For those of you who were too busy smoking to read The Bible, Lazarus was a bearded taxman who choked on a pound coin and dropped dead in the kitchen, only to be brought back to life moments later by a passing hippy called Jesus Christ Superstar.

It’s one of the best stories in there. Only narrowly trumped by the one about Charlton Heston making the Statue of Liberty disappear.

Anyway, in honour of the legend of Lazarus, we thought it high time to doff a cap at a small handful of famous people who have equally died, only to be brought back to life. Metaphorically speaking.

1. Barry from EastEnders

Poor Barry was something of a twerp in EastEnders, everyone thought so. Even that cow Janine who made out she loved him, but eventually killed him by lobbing him off a cliff on holiday. His name was synonymous with being a total failure. Then along came Extras, and suddenly the tables were turned, as he played on his reputation as a loser and won everyone’s affections. It was a bit like the final rap in 8 Mile when Eminem cleverly uses all his weaknesses as a strength. A very little bit.

2. Michael Jackson

Now that he’s bringing the music back, it’s easy to forget that it wasn’t so long ago that Michael Jackson was sitting in a courtroom with his strange broken clown face, explaining to people that he didn’t mean anything by it when he climbed into bed with children. He was just being chummy. Plus, of course, there was the time that he proved his worth as a great father by jokingly dangling his precious baby off a balcony for kicks. Still, try telling that to the frenzied crowds crushing themselves to watch him snatch his balls and kick out a leg to Billie Jean. They won’t listen. They’ve forgotten already.

3. Raef Bjayou

As he snorted something about his ability to hold a conversation with both “prince and pauper”, we were readying ourselves for a swell of hatred directed at Raef on The Apprentice. And yet, by the second week, he’d somehow managed to turn the whole thing around by wearing impressive ties and laughing aggressively down the phone, all the while morphing into our favourite toff since Diana, the princess of hearts. A fine chap indeed.

4. Mickey Rourke

If legend is to believed, at one stage Mickey Rourke was a lonely washed up actor, living on a roadside, making money for scraps by taking part in bare-knuckle boxing fights held in old factory warehouses. The man was an outcast, done for. His face totally buggered by a shit plastic surgeon.  Totally dead in the water. And then he starred in The Wrestler as a big fat warrior with a face like a million year old log, and suddenly everyone wants to work with him again.

5. Jade Goody

Are we allowed to talk about Jade Goody yet ? No? Okay, we’ll leave it.

This was a guest blog by Josh Burt from Interestment, who we’d marry in a jiffy if we had the appropriate parts.

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