Ridiculous

Blond-haired, blue-eyed Jesus does seem inaccurate today, but at the time I first saw this in 1977, there was no "politically correct" version of Jesus that I'd ever seen portrayed before (up till then, there was a long tradition of showing Jesus looking European), so it seemed irrelevant at the time it was made. Watching it the other night, it did strike me as odd that as a child, he was exceptionally blonde, both as a baby and as a 12-year-old, with very very pale blue eyes that almost glowed. But Franco Zefirelli is obviously from Italy and cast a lot of Italians or people of Italian descent ("Bancroft" isn't Anne Bancroft's real surname) in the series, but he made that casting choice on purpose. With the lighting, the young Jesus almost seemed to glow with a halo around him.

By contrast, Robert Powell (the adult Jesus)'s eyes looked more green to me--but that could just be the aging of the film and the contrast with the 12-year-old actor whose eyes are a very unusually pale shade of blue. (I've seen Robert Powell in other things, and I think his eyes are blue.) At any rate, a lot of the disciples could have passed for Middle Eastern (although, looking at the cast names, they were probably Italian or Greek--and at least TWO actual Jewish people: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075520/fullcredits). Certainly the guy who played Joseph didn't look "Norwegian"! Plus, yeah, apparently the Holy Spirit contributed that Y chromosome, so who's to say what color Jesus's eyes were? (Unfortunately, the Bible's not big on descriptions like a modern novel would be, which is probably why so few people read the whole thing and we have so many TV/movie portrayals and, from before television, paintings to bring the people and settings to life.)

Blue eyes are apparently a mutation that occurred when humans started migrating north out of Africa to areas where there wasn't enough sunlight for them to absorb Vitamin D, but it was a useful mutation in northern Europe, so it thrived. Still, mutations occur whether they're useful or not, so, while it seems more likely Jesus would have looked "typically" Jewish (although as someone pointed out, his ancestor had red hair, which would indicate a missing allele for melanin), for the time this movie was made, it didn't seem ridiculous, and his eyes gave Jesus a special "radiant" look that would mark him as holy for the dramatic purposes of the film (that he probably wouldn't have had in reality or else everyone who saw him would have seen he was special and known he was the Messiah, and the whole story would have been different. And if there was anything unique about his appearance--apart from the Transfiguration, when three of the disciples saw Him glowing with miraculous radiant light--at least one of the Gospels would likely have mentioned that too since the red hair was pointed out.) Also, regardless of his coloring, Robert Powell gave the most definitive performance I've ever seen, so, while maybe they could've given him brown contacts or something (I don't think they even had colored contact lenses back in 1977; contact lenses were kind of a new thing for everyday use even then: http://www.contactlenses.org/timeline.htm), it's pretty hard to say he was miscast in the role!

Also, with this being a lavish production for its time, being shown over the course of several nights leading up to Easter, back in the days when there were only three national TV networks plus PBS, there seemed to be more emphasis on having an all-star cast and Biblical accuracy than historical accuracy (political correctness definitely wasn't a "thing" yet!), so a lot of the actors have blue eyes. (Why aren't you complaining about Mary's eyes being pale as well? And blond-haired/blue-eyed Michael York as John the Baptist?! He wouldn't have survived long in the wildnerness wearing just a few animal skins with his fair features! That was the most obvious case of miscasting to me. Then you've got Irish Cyril Cusack playing Yehuda, the rabbi from Jesus's childhood ... His red-blonde hair and blue/green eyes aren't noticeable under the cloth he wears over his head; his white beard kind of makes it less obvious.) Also, how many Jewish/Middle Eastern actors would actually have wanted to perform in the story of Jesus with a strong emphasis on His divinity? I'm guessing all or most of the actors would have come from a Christian background (possibly due to bias on the part of the director ... but I can think of plenty of blue-eyed Jewish people today, even some with blond hair, so even if they were willing to take the roles, it wouldn't have solved anything).