After three decades of witnessing theater extravaganzas like "The Book of Mormon," which launched ASU Gammage’s new season this week, I can sometimes find my attention wandering from the spotlight.
In the case of Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s irreverent book musical, I was more interested in the adulation with which the show was received than I was in seeing baptism being sexualized or hearing the funny song about diarrhea. I was less engaged by the wonderfully frantic choreography than I was in finding out why it took Gammage three years to book a touring production of this monster hit. Or why neither ASU nor the city of Tempe have done anything about the fact that on most nights, their great big playhouse hosts thousands of visitors, a third of whom cannot find parking spaces anywhere nearby.
Which isn’t to say I didn’t enjoy "The Book of Mormon." Robert Lopez’s deeply vulgar songs about God and the Bible warmed the cockles of my atheist heart; its neatly refined performances by triple-threats like A.J. Holmes and Billy Harrigan Tighe and the Valley’s own Alexandra Ncube were fun to watch.
But Gammage’s heel-dragging about booking this Tony-winner, which opened on Broadway in 2011 and hit the touring circuit in 2013, meant that opening night felt more like a revival than it did a premiere.
From its opening notes, the score was matched note for note by a big hunk of Gammage’s overflow crowd; the effect was that of a mammoth karaoke sing-off between the performers and their audience. It became clear that most of the hundreds in attendance had been binge-listening to the show’s cast recording for a couple of years.
I like this show’s Hope-and-Crosby setup about a couple of Mormon missionaries in Africa, trying to convert especially obstreperous natives. It’s always fun to watch the creators of South Park trash the world around us, even while they do tend to rely rather too much on scatological humor and naughty words meant to shock us. And I like that, as with much of their cable TV work, this musical takes no prisoners.
Ultimately, "The Book of Mormon" isn’t really about religion at all. Parker and Stone could have written a musical about Fuller brush salesmen and made the same commentary on the human condition, our desire to fit in, our capacity for believing in impossible nonsense because it explains our existence or makes us feel good. I disagree with the many critics who have lauded this show for its warmth, its “heart.” Book of Mormon succeeds because its meanness is quick and smart, and because it spares no one.
I would not have traveled to Manhattan or Vegas to see "The Book of Mormon," but was happy to have watched its welcome in my own town. And my side-street parking citation was only a warning, so that part was good, too.
Robrt Pela’s reviews appear in the Phoenix New Times.