Pope Joan
Based on a tale that’s been floating around for the past thousand years, inspiring writers from Petrarch and Boccaccio to Caryl Churchill and Lawrence Durrell, Pope Joan tells of one John Anglicus, a British friar whose great learning and charisma have won him fame throughout the Holy Roman Empire. Arriving in Rome in the company of King Louis II–the great-grandson of Charlemagne who seeks his ancestor’s imperial title–John proves he’s not only a teacher but a miracle worker who can raise the dead; when Louis’ puppet pope, the librarian Anastasius, is assassinated, John is elevated to the papal throne. There he wins admiration from clerics and commoners alike–until he is exposed as a she after giving premature birth during a church procession.
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But Moore’s best songs are the choral numbers. Again, they’re derivative–the sardonic cardinals in act one are obviously suggested by the blase apostles in Jesus Christ Superstar, for instance–but at least their intended comic effect suits Moore’s heavy-handed rhymes. We know we’re supposed to laugh when a chorus of vendors in the Roman marketplace sings of selling “Byzantine bouzoukis / Chastity belts with two keys,” for example; but when Joan is described as “Ever dutiful / [and] oh, so beautiful,” or Louis invites his androgynous lover to “Taste what life offers / From earth’s fleshly coffers,” we’re not so sure.
