‘It’s Telling Broadway To Go Fuck Itself’: ‘Book Of Mormon’ Stars Reveal Why It's Still So Successful

Despite the “explicit language” warning attached to The Book Of Mormon, and the fact it’s the brainchild of South Park legends Matt Stone and Trey Parker – the same duo that penned 1999 classic Uncle Fucka – it really is a Broadway production for everyone.

“Do you know what?” begins actor Blake Bowden, the first Aussie to take a leading role in the production as Elder Price, “it’s my favourite thing to look out into the audience and see these little nanas, and they are laughing so hard; they love it.”

At any given performance you’ll find avid theatre lovers rubbing shoulders will pop culture fans, proving it bridges a gap that few other productions have been able to.

“That’s what makes it such a phenomenon,” tells Canadian co-star Nyk Bielak (Elder Cunningham), sitting in the lobby of Crown Perth ahead of the show’s WA premiere. “It’s like taking South Park and mixing it in a blender with traditional musical theatre.

“It’s the show for people who don’t like musicals and it’s also a perfect musical at the same time... It’s a love letter to musical theatre, and also gives it the finger; it’s telling Broadway to go fuck itself, but you can tell that [Stone and Parker] love musicals.

“A friend of ours was saying the other day that he was outside our hotel walking around and they’re laying down all this construction everywhere and there’s this [tradie] in a ute blaring Man Up from the show.”

Shauntelle Benjamin, Blake Bowden and Nyk Bielak in ‘The Book Of Mormon’. Pic by Jeff Busby

Bowden stresses that, although it’s “the funniest musical of all time”, its humour is only part of the reason it has been so successful. “It has this huge heart and it has a great message of friendship and overcoming adversity and community.”

Bielak adds: “[Stone and Parker] are the first ones to push the story and the message of the show, because there’s nothing that they do or say that is being blue for the sake of it, it always serves the story and there’s always a purpose behind it.

“If you’re like, ‘That fart joke was funny!’ or, ‘You saying fuck was great,’ they’ll be like, ‘You’re an idiot.’”

Bielak describes it like a “beautiful nacho plate” that takes those messages and layers them between fart jokes and crass dialogue; it’s a recipe that was perfected before the show opened in New York in 2011.

“Trey said to us, ‘Don’t add anything. There are enough laughs in the show. If you start finding a new laugh somewhere, that’s not what this show is about,’” Bowden explains.

“I’ve been in new shows where you have to work really hard as an actor to make the writing work; you just don’t have to with this one.”

“There’s room to play,” Bielak adds. “We wouldn’t have been doing it if it was the same thing every night; it’s also the energy that you get off the audience... This is really the golden goose; it’s going to be hard to top this.”

The Book Of Mormon plays from 3 Sep at Crown Theatre Perth.