Superstar, episode one, ITV1, review Superstar, ITV's search to cast the part of Jesus for a new production of the musical Jesus Christ Superstar via the talent show format, is in need of some divine inspiration judging by Saturday's opening episode. There's a lot of anticipation riding on this programme: Andrew Lloyd Webber has absconded to commercial television to make it, after four hit series on BBC One, where he cast the leads of four West End Shows via this method (The Sound of Music, Joseph, Oliver and The Wizard of Oz). The brilliant Tim Minchin is already cast as Judas Iscariot in the show itself. And Jesus Christ Superstar, is, after all, the original rock opera: perhaps Lloyd Webber and his lyricist Tim Rice's finest hour, and certainly their most controversial one, after its zany take on the crucifixion story offended some Christians. The production coming at the end of this TV series will be well worth the seeing. But Saturday's opener failed to explain why we should care about this musical written (in 1971) 25 years before most of its likely viewers were born. And its leaden format of audition after audition from somewhat hirsute men in their late twenties doing Jon Bon Jovi impressions became dull very quickly. Why do people so rarely sing songs from musicals when they're auditioning to be in one? Interestingly, two of the best efforts we saw performed tunes from Les Misérables. Judges Jason Donovan and the Spice Girls" Mel C did their best to roll their eyes and add jeopardy to proceedings by doing mean things like picking only three of a band of four to go through. But since the public don't have a clue who he is the camera was too wary to linger long on David Grindrod, who, as a casting director for musicals, was rather better qualified to make decisions. What we needed most of course was more Andrew Lloyd Webber, who knows his stuff like none of the others and is utterly endearing in his passion for the process even when he's making slightly strange faces at the camera. He chose to watch/listen to the auditions from a separate balcony for somewhat obscure reasons that bereft us too long of his company. The preview of Sunday's "boot camp" phase (hey, if a format aint broke don't fix it) looked already better than tonight's first outing. We caught glimpses of the potential messiahs dancing and hugging. Here's hoping there's a saviour among them.