On Tuesday, the national touring production of “The Book of Mormon” will arrive in town for a nearly sold-out six-day run at the San Diego Civic Theatre.
This marks the fifth time the irreverent Broadway musical, which won nine Tony Awards including Best Musical in 2011, has visited San Diego. But it’s the first time it has played here with updated script and staging elements.
When Broadway theaters were shut down during the pandemic, the creators of “Book of Mormon” — “South Park” co-creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone with Robert Lopez — used the downtime to reassess the script. The hilarious and sometimes shocking musical is the satirical story of two White Mormon missionaries from Utah failing in their initial efforts to recruit converts in a poor, violence- and AIDS-troubled village in Uganda.
The revision effort took place in 2021 after Black cast members in the show wrote a letter to the creators expressing their concerns about the show’s clichéd depictions of Black characters as helpless or unsophisticated. Stone, Parker, Lopez and the show’s Tony-winning co-director and choreographer Casey Nicholaw (who grew up in San Diego) hosted a two-week workshop in New York where they went through the script and staging line by line.
The results were not shared publicly, and producers of the current tour declined to comment for this column. But a 2021 New York Times article mentioned a few of the tweaks, and a discussion thread on Reddit.com also includes observations from show-goers who saw the new version of the show.
According to the New York Times, the changes include having the young Ugandan woman character Nabalungi use an iPad, rather than the original typewriter, to send a text. And, to avoid the White savior theme of the original story, it is Nabalungi who takes on the menacing African warlord who threatens her town, rather than the missionaries.
On the Reddit thread, a showgoer also wrote that lines that were considered racist (such as “hot shade of Black” and “the Chinese are the real problem”) have been cut. The Ugandan villagers roles have also been expanded and their personalities are less stereotypical.
“The Book of Mormon” plays Sept. 19 through 24. For tickets, visit broadwaysd.com.
Cygnet Theatre has announced the lineup for its Bill and Judy Garrett Finish Line Commission, a series of three readings by local playwrights on Sunday through Tuesday.
The new play series is underwritten by the Garretts, who are longtime San Diego theater lovers and supporters. It’s presented in partnership with the UCSD MFA Playwriting Program.
“We happily support the nurturing of new playwrights who are exploring provocative, entertaining, contemporary stories and topics to add to the vast lexicon of theatrical works currently available to performers and audiences,” the Garretts said in a statement. “We’re delighted to be able to help create new works for today’s world.”
Now in its eighth year, the Finish Line Commission has produced several plays that have gone on to make their world premieres at Cygnet, including Keiko Green’s “Sharon” earlier this year, and the upcoming “The Little Fellow (or The Queen of Tarts Tells All)” by Kate Hamill.
UCSD’s MFA Playwriting program was launched in 2020 and one or two of the students in the program are invited each year to participate in the Finish Line Commission, which includes a two-week development workshop, a public reading, a financial reward and the possible opportunity for a world premiere production at Cygnet at a later date.
This year’s festival will feature two plays by UCSD MFA students Agyeiwaa Asante and Milo Cramer and a new play by the nationally recognized San Diego playwright Christian St. Croix. All of the readings are free and open to the public at Cygnet’s Old Town Theatre at 4040 Twiggs St., San Diego. To reserve seats, visit cygnettheatre.com/connect/finish-line/ or call (619) 337-1525.
Here’s the lineup:
“Church Play” by Agyeiwaa Asante — 7 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 17
UCSD MFA candidate Asante is a Ghanian-American playwright from Maryland. In her play, the drama ministry at the Guiding Light Charismatic Church in Maryland is thrown into disarray when a member returns after a long time away with new ideas that threaten to upset the drama group’s delicate ecosystem.
“Business Ideas” by Milo Cramer — 7 p.m. Monday, Sept. 18
UCSD MFA second-year student Cramer said he wrote this play about his mom, the cafe where he used to work and his efforts to try to strike it rich, pay for college or simply survive. These get-rich-quick schemes include a plan to market vegetables for men or create a gun app for cellphones.
“We Are the Forgotten Beasts” by Christian St. Croix — 7 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 19
St. Croix’s “Monsters of the American Cinema” was produced last March at Diversionary Theatre. This play, “We Are the Forgotten Beasts,” was a 2022 Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference finalist. It’s the story of Archie, a gay Black man, and his half-brother Nick forming a bond with other overnight guests at a motel in Riverside by sharing personal stories, pirate tales and alien and fantasy adventures.
pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com
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