With the upcoming release of The Thorn movie, I spoke with John Bolin, the creator and producer of The Thorn, to find out more about it. We talk about his journey, creativity and The Thorn, either watch the interview below or you can read our interview which starts underneath the video.
The Thorn is one of the most incredible and powerful passion performances like you’ve never seen before, a visual arts masterpiece that is a must see. Read our full review
Tell us a bit about yourself and how you became a Christian.
I was born in Cape Town, South Africa. My parents, they were not Christians, they were hippies, they weren’t there as missionaries.
My, father was studying religion and philosophy at the University of Cape Town and my mother is a fine artist. So we have these old super eight movies of a white Volkswagen van and my mom is painting flowers on the outside of the Volkswagen and my father, is sitting with his guitar playing old Peter Paul and Mary and Bob Dylan songs, and myself and my siblings were running around in the field nearby.
We moved to the United States in the mid seventies, and my parents came to faith through, what was called at the time, the Catholic charismatic renewal. So I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska and came to faith at a fairly young age, but I think it was somewhere in my high school years that I really committed my life to Christ.
I spent time on missions when I was 16 in the Philippines and Indonesia. I think a combination of just seeing what God was doing around the world and the way that He spoke to me did something transformational. From that young age at 16, 17, I knew I wanted to do whatever I did to make an impact for for the gospel.
What inspired you to get into the arts?
So, my parents, like I said, they’re both pretty artsy. They actually met at the Goodman Theater in Chicago, so I grew up in an artistic family. I didn’t study the arts in college. I was a marketing major. I moved to Colorado Springs when I was in my mid twenties in 1996.
Went to go volunteer at my local church, and I was working as a volunteer youth pastor. I remember one Wednesday night I was sitting on the edge of the stage at a youth meeting and a 16 year old girl came up to me and she held out her arms and I could see where she’d been cutting up and down her arms.
I turned to her and I said, you don’t have to do that because I believe Jesus did that for you. And so I thought next Wednesday night, I wanted to do what I called at the time, an illustrated sermon using drama, music and, and some theatrics. I wanted to show the price that Jesus paid.
I wanted to communicate to young people, that no matter what pain you’re going through, no matter what you’re suffering, Jesus understands because He’s been here and He gets us. I also wanted to communicate, what I consider to be maybe the supernatural battle for the calling, the identity and the destiny of young people.
And so the next Wednesday night, we did the very first Thorn performance. I named it the Thorn as I was walking onto the platform, if I had known it would be around 25 years later, I might have named it something different, but actually the youth pastor before me had done an illustrated sermon called the Whip Hammer and Cross.
So I thought, well, what’s left? The crown of thorns. So anyway we did the first Thorn performance and it was, not good. The makeup wasn’t good, the costumes weren’t good. But it worked, and young people had a deep meaningful connection with the Lord during that service.
I think the reason that it worked is because God loves it when we tell his story. So the next Easter, the senior pastor of the church asked if we would do the Thorn as an Easter performance. I called my parents and said, how do I do this? How? Create a drama and so we improved things that next year we added a few more dynamics, a few more scenes, and that was the beginning of the Thorn.
In that first Thorn Easter performance we did, we had a line of cars that couldn’t get into the church parking lot. People were parking in the fields, crawling under the fence to get into the church. We had thousands of people that attended, and it became a thing every year. Then for the next 10 years, we had literally tens of thousands of people that would come to watch this passion play, drama called the Thorn. It became an annual event and then from there it became a touring production. Now here we are 25 years later. It’s an independent touring production that a million people have seen live certainly not by our incredible skills, but by the grace of God that the production has grown and improved and is what it is.
It started 25 years ago and it’s transformed, as you’ve said, a lot over those years. Now it’s packed full of visual effects and different forms of live art, and they all just combine fantastically. Bringing this passion play kind of with a difference. How do you find combining those different art forms together add to the story and the emotion.
You know, I love that there are so many different ways that people today are telling the story of Jesus, whether it’s by television or film or novel. The kind of the space that God’s given us is this live performing arts stage.
And now film, taking that performing arts to a film version for us, it’s always been about how do we grab the attention of young people? So it was designed for high school and college-aged students. So that’s still the avatar for me when I think of who do I wanna create this new scene or this new effect for it.
So a college-aged student would, would lean into the story. So it’s designed to be immersive, it’s designed to be entertaining, but that’s all window dressing for the core story, which is the gospel. In a very crystal clear way with the production. We just want to use every tool at our disposal to draw people into the story.
And we have, I can tell you our live performance has drawn lots of people that are, that are church certainly, but a lot of people that are outside the circle of faith that maybe have never stepped in the door of a church before that might see the Thorn or hear about the Thorn and then, they engage with the story, and so we love using all the creative art forms.
In fact, about 20 years ago, maybe 15 years ago, my wife and I went to Las Vegas for the first time. We saw Circuit De Sole at the Bellagio and it was their show called O, which, it’s like a, water type show, but it’s got beautiful music and costumes and makeup and the set design. I remember sitting in that show and thinking to myself, I’m so deeply moved, and this story isn’t necessarily redemptive.
So then I thought, what could we do if we use these same tools? Rhere was no speaking in that show. What if we used these same tools and applied it toward the story of God? So in the Thorn live performance, there’s only one speaking part. Really. That’s the narrator who tells the story and then he kind of weaves it together.
It’s a lot like the movie Princess Bride, where you have the grandfather and the little boy. So the movie, the Thorn movie is a lot like that. They tell the story and then we go into the scenes of the Thorn, which are the scenes from the live performance. It’s a unique combination of drama, live music, movement, arts, air acrobatics, martial arts, acting, all coming together to tell this story of God in a way that probably isn’t done anywhere quite like this anywhere else.
The production values are really high. How important is that for you to keep those really high production values in there too?
You know, I think it’s important across the board. I think the production value matters because the story matters.
And so we want to rise to the level of the importance of this story. So that matters to us. Everything from who we hired to do a score. To the performers we bring in this year’s live performance. I just actually this afternoon was at a rehearsal and we have some dancers that deeply love the Lord that that also graduated from the Joffrey School of Dance in New York.
And it’s brilliant to watch their work, to watch how they worship and glorify God through their craft. The same thing is true with our set designers and artists, our other performers, our vocalists. So I think the production value matters, but also in the lights and the stagecraft and the way that we do different effects.
I think it matters that we do it in a good way. I’m inspired by like what Mel Gibson did with the Passion of the Christ in high production value filmmaking. I’m inspired by what Dallas Jenkins is doing with the Chosen in saying, hey, we’re not going to do sort of the average I hate to say cheesy, but we don’t, we don’t wanna.
We wanna rise, we wanna lead the way. I think so often the church has just followed, if you look back a few hundred years during the Renaissance, the church was really leading the way in the arts from architecture, I think about being across the UK and walking through the beautiful cathedrals with my family a few years ago.
And you can see the imprint of the church on culture, from music to design, to sculpture, to art across the board. Somewhere in the past few hundred years, we sort of gave up that mantle and we said, we’ll just be satisfied to follow in the shadows. I think it’s time for us as the body of Christ, as young Christian filmmakers and designers and artists and dancers and playwrights, and fill in the blank to not just kind of follow or be satisfied with status quo, but rather to lead the way.
I agree it’s a way of honoring and worshiping God. Doing, you know, taking your skills to the next level. And you know as well, it’s sometimes with the small budget you have, how can God use that tiny budget to bring on something that’s even better than we can imagine?
So, that’s exactly right. I would say for the people that are watching or listening to this program right now, I know there are young artists that are aspiring filmmakers, aspiring actors, writers, fill in the blank and it’s easy to be discouraged, but it’s important to put in the time, put in the hours, become amazing at your craft, and, and tell the best story possible.
It doesn’t have to necessarily even be a “Christian story”. You can be a Christian filmmaker, storyteller, whatever. I think because we’re made in the image of God, we’re light bearers, we’re image bearers for him, and it’s gonna shine in what we do, whether that’s designing a sculpture or working in a restaurant or making a film.
We can allow our craft and our talent to be a reflection of the glory of God. So to me, that’s a big part of what being a believer, in culture is all about.
Were there some things that you’re able to do on film but perhaps didn’t work so well on stage? Has that helped you in making the film version?
I would say both on both sides of the equation that’s been true. The Thorn has been traveling as a live production for 25 years. In 2020, the production was shut down with Covid in 2021, it was totally dark, as was the West End in London, and in New York.
And sporting events had cardboard cutouts and concerts weren’t touring. So I remember looking across the living room to my wife Sarah, I thought we may never tour again with the Thorn. Then during the Christmas season of 2021, we saw what Dallas Jenkins did with the Chosen Christmas special.
And we thought to ourselves, I wonder if the Thorn could be a film, what if we captured it on camera and we could bring it not just to the people who would love to see it live, but to people around the world that have never heard of this production. That was the beginning of the seed of this idea of the Thorn on Film.
Fathom Events came alongside us as a distributor. We filmed the production in 2022, and that allowed us to do things we could never do live. So in the live experience, it’s very immersive. Performers walk by you in the aisles. An angel or demon might fly overhead. It’s a very immersive type experience.
Well, we knew we couldn’t do that in people’s living rooms, so we thought to ourselves, how can we capture this show in a way that’s different and unique for the at home or the movie theater viewer? And so we filmed for three or four days what we call a coverage or pickup shots without an audience there.
So we’re able to get a perspective on some scenes in the Thorn that you could never get live. So there’s one scene, we call it the battle scene, it’s the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus is praying and we imagine maybe the supernatural forces around him during that Passion Week and in the live experience, you watch it at a distance, but in the film version, you get to be on stage and in the action and part of the scene.
The same thing is true in the crucifixion scene. You watch that when you’re watching it live at a distance, but in the film version, you can be right there behind and around the cross, and so you get a perspective you wouldn’t get in the live experience. Also in the live experience, the narrator, breaks the fourth wall and he just speaks directly to the audience and it works beautifully in the live experience.
When I watched it for the film, it just didn’t translate quite the same. So we created a special sequence, a special story within the story about John the beloved, who’s our narrator, which by the way, the actor in the film is the narrator on the live stage tour, who will be touring across the US this spring.
And so we created a story of this 85 year old John the beloved, opposite a character, this 12 year old slave boy, and he’s telling the story of Jesus to the slave boy. We want the audience to put themselves in the eyes or mind of this boy so they can hear the story. That ended up being a beautiful little capture of a short story that you don’t get in the live experience.
So I think there are, and of course being in the live environment is, there’s nothing like it. So each one has their special dynamics. I hope people that have seen it live will go watch the film version and get a brand new, unique twist on the Thorn. I hope people that see it in theater say, Hey, I wanna find a way to see that live.
Is there a favorite part or scene of the show that that you like?
Oh boy. I’ve seen it so many times that, yeah, I think the opening sequence that we call the creation or the heaven scene, especially when I’m in the live environment, people have never seen anything like this.
When that scene opens and it goes through the creation and the fall and and it’s a very moving, impacting action packed scene. And of course then the other one would be the crucifixion and passion moments. Those are almost identical to what they were, what they’ve been for 25 years.
And so, the crucifixion, resurrection and creation scenes, those three in particular, I love those. I always have.
So what would you hope the audience come away with from watching the movie that might be different from watching it live?
That’s a great question. I hope that people that watch the movie, specifically, I think it would be the story of Asher. I want anybody that experiences the Thorn in any way, whether it’s the film or, or the live stage show to meet the person of Jesus in a way they haven’t before, to come face to face with Him, and then to leave the show and to go seek Him in their own way.
And the Bible says that if you seek after me, then I will find you. So I want people to look for Jesus and to meet Him. Specifically for the movie, I think I want them to maybe put themselves in the mind of Asher, who is this boy who doesn’t really see himself the way that God sees him, he sees himself the way that the, the narrative around him has shaped his worldview, has shaped how he sees himself, has put him in his own sort of prison.
And I hope people walk away saying, you know what, maybe that if I’ve lost some hope, I can regain hope. Maybe if I’ve been bound by some invisible force than God can set me free and I can be the person that He’s called me to be. So I hope people can find hope more than anything else, and maybe a sense of freedom they haven’t had before.
Finally how can we pray for you?
Well, thank you. I think for me this is by far the biggest thing we’ve ever done. I remember a few years ago we thought about that we should capture this on film. I thought we’ll make a movie. How hard can that be? So hats off to all of our filmmaking friends.
And you talk about a small budget. The film budget on this was considered a micro budget in US filmmaking standards. So you can do a lot with a little and you can fight hard to make even what you have beautiful. But making the film and pushing that uphill for the last couple of months, and then going right from that into our biggest live stage tour ever.
And this year we’ve made a major shift from churches to all public performing art centers. That’s a big shift for us. So just pray for energy, pray for faith over fear. Pray for health for our casting crew as they go on the road and then pray that God would use this film in ways that we don’t even expect that He would, in so many ways, make it better than it is.
And so as people engage with it, as people watch it, they are confronted with Jesus and the sacrifice of Jesus and they would consider what it means to follow Him.
The Thorn will be released in US theatres on March 6th and 7th for tickets visit: https://tickets.thethorn.com