By Joseph Hurley
"The Book of Mormon" • Book, Music and Lyrics By Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone • Eugene O'Neill Theatre, 230 W. 49th St., NYC
It would be difficult, if not impossible, to imagine a less promising starting point for a Broadway musical than the recruiting practices of the Mormon Church. Nevertheless, that's precisely the scheme behind "The Book of Mormon." This generally well-received new show was written by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the major talent behind "South Park," working this time with composer Robert Lopez, one of the creators of the hit production, "Avenue Q."
People say that, in order to fully understand "The Book of Mormon," it helps to be familiar with "South Park" and its casual, strangely innocent, embrace of obscenity and vulgarity. It's also useful to be reminded of the origins of the Mormon Church, whose members are also known as Latter Day Saints and whose roots reach deep into the soil of the state of Utah.
Joseph Smith, Jr., found, or so he claimed, the Mormon gold tablets buried near his home in Palmyra, New York, in 1823. Smith and his father, who were impoverished and only partially literate enthusiasts, were never able to produce the tablets. Despite that minor detail, Smith's "discovery" led to the eventual distribution of more than a hundred million copies of the "golden Bible" worldwide.
Smith, who had been in the habit of using divining rods in his search for buried treasure, maintained that the angel Moroni had summoned him to his "work."
That was almost two hundred years ago, and what most people these days know about the Mormons, unless they happen to live in Salt Lake City, probably involves their recruitment techniques.
Those methods, including dispatching young male Mormons, two by two, in search of potential converts, serve as the trigger for "The Book of Mormon," which manages to get a good deal of fun, some of it innocent and some of it not, out of singing, dancing and making a variety of jokes, many of them tasteless, about the Latter Day Saints.
In the show, co-directed by Parker and Casey Nickolaw, two young Mormons, Elder Price and Elder Cunningham, entering their compulsive two-year stint as missionaries, are sent to a small, poverty-stricken African country, determined to convert the inhabitants, some of whom are willing and others rigidly resistant.
The songs are mostly simplistic, while Nickolaw's appealing choreography involves a good deal of elemental tap dancing. The sight of a dozen Mormon elders in their short-sleeved white shirts and black suits tapping away conjures up a surprising measure of charm.
Josh Gad, as the chubby, frenetic Elder Cunningham, and Andrew Rannells, as the sleeker Elder Price, work like dynamos to keep "The Book of Mormon" airborne, and for the most part they succeed, sometimes brilliantly.
The show's considerable success is at least partially due to the fact that it doesn't demand too much of its audience, settling for being mildly pleasant and frequently funny -- objectionable, it would seem, only to Mormons themselves.
"The Book of Mormon," unlike most productions that actually make it to Broadway, has the look of having been done on the cheap, starting with Scott Pask's understated scenic design and carrying on through Ann Roth's costumes, which are hobbled a bit by the fact that the Mormon lads wear outfits that amount to uniforms.
The modest show, which might be thought of as "Son of South Park," provides pleasure if you're not overly demanding. Also, it probably helps if you're not a Latter Day Saint.
