Over a decade after it first shocked and delighted London audiences, The Book of Mormon remains one of the West End’s most outrageous and most acclaimed, musical comedies. Here’s everything you need to know.
Few musicals have proved as enduringly, gleefully offensive as The Book of Mormon. Now well into its second decade at the Prince of Wales Theatre, this nine-time Tony Award and four-time Olivier-winning satire from the creators of South Park shows no sign of slowing down, having recently become one of the longest-running musicals in West End history.
Led by Declan Egan as Elder Price and Conner Peirson as Elder Cunningham, the current London company continues a tradition of note-perfect comic performances in a show that somehow manages to be both riotously offensive and, in its own strange way, genuinely moving.
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What is The Book of Mormon about?
Elder Price is the golden boy of the Missionary Training Centre: handsome, devout, and quietly certain that God is about to reward his faith by sending him somewhere wonderful. Ideally Orlando.
In a surprise to absolutely no one, that’s not what happens. Instead, he’s paired with Elder Cunningham, an anxious and over-imaginative outsider with a habit of inventing scripture whenever the real thing gets boring, and the two are shipped off together to a remote village in Uganda.
Turns out, their training didn’t prepare them for a community grappling with poverty, disease and a violent warlord, for whom polite door-to-door proselytising means very little.
As the mismatched pair’s carefully rehearsed pitch collides head-on with the realities of the villagers’ lives, both Elders are forced to reckon with what faith, storytelling and genuine human connection actually mean.
It’s a hard show to categorise tonally: yes, it’s outrageously crude, packed with songs about subjects no other musical would touch, but it’s somehow also a genuinely warm, even sentimental story about friendship and belief. Expect to be shocked and expect to laugh far more than you’d think appropriate.
The history of The Book of Mormon
The Book of Mormon was created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the writers behind South Park, together with Robert Lopez, the EGOT-winning co-creator of Avenue Q and the songs for Disney’s Frozen.
Development reportedly began as early as 2003, and the show finally opened on Broadway in 2011, where it became an immediate cultural phenomenon, sweeping the Tony Awards with nine wins including Best Musical, and producing a cast recording that became the fastest-selling in iTunes history at the time.
The West End production opened at the Prince of Wales Theatre in March 2013, led originally by Gavin Creel and Jared Gertner reprising their Broadway roles, and won four Olivier Awards including Best New Musical. More than a decade on, the show has become a genuine fixture of London theatre, recently overtaking We Will Rock You and Miss Saigon to become one of the West End’s longest-running musicals of all time.
Who is in The Book of Mormon?
- Elder Price: Declan Egan (Jersey Boys, Hairspray)
- Elder Cunningham: Conner Peirson
- Nabulungi: Regan-Bailey Walker (The Sound of Music, Evita)
- Elder McKinley: Tom Bales
- Mafala Hatimbi: Kirk Patterson
- Note that casting at long-running productions like The Book of Mormon changes regularly, and can also vary by individual performance, so it’s always worth checking who’s playing on the specific date you book.
The creators: Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Robert Lopez
Trey Parker and Matt Stone need little introduction: the creators of South Park have spent nearly three decades building a reputation as some of the most fearless satirists in American entertainment, willing to take aim at religion, politics and popular culture with equal relish.
The Book of Mormon channels exactly that same appetite for provocation into musical theatre, a genre it treats with as much genuine affection as it does mockery.
Their collaborator, Robert Lopez, brought a different but complementary sensibility, having already co-created the puppet musical parody Avenue Q before going on to write, with his wife Kristen Anderson-Lopez, the Oscar-winning songs for Frozen.
That combination of South Park’s gleeful and boundary-pushing satire, married to Lopez’s genuine command of traditional musical theatre songcraft, is precisely what makes The Book of Mormon land as both a joke and a well-built musical.
The score
The Book of Mormon’s score is, perhaps surprisingly, a loving pastiche of the classic Broadway musical, deploying big, traditional showstoppers to deliver some of the filthiest and funniest lyrics in modern musical theatre.
Standout numbers include Hello, the missionaries’ door-to-door introduction song, the sweepingly ironic All-American Prophet, and Turn It Off, Elder McKinley’s tap-dancing anthem to suppression and denial.
The show’s most sneakily audacious number, however, may be I Believe, in which Elder Price’s earnest declaration of his faith spirals into ever more absurd territory, a song that manages to satirise religious conviction while somehow also honouring the sincerity behind it. It’s this ability to have it both ways: to be mocking and genuinely moving in the same breath, that runs through the entire score.
Why The Book of Mormon matters
Beneath its shock-value reputation, The Book of Mormon has always been a genuinely well-constructed piece of musical theatre, and its longevity in the West End speaks to more than mere notoriety.
The satire is aimed less at any particular faith than at the universal human impulse to tell ourselves stories that make an unbearable world feel bearable, a theme handled with more warmth and generosity than its filthy reputation might suggest.
Over a decade since it first opened, and having weathered plenty of cultural shifts in what audiences find acceptable, the show’s continued success in London suggests its central alchemy, outrageous comedy in service of a genuinely humane story, hasn’t dated at all.
What to expect on the night
Expect a show that pushes every boundary it can find, and does so with real craft. The production features explicit language throughout, strong adult themes, sexual content, strobe lighting and gunshot sound effects.
- Age guidance: Recommended for ages 14+. Under-16s must be accompanied by an adult, and under-5s are not permitted.
- Running time: Approximately 2 hours 20 minutes, including one interval
- Access: Audio described, captioned and BSL-interpreted performances are scheduled by the venue; check Delfont Mackintosh’s access services before booking. GalaPro captioning and audio description via personal device is available at all performances.
Is The Book of Mormon worth seeing?
Unquestionably, provided you know what you’re walking into. With nine Tony Awards, four Olivier Awards and over a decade of consistently packed houses in the West End, The Book of Mormon’s reputation as one of the funniest musicals ever written is thoroughly earned. The Telegraph has called it simply “hilarious.”
This isn’t a show for the easily offended, or for those looking for a gentle night out, but for audiences ready to laugh at material no other musical would dare touch, while being unexpectedly moved along the way, it remains one of the very best nights out in London theatre.
Book tickets to The Book of Mormon at the Prince of Wales Theatre here
Plan your visit to The Book of Mormon
- Address: Prince of Wales Theatre, Coventry Street, London W1D 6AS
- Booking dates: Currently booking
- Performance schedule: Monday–Saturday 7.30pm, Friday and Saturday 2.30pm
- Running time: Approximately 2 hours 20 minutes, including one interval
- Age guidance: 14+. Under-16s must be accompanied by an adult; under-5s not admitted
- Getting there: Piccadilly Circus (Bakerloo and Piccadilly lines), Leicester Square
- Access: Audio described, captioned and BSL-interpreted performances available; check Delfont Mackintosh access services for dates
Prince of Wales Theatre, London
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