is a production as rich in word, sound and imagery as a High Church mass. It has a strongly ritualised quality.
The actors are often frozen in shadow or shafts of light as if caught on the canvas of a medieval painting. The mob's cry of "crucify him" could have been choreographed by Bob Fosse. The disciples rush around spreading the word like east end Jews selling encyclopedias door to door. The vigour and energy of the production are exquisitely weighted, as are the imaginary 30 pieces of silver that fall into Judas's hand like the drop of a body from a noose. Berkoff is the great showman and he knows the importance of gesture as well as Pontius Pilate, who remarks: "I wash my hands. People love gestures - that's why they go to the theatre."
The performance would be even more effective if it was 20 minutes shorter, but the writing has real depth and pungency, and the ensemble is never less than superb in its portrayal of raggle-taggle humanity, whether it is the agony of Mary, the bruised tenderness of the Magdalene or just the terrible indifference of the crowd. History has many perspectives here, and everyone has their own story to tell.
"I am alive," cries Jesus at the instant of his death. At that moment Berkoff makes you believe it. Now that's a real theatrical conjuring trick. For his next? It couldn't be less than water into wine.
• Till August 28. Box office: 0131-226 2428.
