“Christmas With the Chosen: Holy Night”

This past Monday, our Communications office was invited to attend a VIP screening of “Christmas with the Chosen: Holy Night” before it was released in theatres this week. It will be playing in Winnipeg theatres throughout this week until Sunday, December 17th, and we encourage everyone to go see it if they can, as it is a truly beautiful way to enter deeper into the sacredness of this Advent season.

Monday’s special screening included the attendance of Dallas Jenkins, who is the writer, director, and producer of “The Chosen” series. He is filming his new project, “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever,” in the city and was therefore able to attend this special screening, along with his wife, Amanda Jenkins.

We were blessed to sit down with Dallas for a brief interview at the beginning of the evening and have a discussion on the inspiration, motivation, and intention that went into creating the hit series, “The Chosen.”

 

You’ve sat down with various faith leaders (Catholic, Jewish, Evangelical, etc.) to get a well-rounded context for The Chosen. Was this always the intention?

From the beginning I was focused on accurately capturing the Gospels and the character and intention of Jesus in the Gospels. The disagreements, the theological differences, and the denominational differences all seem to come after the time of the Gospels.

Through the spread of the show, walls are starting to come down on every end, and people of every denomination can focus on the most important thing: Jesus as the Son of God and our Saviour.

A neat part of this project is that I’ve gotten to know so many Catholic brothers and sisters that I would not have known otherwise. Even though I’m an Evangelical Protestant, and the show is probably going to come from that perspective, I wanted to know from Catholic leaders what the things are that might unnecessarily bother Catholics that I might not know about. Working with our Catholic consultants, such as Fr. David Guffey from Los Angeles, has been very helpful”

 

Your cast is quite a broad range of religions and beliefs: Catholic (ex. Jonathan Roumie, who plays the role of Jesus), Evangelical, Greek Orthodox, and even atheists are among the crew. Has this created any sort of issues on set?

There are no issues at all. We’re there to tell the story of Jesus. Some believe, some don’t. Everyone believes Jesus actually existed, and they are all excited about the story and show that they’re creating. It’s been a really interesting thing to talk and engage about while creating this together.

 

How do you navigate staying true to your source (the Bible) while adding your own perspective to this sacred story?

We make sure that anything that we do that’s not from scripture answers “Yes” to the questions “Is this plausible?”, “Could Jesus have said this?” “Does this fit within the character and intentions of Jesus and the Gospels?” If it does, and if our consultants all agree and agree on the scripts, then we are comfortable going forward saying, “This is a TV show, this is not the Bible or a replacement of it, but we are comfortable imagining what could have been; which even as an Evangelical is new for me, as that is quite a Catholic perspective! As St. Ignatius would say, “you should have a righteous imagination as you read Scripture.” I think we’re doing that.

 I’m not creating a story that makes Him more relatable, I am trying to expose the truth that makes him more relatable. I think we have gotten in the way of a Jesus who wants to know us on an intimate level and who is relatable. He did dance with His friends at weddings, He laughed, He joked, He brushed His teeth . . . we need to know that the God of the Universe walked among us. Knowing this can enhance our relationship with God.