The producer who fired former SKID ROW frontman Sebastian Bach from the national tour of "Jesus Christ Superstar" has challenged Bach's account of the events that led to his dismissal from the show, saying that Bach missed an entire five-show weekend in Columbus after refusing to accept minor changes during curtain calls � a move Sebastian felt would "erase any sense of rock 'n' roll" from his
performance. 

In an e-mail sent to the Spouzic! sports and music web site on April 9, executive producer Tom McCoy said, "I won't go into great detail, but the straw that finally broke the camels back was an incident that occurred two Fridays ago in Columbus Ohio. I asked the director of 'JCS' to go out and adjust the curtain call in a very minor way, to portray Sebastian in a better light. Sebastian was warned weeks earlier in a letter from me that this would happen. During the rehearsal, he decided not to accept the director's changes, walked off stage, got into his car, and vanished, missing the entire five-show weekend in Columbus. We had been putting up with this kind of behavior from the first day of rehearsals. Columbus gave me the legal opportunity to finally get rid of Sebastian. After all his bluster about 'his fans', I found it interesting that he left his Columbus fans high and dry. This story is just the tip of the iceberg, but suffice to say that the entire 'Superstar' company is thrilled with the change, now that the white elephant in the middle of the living room has left the scene. Since Sebastian's name was only selling between 30 and 50 tickets per night in 3,000 seat theatres, it made the decision even easier."

Bach Denies this.

Bach quickly responded to McCoy�s claims in a post on his official website,  "Again, I would like to apologize to the fans who came to Columbus only to find me not in the show but there is no way I can deal with physically confrontational situations when I am trying my best to deliver a show of the caliber you have come to expect from me over the last 16 years or so. I NEVER missed a show or rehearsal in 6 months & you would think that 3 days off after 6 months would be a reasonable request. I had EVERY intention of being in Atlanta Tuesday night to resume & complete the remainder of the tour. I would like to thank all of you who came to the shows & made us the # 1 Broadway tour in the USA, according to Variety magazine, for many of the weeks when I was in the show. As for the hilarious allegation by the producer that my fans had nothing to do with the ticket sales of the show, well, for one, this producer was NOT on the road with us, he would come to a show maybe once a month & sometimes not even watch the show, & if you are the #1 tour in attendance in Variety magazine how do you know WHY the people bought a ticket????? Whether or not a ticket was bought because of my name or not, a #1 hit show is a rare thing & it is because of the FANS that it is #1 &  no one else! I am sorry that the producer of the show has absolutely no understanding of rock'n'roll whatsoever & completely ignores the fact that the role of Jesus was originated by Ian Gillan from DEEP PURPLE, a fact that I appreciated about the play before I stepped into it & payed [sic] respect to every performance I gave. Imagine trying to tell Ian Gillan, or any real rock'n'roller for that matter, to tone it down (for $70 a ticket!) & using physical confrontation to do so. This is showbiz, kids! It's supposed to be FUN! If you are wondering why this happened now, well the truth is that 'Jekyll & Hyde' & 'The Rocky Horror Show' ROCKED & so did 'JCS' for the last 5 months .... If the producers of either of the Broadway shows I have done treated my fans the way 'JCS' does I would have split from them too ! The fact is that both Broadway shows I have starred in treated the people who came to the shows with RESPECT & that is something I demand from the people I work with."

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