We went to see the stage show of The Book of Mormon at the Princess of Wales Theatre in Toronto. I haven’t laughed so much for ages. It was hilarious. It’s also making some serious points about religion.

In the interval, I was amused to overhear someone saying “There’s a lot of swearing in it.” Well duh, it was written by the creators of South Park. Of course there’s swearing in it.

The set design, choreography, lighting, acting, and music were all outstanding. I especially loved the sparkly lighting when Elder Price was on the stage.

The libretto also explains how Mormonism developed and what their founding myth is. It’s even freakier and less plausible than you thought.

I will try not to reveal too much of the plot — but from here on out there will be spoilers.

The musical opens with the freshly-minted Mormon missionaries getting ready to leave missionary training school and go out on assignment. Naturally the most popular guy in the class gets paired with the least popular guy. And they’re sent to Uganda.

But what’s really neat is that — just like in a fairy tale — it’s the least popular guy (Elder Cunningham) who wins out in the end.

Because Cunningham hasn’t actually read The Book of Mormon (it was too boring), he ends up inventing a new version of the story that actually works for the Ugandans he’s preaching to. He bases it — very loosely — on The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars.

The Ugandan villagers, who are a lot more sophisticated than the Mormon missionaries, recognize a metaphor when they see one, and enjoy the (modified) stories and find them uplifting.

There’s so much in this story. As a study of religions nerd: there was a PhD’s worth of stuff in there, about belief, metaphors, acculturation of religion to the surrounding culture, the importance of stories, and more.

It was great to see a cast that was 50% Black people too.

Definitely recommended for fans of South Park and Avenue Q, people who have very thoroughly deconstructed any involvement with Mormonism or religions adjacent to it, such as Christianity, and people who like a lot of swearing in their musicals. I check all of these boxes (never been a Mormon but I check the deconstruction from Christianity box) so it was very much in my wheelhouse.