History Theatre / Jerusalem

* TheMunchausen: Johnny Byron in spades.

* NeverAcceptedInHisHometown: Everyone in town loves Johnny--until they grow up and/or are suddenly expected to behave like respectable people, at which point they tend to turn him.

Johnny Byron, an eccentric ex-daredevil turned hard-drinking, trailer-dwelling hermit, lives in the midst of an idyllic pastoral forest on the outskirts of his small town. He attracts a royal court of misfits and outsiders, including some local teenagers whom he supplies drugs and alcohol. Johnny's drunken antics and drug-peddling make him a bur under the town's saddle and as the play begins a longtime campaign to evict and/or arrest him nears its endgame. At stake is more than just Johnny's wayward lifestyle; developers have an eye on turning his plot of forest into suburban sprawl, as they have most of the surrounding region. On St. George's Day, Johnny makes his last stand, and he and his followers have the chance to learn what they and each other are really made of.

* BoisterousBruiser -- Johnny Byron, again.

* CloudCuckooLander -- The Professor.

* DudeLooksLikeALady -- Ginger is mistaken for a woman by the senile old Professor due to his long hair.

* ExtremelyShortTimespan -- The play is three hours and as many acts long, but it only covers the events of a single day.

* FriendToAllChildren -- Johnny again, in his strange way.

* GoodIsNotNice: Johnny...perhaps.

* TheMunchausen -- Johnny Byron in spades.

* NoHoldsBarredBeatdown -- Near the end of Act Three.
* OnlyMostlyDead -- Early on, Ginger tells the teenagers a story about Johnny's daredevil days that starts like this: "He tried to jump twenty eighteen-wheelers, and he fucked it up, and died." Turns out, Johnny survived.

* TitledAfterTheSong -- In this case, the famous English hymn by Hubert Parry, the lyrics of which come from the poem "And did those feet in ancient time" by William Blake. The song is performed at the very top of the show, and later on, by Phaedra.

* MysticalPregnancy: Johnny claims that he was conceived when a bullet passed through his father's scrotum and struck his(virgin) mother's belly. Eight months and some odd days later he was born, with the bullet clenched between his teeth.

* FlowerInHerHair: Phaedra's costume includes a crown of flowers. The Professor wakes up from his acid trip completely bedecked in flowers in a manner very reminiscent of ''Theatre/KingLear''.

"Jerusalem" premiered at the Royal Court Theatre in London in 2009 to ecstatic reviews before moving to the Apollo Theatre in 2010, where it played until early 2012. For part of 2011 the production left the Apollo to play on Broadway with most of the original cast. In early 2014 a new production opened in San Francisco, the first and so far only American production and the first without Butterworth or Rylance on hand.

* FragileFlower: Phaedra, the runaway town beauty queen.

* ThePowerOfBlood: Johnny teaches Marky that his Byron blood, "Romany blood," is special, perhaps even magically powerful.
** In the final moments of the play, Johnny's blood becomes a potent component of the curse he puts on the land.

* FlowerInHerHair: Phaedra's costume includes a crown of flowers. The Professor wakes up from his acid trip completely bedecked in flowers in a manner very reminiscent of KingLear.

* IrishTraveller: Probably Johnny; he's called a "Pikey" and a "Gypo" pretty routinely. He does, however, claim to have Romany blood--whether this is true or just another part of the Byron mystique is hard to tell.

* RedOniBlueOnine: Lee, the restless dreamer who is leaving town to find himself, and Dave, the practical, unromantic working man who sees no reason to ever leave.

* SceneryPorn -- Just [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SetforJerusalem.jpg look]] at the set!

* {{Badass}} -- Johnny Byron. Mark Rylance himself, for being able to get up on-stage and perform this ridiculously demanding role eight times a week for over a year.

''Jerusalem'' is a critically acclaimed 2009 play by Jez Butterworth, frequently hailed as the most important new play of the 21st century and a seminal classic in the making. Of particular note is the almost universally lauded performance of longtime leading man Mark Rylance, whose profile soared on the strength of his turn as Johnny "Rooster" Byron (some critics went so far as to compare him to LaurenceOlivier)

* HeroesPreferMotorcycles: In days gone past, Johnny was a motorcycle-jumping daredevil and the town hero.

* ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything: There's a running gag that Ginger fancies himself a DJ but never actually DJs.

* WateringItDown: Johnny apparently cuts his meth with chalk. He notes that no one complains once they're high.

* StrawmanHasAPoint: The county workers are pale, callow caricatures, and Johnny is certainly right when he points out that his critics are by and large hypocrites--but that doesn't mean they're wrong about him.