Sight & Sound’s stage epic JESUS begins streaming Thursday, July 30, as the opening title in the theater company’s new deal with Wonder Project, the faith-based subscription service available through Prime Video.
“There’s something special about getting to partner with like-minded organizations using their platforms to spread messages of hope to a hope-hungry world,” said Katie Miller, Sight & Sound’s vice president of brand development. “We’re grateful for this new partnership and cannot wait to begin bringing these powerful stories to life for Wonder audiences and their families across the country!”
JESUS isn’t new to Sight & Sound’s stage, but this is its widest streaming release yet. Back in 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic shut down Sight & Sound’s theaters in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and Branson, Missouri, the company streamed a filmed version of JESUS over Easter weekend and drew nearly 3 million viewers, a surprise hit that pushed Sight & Sound to launch its own streaming service later that year.
Now Wonder Project is betting the production can pull an even bigger crowd. A new Sight & Sound title will roll out on the platform roughly every two weeks through the fall, including RUTH, MOSES, NOAH — 30TH ANNIVERSARY, QUEEN ESTHER, DAVID, SAMSON, DANIEL and MIRACLE OF CHRISTMAS, alongside a documentary on the company’s origins called THE STORY OF SIGHT & SOUND.
Access doesn’t come bundled with a regular Prime membership. Wonder Project runs $8.99 a month or $89.99 a year, the same price as Sight & Sound’s own streaming service, Sight & Sound TV, though the Wonder deal puts the catalog in front of a much bigger built-in audience.
Related: Wonder Project Partners with Sight & Sound for Major Streaming Slate
“Few organizations have earned the level of trust and lasting connection with audiences that Sight & Sound has built over generations,” said Ani Haftvani, Wonder Project’s senior vice president of programming and content acquisitions. “Their productions have become part of family traditions and a milestone experience for kids growing up across the country. We’re honored to celebrate that legacy with a season of exclusive SVOD premieres, giving Wonder audiences new opportunities to experience these stories together throughout the fall.”
Anyone who hasn’t seen JESUS live has missed quite a spectacle, and the trailer for the streaming release gives a taste of why. The 2,000-seat Lancaster theater built the production around a 12-ton, nearly 300-foot wraparound LED screen, dressed a 45-member cast in 882 costumes, and floated a boat carrying 13 actors nearly 12 feet above the stage floor. It’s the kind of scale that earned Sight & Sound its nickname among fans: “Christian Broadway.”
Movieguide® has followed Sight & Sound’s growth for years, from its stage anniversaries to its 2022 leap into movies with I HEARD THE BELLS. Its most recent movie, A GREAT AWAKENING, a Revolutionary-era drama about preacher George Whitefield and Benjamin Franklin, already streams on Wonder Project and has performed well there ahead of this larger rollout.
Wonder Project itself launched in 2023 under director Jon Erwin and former Netflix executive Kelly Merryman Hoogstraten, and its biggest swing so far, HOUSE OF DAVID, became Prime Video’s No. 1 show and drew more than 44 million viewers before earning a third-season renewal. Folding Sight & Sound’s catalog into that platform gives Wonder subscribers a deeper well of proven, multigenerational storytelling, and gives Sight & Sound a shot at reaching households who’ve never made the drive to Lancaster or Branson.
“We are hoping that there’s a new audience through Wonder that will get to experience the good news of the gospel,” said Toni Montgomery, Sight & Sound’s director of marketing and communications, in comments to Anabaptist World.
That’s really the whole pitch. For a company that’s spent nearly 50 years telling Bible stories to people willing to drive to Pennsylvania or Missouri, streaming means the story now comes to the living room instead.
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