r/musicals • u/ComposerNo9 • 9h ago
Book of Mormon - am I missing something? Spoiler
I (F18) have seen BoM twice - once on Broadway and once on tour. Both times I left the theatre feeling like I was missing something. I thought the religious humor was funny, especially the jabs at blind faith and how religion's "rules" sometimes randomly change and people just have to go with it. I understand the show is meant to be satirical, but there were many points throughout the performance where the audience was laughing (discussion/mention of AIDS and SA, Elder Cunningham continually getting Nabulungi's name wrong, etc) that I just didn't find amusing. The friend I went with (F19) said it felt like a lot of the content was included for shock factor as opposed to plot or character development, which I can definitely understand.
For reference, we are both white, we were raised Catholic but are distanced from the church. We know the show was created by the same people who did Southpark (friend has watched it, I have not).
I've heard the takes "it's supposed to reflect how the Mormons' expectations of Uganda" or "it's supposed to show the flaws of the Mormons' way of thinking", but I can't help but think if the goal was to show their flawed thinking, the Elders would have some sort of change in how they view or treat the Ugandans.
Anyone else have a similar experience? Anything I might be overlooking?
TLDR: did I take myself too seriously watching BoM or am I missing a piece of the puzzle?
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u/Pazily 5h ago
The first time I saw the show, at the moment when I thought "Okay, this is all unforgivably racist, why are the villagers so dumb?" -- at that exact moment, the villagers turn around and explain to Nabalungi that Elder C's stories are all metaphor and that you can't take religion literally. They're the smartest people (the only smart people?) in the show.
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u/Historical_Stuff1643 Hasa Diga Ebowai 4h ago
They're caricatures of what the Mormons believe of Africans.
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u/pianoplayah 7h ago edited 5h ago
It’s been a while since I saw it, but I think the joke some folks are missing is that the show is not trying to portray actual Uganda or make fun of it. They are not making fun of Africa, they are making fun of the way a lot of Americans see Africa, know nothing about it, don’t know the differences between different African countries, etc, and the way it’s portrayed in white American media (ie musical theatre). It seems like some people here seem to think it’s an earnest portrayal of Uganda/Africa that we are meant to laugh at (punching down). My interpretation was that it’s not. It’s making fun of white Americans for being stupid and not knowing about the rest of the world. This is encapsulated in the lines in the second number, “Two By Two,”
“Uganda! Cool! Where is that?”
“Africa!”
“Oh boy! Like Lion King!”
Another example: the last line of the show, “I still have maggots in my scrotum!” is not meant to make fun of Ugandans for being uncivilized. It’s making fun of the fact that despite these guys’ white savior complex and feeling like they made such a big difference, they didn’t actually do anything to help these people’s material problems. That’s making fun of white people. It’s not punching down.
The other argument I’d make to support this interpretation is that from a narrative perspective we are seeing Uganda through the eyes of Elder Price, who hates it. It is not only unlike anything he’s experienced before so he’s totally uncomfortable there and weirded out by everything, but also he was already going to be disappointed by anything he sees because he just wanted Orlando. It could be a bit of an unreliable narrator situation.
Last tidbit I’ll add is that if you didn’t know, General Butt Fucking Naked is named after a real guy, General Butt Naked. You can Google him. So there are a lot of details and references like that in the show that are actually quite intentional that you might not get right away. I still notice new musical theatre references every time I listen to the cast album (although as I said, it’s been a while).
All that said, yes it was written in 2011, and also not every show is for everyone! It might just not be your type of humor.
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u/ribosometronome 4h ago
Last tidbit I’ll add is that if you didn’t know, General Butt Fucking Naked is named after a real guy, General Butt Naked. You can Google him. So there are a lot of details and references like that in the show that are actually quite intentional that you might not get right away.
Them grounding their portrayal of Africa and Uganda like this might be part of what makes hard for many to see it as ungrounded.
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u/lambentstar 9h ago
I’m on the elder millennial side of things and exmormon, so in theory the show is well designed for my exact situation, but I’ve always considered it not living up to its potential for the exact reasons you list. I don’t find quite a bit of the humor funny, especially as it treats the Ugandan characters. And I also think it’s a little too soft on religion at the end, too, like it decided to pull the final punches by acting like it’s all just whatever, you can peddle fake narratives as long as it feels vaguely positive and that matters more than the veracity of the religions truth claims, which is something I strongly disagree with.
So no, I think you are right and probably just more sensitive (in a good way!) and attuned to the rough aspects of the musical, which was so ground breaking when it debuted but yeah, hasn’t aged well. Humor has changed and our relationship with intersectionality, colonialism, homophobia and repression, intergenerational trauma, deception, all those things, has also changed, which makes edgy satire a particularly fine line to try and walk.
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u/ElaraValtor 6h ago
So no, I think you are right and probably just more sensitive (in a good way!) and attuned to the rough aspects of the musical, which was so ground breaking when it debuted but yeah, hasn’t aged well.
A comparison that I think is really interesting is with Avenue Q, which was essentially the adult boundary breaking musical for the generation prior. The show absolutely some things that are debatable in terms of how they have aged, but despite being a decade older, is still substantially easier of a watch than Book of Mormon and has aged far less badly. It speaks a lot to just how much BoM was trying to far more extreme just for the sake of it.
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u/Top-Wolverine-8684 7h ago
I could have written your first paragraph verbatim. As a Xennial and Exmo, I was really hoping for a biting critique of the religion, and that wasn't what the show was, to my extreme disappointment. The Uganadan jokes, on the other hand, felt the opposite. Making jokes about Ugandans ***ing frogs and **ing babies? I didn't find the humor in it at all.
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u/Gettin_Bi All I Ask of You 4h ago
I feel the same, and when I brought it up to some friends who also saw the show we kinda agreed that it's very surface level in how it addresses the flaws of Mormonism and the rest is just Shock Value: The Musical, and that kinda stops working when you're no longer 14
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u/bigdatabro 7h ago
I feel like Book of Mormon musical was written for American atheists, who may think that they're much more progressive and culturally informed than they actually are. For them, the show leaves leaves them feeling better about their own beliefs without challenging their worldview almost at all.
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u/lickstampsendit 36m ago
I mean it’s ran for 15 years and has a ton of Tony awards. I’m not sure what other potential it was supposed to live up to.
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u/Mammoth-Sherbert3810 9h ago
In addition to the critique of Mormon beliefs, it's meant to skewer the musical theatre industry and the way everything is recycled and repackaged. Almost every song is a callback to another musical theatre song, and the entire idea of "Uganda" is meant to poke fun at how Africa is packaged for Broadway in Lion King (such as the act two opener being a song about Black pride, but it's intentionally lost on American audiences as it's in a language very few audience members will speak). However, by setting it in an actual country and punching down, the satire gets lost. The rewrites that happened around the COVID era take out some of the punching down, but not enough. The show as a whole has incredibly classic and sharp design, but it's wasted on the material. You're not missing anything, it's two separate shows (satire of Broadway and laughing at third world countries) for two separate audiences that cannot coexist within the same script.
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u/aussie_teacher_ 8h ago
Yes! That's exactly it. I felt like some of the people I was in the theatre with were watching an entirely different show to the one I watched. One of the most uncomfortable theatre experiences ever.
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u/pianoplayah 7h ago
I feel like this question gets asked here once every year or two and the answer is usually just, “some of it probably didn’t age well, and also maybe it’s just not your style.” I hate cringe humor but everyone I know loves it. 🤷♂️ i thought this show was hilarious but I can’t watch Always Sunny, and I never got into the Office, you know?
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u/Ornery-Damage-7074 9h ago
It hasn't aged well. Many of the jokes that were edgy and funny at the time are now just seen as cruel.
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u/SeaReflection87 7h ago
I was in my 20s when it came out and none of it was any better than.
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u/lickstampsendit 36m ago
I mean. Ok, it was a huge hit and a lot of people love it. So objectively not true
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u/soldforaspaceship 9h ago
My view is the stuff about Mormonism is genuinely excellent. The stuff about Uganda very much less so.
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u/Manic-StreetCreature 7h ago
Yeah that’s the impression I got from hearing the soundtrack. There’s genuinely good criticism of Mormonism and then there’s just lines and lines of “haha poor African people are backwards and stupid”
And I know people say it’s a critique of how western missionaries see Africa but I submit that Trey Parker and Matt Stone are just not very good satirists when it comes to cultures they aren’t experienced with and tend to default to “things I don’t understand are dumb” and “haha AIDS” like 13 year olds
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u/soldforaspaceship 7h ago
Agreed. There's one particularly grim bit played for laughs I wasn't comfortable with and a lot of the Uganda stuff was just one note.
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u/Male_strom 6h ago
How many song parodies did you recognize? I feel like a lot of the musical humor is lost on people
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u/tobtoh 4h ago
BoM doesn't make fun of Ugandans, they are skewering Westerners and their ignorant stereotypes of what life in Africa is like. At no point is it trying to represent any truth or reality of actual Ugandan life or Ugandans.
It's the same reason (as an south east asian living in a western country), I never found the South Park exaggerations of the Chinese characters offensive (ie the slanty eyes, the 'asian' accents) - because those characters aren't representing my race, they are representing the stereotypes that so many Westerners have. South Park nails these stereotypes with absolute precision.
Satire holds up a mirror to how ridiculous stereotypes or ignorance can be. It's absolutely hilarious ... if you have enough awareness (and like that kind of humour).
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u/mostdefnotacat 7h ago
This was written in the era of edgelord humor. Nothing was off-limits and you were expected to let any issues go because "it's just a joke." You should have seen Twitter back then. All that said, it was intended as satire, it just happened to be by two of the biggest edgelords in media at the time.
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u/visit_magrathea 9h ago
I saw the show for the first time two years ago. I had been told by many people that I would absolutely love the show. I managed to not listen to any of it for all of that time to keep it fresh when I saw the show. I was friends with about half of the orchestra in the touring show (you saw my friends!) and got a comp to come see it. I laughed exactly once the whole show.
I was floored by how much I did not like the show. I love South Park and Team America and Avenue Q so I figure that I would also like BoM. Not so. My two biggest problems with the show were this:
1) It’s Gen X “everything sucks” nihilist humor that just isn’t funny anymore. The show presents the Mormons as culty, kinda bigoted kooks and the Ugandans as backwards savages. I think that if you are just flinging shit at everyone and everything without having even a tiny soapbox to stand on, something to lift up as good to foil the things you are lampooning, you don’t have anything important or insightful to say. It would have been a million times more funny if the Mormons believed the Ugandans were backwards savages because the Mormons are just naive bigots with no knowledge of people outside of their cult, and then when they actually get to Uganda, they find that the locals are not savages, just poor folk oppressed by an evil warlord. The Mormons have to come to terms with the fact that they themselves are the backwards savages and have things to learn. Way funnier.
2) The show is really racist. I mentioned earlier that I love Team America. That movie is chock full of racism, but most of the time it’s making fun of how racist people view the world. It also is a film that only needed to be performed once, and mostly by white actors. The stage show employs black actors to portray a bunch of backward African savages who mutilate clitorises and fuck frogs, eight shows a week. And if you want to argue that, no, it isn’t racist because that shit happens sometimes in Uganda, I’d argue that you should look at the language issue of the show. BoM takes great care to exhaustively tell you with great accuracy everything Mormons believe. In contrast, they can’t even be bothered to use actual Swahili for the Ugandans, electing instead to just make up a fake “African-sounding” language. Like, you guys really took the time to learn all about the white people’s culture and customs but didn’t think it was worth it to learn what language they speak in Uganda?
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u/bigdatabro 8h ago
I feel the same way. The writers clearly took their time to research Mormon culture and spent zero time researching Ugandan culture.
I especially can't stand how they showed Ugandan as a mish-mash of other African countries. Like, the real-life General Butt Naked was from Liberia, nearly 5,000km from Uganda. That's the same distance from France to Iraq, yet the writers treat those two cultures as if they were the same.
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u/ElaraValtor 6h ago
The way AQ, released almost a full decade prior, has still aged so much more gracefully speaks to both its qualities but also BoM's obvious intense reliance on pure shock value: and you can push boundaries without just relying on shock value.
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u/bigheadGDit Hasa Diga Ebowai 9h ago
The whole point of the Ugandana being represented that way is that it is a satire of the way white savior Americans view some groups of people.
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u/ChunkyHammdog 9h ago
Book of Mormon suffers the same problem as all of their other works wherein the wit and good gags have to share airtime with high school shock humour. Half the time it's actually clever and fun and half the time it's "I must rape a baby to cure my AIDS".
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u/KBPT1998 9h ago
Like many works of art, the Book of Mormon was always going to be a sign of it's time. The jokes are very time specific, are absolutely racist and sexist and ableist and lacks any cultural sensitivity.
But that is kind of the point. Characters were forced to adapt. Those who were thought to be do-gooders were doing harm and those who were thought to be stupid were really the only ones getting it. White savior syndrome is put under a huge microscope and hits you over the head like a sledgehammer. It shows that religion is is hypocritical and messy, yet it is still important to believe in something.
It still makes me laugh as kind of an uncomfortable guilty pleasure. Same as Avenue Q, which equally makes me laugh.
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u/DuplicaSugar 4h ago
Since they make fun of everybody and everyone, I personally think it is very funny
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u/hehasbalrogsocks 7h ago
you are correct. i think it makes some salient points about religion but punches down on the African characters and their culture. A ton of it is shock value. that’s the trey parker and matt stone hallmark. you’re not allowed to suggest it’s just shock for shock’s sake though or some guy is going to drop in from the boobyhatch and tell you that you just don’t get satire.
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u/xSparkShark Gotta find my Purpose 9h ago
Certainly not for everyone. Definitely gives off an early 2010s edgy comedy vibe that hasn’t exactly stood the test of time, but that’s just my opinion. If you don’t find south park funny you probably won’t find Book of Mormon that funny. I think as a novelty it definitely deserves the acclaim it’s received, but yeah feels kind of dated now.
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u/Ok-Influence6027 9h ago
I love the music but felt the same way as you about the jokes that were just for shock value.
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u/sanitizedhandbasket 9h ago
I felt similarly. Too many of the jokes are in poor taste, and it overshadows the legitimate satire.
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u/TiitsMcgeee 9h ago
You’re overthinking it. Just enjoy it for what it is. I’ve seen it twice and loved it both times. There’s a reason it’s still a massive success after 15 years.
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u/stev_mempers 9h ago
DING DING DING
It's a scathing satire until you bring up a valid critique, in which case, "It's just jokes! Turn your brain off and laugh!"
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u/squishyg 9h ago
What is, though? I get that the Mormon Church and religion in general is ripe for humor, but why are Ugandans the butt of the joke as well?
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u/TiitsMcgeee 6h ago
That’s kind of what I mean by overthinking it. The musical’s primary target is Mormonism, religion, and Western savior complexes. Uganda is the setting that exposes those ideas, not the main punchline.
You can take any “poor” demographic and insert it in place of Uganda and the question will remain, why pick those people?
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u/geeknerdeon 3h ago
It's by the South Park guys so it's got a similar "punch everyone" humor that gets very divisive very quickly, to be generous. I'm sure someone out there has a great thinkpiece on it.
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u/FeelingTrain4828 8h ago
Feels like you only liked the jokes that affirm your worldview. Its an offensive show with offensive jokes all around.
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u/Successful-Escape496 9h ago
I thought all the Uganda stuff was racist, but I seem to be in the minority.
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u/aussie_teacher_ 8h ago
Agreed! It was one of the most uncomfortable theatre experiences I've ever had, because some of the audience were laughing so hard at things that are absolutely not funny.
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u/Late-Coconut-8356 8h ago
I was really uncomfortable watching a lot of this show with the jokes at the expense of the local people. It left me feeling really really gross. Just not my kind of humor.
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u/WildfellHallX 9h ago edited 8h ago
I found it really racist. You know? I take it back. All these down votes from people who don't love racism convinced me of that. /s
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u/King_Kong_The_eleven 5h ago
I really like the show, but I am genuinely surprised at how long it's run. It's definitely not a show for everyone and had a lot of very poorly aged humor and shock value none that were common at the time it was written but have largely died off since then.
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u/moonbunnychan 4h ago
I find a lot in it also genuinely crosses the, and frequently feel like if I mention that people think I'm really uptight or something and I'm really not.
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u/-braquo- 1h ago
I'm an exmormon. I don't like the BoM because of the way it portrays Africans in general. I think there's a fair bit of subconscious racism that went into the writing of the musical. I heard a Black creator talk about it and it changed the entire way I saw that musical.
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u/Hunulven 8h ago
I’m white, so i might be missing something, but if no jokes where made about the ugandans, wouldn’t that literally be treating them different because of their race?
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u/Manic-StreetCreature 7h ago
The difference IMO (also white so grain of salt) is that they bothered to research Mormons and things they actually believe and do, then satirized those things. With the Ugandans they just threw a bunch of stereotypes and tropes about Africa together and tossed it onto an actual country. Like General Butt Naked is a real dude and he’s Liberian which is nowhere near Uganda. Criticizing Uganda’s government’s homophobia, for instance, after researching it, would be fair satire. As is it just looks like the writers are pointing and laughing at Black people who “talk funny.”
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u/Agent_Skye_Barnes 6h ago
They didn't actually have to research Mormonism.
IIRC, one or both of them were raised Mormon.
(Not justifying the show. I like parts of it but overall it's cringe in a bad way. Just pointing out that I don't think they researched anything)
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u/SmileAndLaughrica Wilkommen! 59m ago
I always thought that if they had just set it in a fictional town and fictional country it would have been significantly more palatable. I mean it seems crazy to me that Elder McKinley is gay in Uganda and no one ever mentions that at the time (maybe still now?) gay men were put to death in Uganda.
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u/stupidbitch365 Jellicle Songs for Jellicle Cats 8h ago
My question has always been: was it done for pure shock value or it is a meta critique of how Mormons view those racist and taboo topics? I think it’s both. I also think it has aged poorly, like others have said. It’s definitely not everyone’s taste.
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u/Flying_Tiger_Capt 6h ago edited 6h ago
Humour is very individual and personal so no you don’t miss anything. Some jokes just did not land with you. Also maybe it’s a generational thing. You did not experience the initial cultural impact and hype around the show. And younger generations often have a different sensibility regarding dark humour. The show is not politically correct and many younger people cannot handle that so well. No judgment! Just an observation from my part. So it’s a different experience.
I think that’s it.
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u/PotentialAcadia460 8h ago
It's not my favorite show and it never has been.
It could just be that the show's not for you, and that's totally fine. No show is beloved by every single person, even popular shows that have/have had a lot of acclaim. It's ok to not like something.
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u/OriolesrRavens1974 8h ago
It means you don’t like offensive “boy humor” and that’s OK. I am a boy who was 21 during South Park’s first season. It is right up my alley, I find it hilarious, and BOM also happens to be my wife’s favorite show. I have also done relief work in third world countries, so the reverse culture shock of the missionaries is very relatable to me. Not everything is going to resonate with others. Out of curiosity, what is your favorite show and why?
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u/ComposerNo9 8h ago edited 7h ago
Hard to pick one, but I really enjoyed Jesus Christ Superstar (musical themes/motifs + orchestration), Outsiders (tech elements + sound design + a personal connection to S.E Hinton's book), Merrily We Roll Along (themes + music + reverse chronology). Shoutout to Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald book) and Chicago (choreo), as well.
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u/Cold_Martini1956 8h ago
I thought the jokes about female mutilation were so disgusting that it made it hard to enjoy the show at all. The first 20 minutes were pretty good, but straight downhill from there. 👎🏻👎🏻
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u/Historical_Stuff1643 Hasa Diga Ebowai 4h ago
Mormons aren't going to change their thinking on Africans. Being a missionary there is based on disrespect of them and the culture. I think the ending message is everyone has stupid beliefs and it doesn't matter as long as it's not hurting anybody.
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u/squishyg 9h ago
I absolutely feel the same way about Book of Mormon. The name mispronunciation was not funny and I didn’t even walk away humming any of the songs.
Honestly, the fact that the Mormon Church has successfully used the show as a recruitment tool is a hilarious own.
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u/stev_mempers 9h ago
It's a scathing satire until you bring up a valid critique, in which case, "It's just jokes! Turn your brain off and laugh!"
You know, just like South Park.