As cheesy and awkward as the majority of NBC's live musicals are, there is one good thing about every one of them: they bring theater to an audience that normally either wouldn't think to see or wouldn't get to see a large-scale production. This past week's Jesus Christ Superstar: Live in Concert was no exception. In fact, it was probably the best production NBC has put on, in terms of its ability to connect a larger audience to live theater.

There is a key disparity here, though. While NBC put on a production of Jesus Christ Superstar that successfully introduced a flashy, exciting piece of theater into people's homes from an actual stage, was it actually a good production of Jesus Christ Superstar? Let's look at the pros and cons of NBC's JCS: Live.

The Best

1. The originality of the production

Nearly every NBC live musical has been heavily based on the movie that musical was made into. Because of that, they can easily be written off by casual audiences as simple imitations and don't impress upon the audience what theater can do. Though some of the singing styles and riffs in JCS: Live are clearly inspired by the 1973 Jesus Christ Superstar film, nothing else from this production comes from it. It is a stand-alone production and really shows off what can be done on stage that can't be done in a film, thus actually introducing its audience to theater like NBC's musicals should be.

2. Brandon Victor Dixon as Judas

The decision to use actual Broadway actors in this performance, not only as side characters like Norm Lewis as Caiaphas (who was so beautiful), but as the lead was one of this production's best choices. Where the casting of John Legend helped add to the "superstar" status of Jesus, the emotion and acting chops Brandon Victor Dixon brought to Judas were at the core of this production's success. His "I Don't Know How To Love Him" reprise is one of the best, if not the best, I've seen.

2. The set

The moment I saw that this production was being to be housed beneath the collapsed remains of a chapel fresco, I sat forward in my seat. Two hours later, seeing Jesus enter that fresco upon his crucifixion and symbolically become a part of such a large history was the perfect end to this show. It's simple and beautiful.

3. The choreography

I wish the cameraman had been a little stiller and fonder of wide shots because the dancing in this show was so much fun. There are a couple songs you expect to be fully choreographed in this show, but every song, from "What's The Buzz?" to "Superstar," comes out with some really stellar ensemble dance numbers.

4. The costume design

Norm Lewis' braids and weird geometric coat. Judas' "Superstar" outfit. Pontius Pilate. I need all of these wardrobes ASAP.

5. The ensemble numbers

This production had a huge stage, and the moments where the stage is filled are some of the show's best. A stand out in my mind is the 39 Lashes sequence, when each ensemble member becomes one of the lashes. The bigger the ensemble in this show, the better, and this production came through with the ensemble numbers.

6. The small moments

One of the good things about filming a theater production like this is that you can catch moments that you can't see watching from the mezzanine or from the wrong side of the theater. Thankfully, the cameramen for this production focused in on a couple of those moments. Mary putting her apostle's scarf around Judas before the Last Supper, Jesus smiling in the face of the men who will kill him within the week, or Judas, Simon, and Peter warning Jesus of what's happening in the temple at the edge of the stage are all easy to miss from the orchestra, but the camera lingers on them to make sure we get an effect that theater cannot always pull of successfully.

7. John Legend's soft and soulful Jesus

One of the best moments in this performance was at the very beginning, when "Heaven on Their Minds" is overtaken by the shouts of the audience as John Legend greets them. It was spontaneous and symbolic and illustrated Judas' warning that fame would corrupt Jesus' message perfectly, and that is all due to John Legend's presence in this show.

I have some qualms about his ability to hit the high notes and with some of his acting, but there's just a general aesthetic and feeling that his Jesus has that felt right. He was gentle, humble, anxious, and sad. I think it's something about John Legend's face.

So, yes, as an introduction to theater or as a way of bringing theater to the rest of the world, it's great. It has all of the spectacle and design that make Jesus Christ Superstar fun to watch, and the show itself is a unique and well-written exploration of Holy Week that should be enticing to everyone.

There are a few moments where things start to fall apart, though.

The Worst

1. The lack of a parallel between Jesus and Judas

Obviously, since I've already talked about each of them, I don't mean to criticize the characterization of these two. I think Brandon and John both had some great interpretations of their characters. What I mean is that the direction of the production doesn't pay close enough attention to what's going on inside either of these men, making their relationship to each other and to the rest of the cast impersonal and distant.

When Judas establishes himself as the Point of View character in "Heaven on Their Minds" and then steps into the background for the rest of the first act, you cannot let him just disappear. He is our window into the story now, so you need to have an idea of where he is, what he's doing, how he's feeling. He has to be at the forefront of our minds, even as he takes a backseat to the action. In this production, though, if Judas isn't singing, he is as far from the action as possible, sometimes not even on stage. How are we supposed to follow his emotional journey if we forget about him up until he decides to betray Jesus? Is it too much to ask that the camera cut to Judas from time to time?

And I don't mean to attack John Legend's acting skills, but it really did feel like he was just singing the songs rather than feeling the conflict behind them, especially in "Gethsemane." "Superstar," too, which is meant to be Judas questioning Jesus from the grave now that he sees Jesus' future legacy (or meant to be Jesus' fears manifested as he's being tortured and crucified as a vision of Judas, whichever interpretation you're feeling) was simply performed for the audience. Jesus wasn't even on stage until the very end, and even then the number didn't address him. I guess that's the "in Concert" part of the title, though.

Between John's non-acting and the production's failure to really dig into Jesus' mental state in these final days, it's difficult to sense where he is and where he's coming from. Jesus and Judas' downfalls, in the end, should feel like foils, like the twin centers of this story, but I felt neither of them. This production was really just telling the story we all know without a care for exactly why the story is being told in this specific way, and that took away from what really makes Jesus Christ Superstar special.

2. The staging and blocking

This production had a HUGE stage, but very rarely used it to its full potential. "Herod's Song" is the clearest example of this, where Alice Cooper stands in one spot for an entire song while the smallest group of dancers taunt Jesus. It's there in "The Last Supper," too, when Jesus and Judas are shouting back and forth but rarely move. It's hard to work up energy when your actors are all standing in the same spot.

The scaffolding on the set had multiple levels that they were clearly willing to use since Judas spends half his time hiding up in them, but everything happens on one tiny piece of the set. Why not keep the action moving, especially when the commercials force you to stop that action every ten minutes?

3. Pontius Pilate

I loved this version of "Pilate's Dream," but all of the worry and curiosity present in that song is completely absent as soon as Pilate meets Jesus. He's basically just a Herod 2.0, taunting Jesus until halfway through his third song when he suddenly decides to defend Jesus. If we can't feel his wonder before that moment, Pilate's decision to send Jesus to his death doesn't carry any of the weight it should.

4. The lack of a political purpose

Jesus Christ Superstar, as a piece of writing, is political. It's about a government recognizing the voice and power of the scrappy, younger generation and doing its very best to snuff it out, inadvertently amplifying their protesters' message through the death and tragedy used to silence them. It was created in response to the political climate of 1970 and translates all too easily to 2018.

If you don't think about the politics of this show while you're producing it, it shows. A disparity between the lyrics and the atmosphere is created, and that disparity is blatantly present in JCS: Live.

I think it's most obvious in the non-existent, non-specific time period of this production.

A lot of productions of this show stick with the original style: an amalgam of the aesthetics of 1970 and 33 AD, so that the events of 33 AD could reflect on the current state of the nation in 1970. Though the costume design for the apostles in this new production suggests 2018, the guards and high priests dress like something out of a Hunger Games-esque dystopia. Simon sings about gaining power and taking down the government, but it's impossible to see our modern government in the priests he's singing about. They are the priests of another reality, making it far too easy to remove our lives and our present from what we're watching and too easy to become a passive viewer.

The only sign there is that this could be a part of our world is that the set features a small radiation warning decal in the background. Apparently, these costumes come from a post-nuclear war America. Though this might be a background jab at the current fears of America, nothing else about the dystopian aesthetic suggests anything from our world, making it difficult to apply current events to it.

Though there are plenty of things the 2012 Arena Tour's modern adaptation of the show got wrong, this was something it understood deeply and that this production could take few notes from.

5. The audience

These last two points have less to do with this production of JCS and more to do with the practical aspects of making a live, star-studded TV production of a musical. I don't mean to sound uppity (though I know I will) when I say this was not an audience that understood theater etiquette. They constantly shouted and cheered every time someone hit a note, no matter what was happening on stage. It felt like they weren't actually following the story, but were simply listening to the music. This was most obvious when Judas was acting his heart out before committing suicide and the audience clapped over his next line just because he hit a pretty note. This audience was clearly there as fans of the actors, as ticket-holders to a concert rather than to a theater production, which is unfortunate.

6. The commercials

Like I said, the action stopped every two songs in this performance for a commercial break. For a show that is meant to feel like an inevitable and accelerating decent, interrupting the show with the cheery voice of a man trying to sell me a car for the tenth time really broke the rhythm. Between that and the staging, it was hard to make this production move.

As a production of Jesus Christ Superstar, this one does not perform it to its full potential. Obviously, this means nothing to anyone who does not know the show, which is the exact audience NBC is targeting, so does that matter? Not necessarily. It's a flashy twist on a well-worn story that will, hopefully, bring more people to the theater to see real productions.

Combine that with the fact that the Olivier Award-winning UK production of Jesus Christ Superstar is going on tour in America next year, and I'm actually positive more people will be seeing theater that would have before NBC aired it. So, no matter the flaws, this show was a success.