“The Book of Mormon” is living up to its reputation, as the Tony Award-winning musical is enjoying a wildly successful run in Philadelphia at The Forrest Theatre through Sept. 14.
Written by “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone and “Avenue Q” creator Robert Lopez, it tells the story of two Mormon missionaries sent to Uganda to spread the word about their religion.
Grey Henson, who plays the character Elder McKinley, said fans of both “Avenue Q” and “South Park” will definitely appreciate the brutally satirical nature of “The Book of Mormon,” but there is a finely crafted musical underneath the humor.
“It’s definitely in the same vein of those shows but it has its own voice all together,” Henson said. “As crude and wild and blasphemous as people like to say that it is, it’s really a beautiful piece of musical theater and that is why people love it. It’s not what you expect it to be. People are surprised by the dancing and the choreography. It’s really smartly done and it’s completely original and different.”
Any time you combine religion and humor, there is bound to be some controversy. But Henson said the humor in the show isn’t necessarily always at the expense of Mormonism.
“The story is surrounding this religion but the show makes fun of everybody,” Henson said. “It’s one of those shows where, if you can’t laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at, because at some point you are going to be lampooned. It’s about these boys that go to Africa from America and they think they can fix everything. They just assume life is just like it is in Salt Lake City. They don’t realize people in the world really suffer. Then they get this major truth-bomb thrown at them. It makes you question your own values. It shows how silly some of the things in the religion might seem to people, but it is definitely not necessarily lampooning the Mormon religion. I think the show is Trey Parker’s and Matt Stone’s atheist love letter to religion. At the end of the show, it puts faith and spirituality on a pedestal. One of the boys ends up making up his own religion that the Africans believe in and it really gives them hope. It’s a sweet message.”
Henson added that, while some in the Mormon community aren’t happy about the show, others are using its success as an opportunity to introduce people to their faith.
“Some Mormons of course think that it paints them in a bad light but [for the most part] they’ve been kind of jumping on the success of the show,” Henson said. “They advertise in all our playbills. Everywhere we go there are full-page ads saying, ‘You’ve seen the play, now read the book’ and ‘The book is always better.’ They’ve been really smart about it. Almost every show, we have real Mormon missionaries standing outside of the theater handing out Mormon literature and talking to people about the actual religion. The religion, now more than ever, has been in the forefront of the media and the news because of the show, and they are excited about it. They are such a wonderful, sweet group of people as a whole, the Mormons that I have met touring across the country for two years. They are interested in what we do as actors. We’ve gone the whole nine yards when it comes to learning about Mormons, and they are great and they love that we are doing the show.”
The show also broaches the subject of sexuality and religion through the character of Elder McKinley, who is gay but is in denial about his sexuality.
“I think McKinley is really complex,” Henson said. “He’s got a lot of interesting layers. He’s a really troubled person because he’s trying to repress all these feelings. The thing that’s most important for him is being a good Mormon. He’s very passionate about that. He cares so much about being a good Mormon but he just can’t. So there’s the tragic flaw of being gay, which is kind of frustrating for him. That is interesting to play with every night. The most important number-one thing for him is being a good Mormon and being in charge of this mission.”
Henson added that he often meets fans of the show who identify with the internal conflict between sexuality and spirituality his character goes through.
“A lot of audience members come up to me telling me how much they relate to McKinley because they went through that,” Henson said. “I think there’s a huge group of people thinking they couldn’t be themselves. A lot of it had to do with their religion. I think McKinley’s journey is a very small one. The song I sing, ‘Turn It Off,’ is an anthem to suppression. In some way, shape or form, the LGBT community has felt things feeling and that is what people relate to in the show. There’s been a moment in everyone’s life, no matter how wonderful their parents were with their coming out, that they felt like they have to turn it off and shut down certain truthful feelings they were having. Hopefully it’s not as difficult as it is for McKinley because he just flat-out says that being gay is bad. It’s sad and it is tragic and I hope nobody goes through that, but that is something a lot of people relate to. And it’s all positive because I do think there is a light at the end of the tunnel for McKinley by the end of the show. It’s not very clear and laid out, but there is hope for him and hopefully for anyone else who has ever had to turn it off.”
The Kimmel Center presents “The Book of Mormon” through Sept. 14 at The Forrest Theatre, 1114 Walnut St. For more information or tickets, call 215-923-1515 or visit http://www.kimmelcenter.org/events/?id=4676.