Cold at The Passion

An estimated 20,000 people attended the performance of The Passion in an icy The Hague on Thursday evening. At the Hofvijver, well-known artists, led by René van Kooten, performed the story of the last hours of the life of Jesus. The annual music spectacle was shown for the third time. The cast included Daniel Boissevain, Anita Meyer and Jim Bakkum. Jörgen Raymann was the narrator. 2.3 million people saw the live broadcast from The Hague yesterday. Last year, the performance of the Passion attracted 1.7 million viewers on television. The first edition of The Passion attracted only a meager 979,000 people. The EO and RKK broadcasted this years' event live and were happy with the new record number of viewers. According to a spokesperson of the EO, the show at the Hofvijver in the Hague and all the preparations for it ran smoothly. ''We are very pleased with this Passion as it has become a nice program,'' she said. Not everybody is a fan of this show. In an interview with Volkskrant, presenter Cornald Maas says, “It's not my thing. It has, just like a carnival, a function of collectivity. The coherence of religion has disappeared and now we are looking for anything else which can bind us. We think that this type of mass ritual has something mystical. It is not very different from a concert of the Toppers, where I have once been.”