After Seven Years of Waiting, I Finally Saw The Book of Mormon

This last Saturday I saw The Book of Mormon in San Francisco at the SHN Orpheum Theatre. I have been waiting for this day to come since the musical first began running in 2011. I watched the 2012 Tony’s, so excited to see the South Park duo, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and Avenue Q’s creator Robert Lopez take home 9 Tony Awards. Now, in February of 2018, I was finally seeing the musical I’d been salivation over for seven years.

My husband and I are both South Park fans as well as lovers of musical theater. We’ve had the pleasure of spending countless hours in front of the boob tube with South Park as well as seeing such gems as Spamalot, In the Heights, Avenue Q, and Wicked. As soon as it was possible, we ran out and purchased the original Broadway soundtrack for The Book of Mormon and quickly memorized every song. Yet having just the soundtrack of a musical only tells a third of the story. We were missing rest of the script and the visuals that give context to the songs, and we knew it.

A gift to remember

In the great Christmas gift ruse of 2017, my beautiful in-laws delivered and delivered hard. In a garment box filled with travel toiletries, we found a golden egg. My mother-in-law had taped two tickets for The Book of Mormon to the garment box’s lid. Matt and I practically danced around like kids on a snow day. The rub was that we would have to wait two more months to see it. But what’s two months after seven years? We stuck the tickets to the fridge with a hippo ass magnet and waited.

The Happy Day

We arrived thirty minutes early to the Orpheum, one of those lovely old theatres nestled in the Tender Loin of SF. We hit the toilets, grabbed some water, and found our seats, snapped a couple pictures of the stage and quickly shut off our phones as the lights flickered and the show began.

Sometimes life can be better than our dreams

I’m a cynic at heart. This means that I try to stay level-headed and not allow myself to get carried away. What I mean to say is, I hate to be disappointed. With the idea of avoiding this unwanted emotion, I try to keep from getting too excited or expecting too much. Yet somewhere in the back of my mind, I hoped Mormon would knock my socks asunder. I was not prepared for what reality was about to deliver.

Being familiar with the original Broadway cast singing, I expected to be put off by voice differences, something that really bothered me with In the Heights (I preferred the live SF version over the Broadway recording, but SF never came out with a soundtrack). I thought I may be distracted by set changes or not like the choreography (like I did with West Side Story). I needn’t have worried. The show was better than I could have ever dreamed.

I’m not sure if it is a personality thing, or maybe it was that the Broadway recording occurred in a studio, and lacked the gusto the San Francisco cast brought. The live show was sooooo much better than I could have ever hoped. It was easy to see, even without my glasses, that these folks were family. The chemistry was on point (some of the cast even put on a cabaret show during the week together). The acting was so top shelf you’d need a ladder to reach it. And the chorus, man, the chorus. I hope I can do them justice.

To the ensemble, I tip my hat

The ensemble for Mormon was the best I’ve ever seen. I felt like our Saturday afternoon matinee was their last performance of the season. Every actor threw their heart into their performance. My Broadway recording can’t shine a light on what I witnessed this past Saturday. “Like a Light Switch” is now my new favorite song from the show. I find myself applying the nuance the SF cast added as I belt it in the car.

Stand out performances

I will forever remember Connor Peirson as Elder Cunningham and his performance of “Man Up.” The rock n roll. The gravitas. The gyrating. God, to think of it now bring tears of joy to my eyes. As far as I’m concerned, Elder Cunningham is the hero of The Book of Mormon. After all, the whole musical is a lead up to the fourth installment of the Bible, the Book of Arnold.

Andre-Chance Goddard as the Doctor was superb. The memory of his clear beautiful voice rising through the laughter to declare he has maggots in his scrotum still makes me smile. Corey Jones as the eye-patched General was fantastic. Who knew someone could be so expressive with a single eye? And Kayla Pecchioni impassioned performance as Nabulungi with the reprised “Hasa Diga Eebowai” made me well up.

Pushing the boundaries

What makes Mormon, South Park, and Avenue Q standout is their fearlessness. These shows don’t back down from taboos. Instead, they run up to them and give them a wedgie. Mormon has a song dedicated to flipping God the bird. It’s one thing to enjoy “Hasa Diga Eebowai” in the privacy of your car. But like David Herman’s character, Michael Bolton in Office Space, you quickly roll up the window if anyone strays near your car. To sit in a theater with 500 other people and watch a dozen or so people dance around and sing at the top of their lungs, “Fuck you God! In the cunt!” is uncomfortable. Very uncomfortable. But beyond the discomfort is this bubbling thrill of doing something you’ve been told to never do. By the end of the show, I felt like a kid who’s just cut school for the first time or punched their bully square in the nose.

The Book of Mormon pokes fun at religion, the absurdity of blind faith, and misconceptions of stereotypes we all harbor. When Nabulungi laments taking the missionaries at their word only to find that it was all made up, the other Ugandians set her straight:

Kimba: Nabulungi, Sal Tlay Ka Sity isn’t an actual PLACE… It’s an IDEA. A metaphor.

Mafala: You need to remember that Prophets always speak in metaphors.

Asmerety:  Yeah, you don’t think a man ACTUALLY fucked a frog do you? That’s fucking stupid.

This exchange towards the end of the musical lets the audience know that the occupants of this small Ugandian village are much savvier than we may have originally thought. They know the religion the Mormon missionaries bring is filled with parables and probably shouldn’t be taken literally. This revelation was a relief to me. Throughout the musical, I had been operating under the assumption that the Ugandans were being taken advantage of. To find out that they know what’s up made me question my own prejudices I didn’t even know I had. Which is always a good thing.

There is so much more I could say about The Book of Mormon, but I’ll leave it at this: The Book of Mormon is now my favorite musical. I would see it again, and I hope the SF cast puts out a recording of some sort that we can all enjoy for years to come.

A/N: A huge thank you to tee-kyrin at Deviant Art for allowing me to use her amazing artwork in this post. I am forever grateful. If you enjoy her work as much as I do, I hope you’ll head over and let her know personally.