Max Lambert and Nick Enright’s pre-The Boy From Oz musical Miracle City has enjoyed an almost mythological status on the Australian theatre scene. Premiered by Sydney Theatre Company in 1996, the show – which is set during the live-broadcast of a TV show by a Tennessee-based televangelist family – languished on the shelf until The Hayes Theatre’s 2014 production revived its fortunes. The musical now returns for a run at the Sydney Opera House, in a new production directed by Darren Yap (who also helmed the Hayes production).

^{Miracle City. Photograph © Branco Gaica}

Gus Murray plays ex-con turned televangelist preacher Ricky Truswell, whose dream is to build the titular Miracle City, a Christian theme park – “first you pray and then you play” – and the action takes place during a pledge drive on their television show Ministry of Miracles. In the Opera House’s Studio, the audience is the live TV audience (signs for Applause and On Air hang above the stage) and the actors mill around, preparing for the broadcast, as people take their seats.

Ricky Truswell’s wife Lora Lee (Kellie Rode) and children Loretta (Jessica Vickers) and Ricky-Bob (Finn...