‘Duck Dynasty’-Backed Gen Z Jesus Musical ‘His Story’ To Debut in Texas

(RNS) — Sixteen-year-old Anna Miriam Brown didn’t know how to play piano in 2017, but she knew God was calling her to write a musical.

The homeschooled daughter of evangelical missionaries, Brown was sitting in a bus recovering from heat stroke on a mission trip in Kenya when a friend played her the hit “Hamilton” album. Brown thought musicals were cheesy but was stirred by the rap-infused songs about the ambitious Founding Father.

“I was praying and talking to God, and I felt like God spoke to me and told me that my way of sharing the faith I’d found wasn’t going to be through traveling or telling people the old-fashioned way,” Brown told Religion News Service. “It was going to be through music, and through the way this ‘Hamilton’ musical had impacted me.”

On May 5, “His Story” — a new musical about the life of Jesus with book, music and lyrics by Brown — will begin previews just north of Dallas in a “tent village” designed and built for the show’s open-ended run. Audiences of up to 1,300 will sit in plush, velvet seats surrounding the stage in the main tent, which is rigged with heating and air conditioning.

The show was made possible through an unexpected alliance of Broadway veterans and evangelical celebrities. Bruce Lazarus (who produced “Say Goodnight Gracie,” nominated for best play at the 2003 Tony Awards) and Jeff Calhoun (who was nominated for best director at the 2012 Tony Awards for “Newsies”) joined producers Willie and Korie Robertson of “Duck Dynasty” fame.

The entire process has felt “blessed,” according to Calhoun.

“Normally it takes, like, seven years to put a musical together; we put this together in, like, 14 months, and we raised 7.5 million dollars in a very short period of time,” Lazarus agreed.

Brown never envisioned her musical onstage. She wrote the album by improvising melodies and lyrics over chords her sister taught her to play on a children’s keyboard, aiming to reach other Gen Zers who are anxious about life’s meaning and purpose. In 2019, she and a team of hired professionals released a concept album for the show. Brown figured that would be the end of it.

But then the album landed on Lazarus’ desk.

At first, he was skeptical. “I thought, ‘oh, 17-year-old girl writes sweet little musical about Jesus, how nice.’” But, he said, by the time he reached the third song on the album, he was weeping.

Lazarus, who described himself as a “product of the 12 steps” whose life changed after he made “conscious contact with God,” met with Brown in New York City and secured the rights to do the show worldwide. Soon, he teamed up with Calhoun, who was also hooked on the album.

“Coming out of the pandemic, it gave me time to look at my career in the rearview mirror. I was going to an insecure or dark place,” said Calhoun, who was raised Lutheran but now considers the theater his church. “This show fulfills many voids. I felt confident I could turn it into a beautiful piece of art for the stage, but also it was healing for me, too, being around this material. It’s been healing for me, both professionally and personally.”