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    The Review Is In

    Restoring our faith in musicals: The Book of Mormon brings sacrilegious hope to Houston

    Tarra Gaines
    Tarra Gaines
    Sep 6, 2013 | 7:59 am

    Those smiling, singing missionaries from The Book of Mormon have finally arrived in Houston ready to convert us all, and my reaction to their ringing of our doorbell is: Hasa Diga for taking so long.

    If you know what "Hasa Diga" means you are either a musical theater geek who bought your tickets months ago or speak an imaginary Ugandan dialect made up by South Park creators Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Avenue Q creator Robert Lopez.

    After taking Broadway by a storm of pressed-white-shirt-wearing, caffeine-free, earnest backup dancers and gathering nine Tony Awards, it seems like it's taken forever for the traveling production to hit the road and give the flyover states a chance to be outrageously offended while giving audiences a reason to laugh their asses off. The spectacle is in Houston, via Gexa Energy Broadway at the Hobby Center, and runs through Sept. 15.

    If you have somehow missed the (deserved) hype, The Book of Mormon, with book and lyrics by Parker, Stone and Lopez, is a feel-good, old-fashion musical about AIDS, female genital mutilation, rape, dysentery, murderous war lords, the loss of hope and the death of faith in the existence of a benevolent God. There's also some spectacular tap dancing throughout the show.

    The play has so much profanity and hummable, blasphemous songs, which are equal opportunity offenders of all of humanity, but those many controversial dancing elements tend to disguise a classic fish-out-of-water plot. The characters in the play question and doubt. Yet when they allow their beliefs to evolve and adapt and when they finally understand the transcendental power of a good metaphor, enough hope is resurrected to help them sing through life's tragedies.

    As the play begins, two innocent, 19-year-old Mormon men with the ironic title of Elders, Kevin Price and Arnold Cunningham, are sent to Uganda. According to their religion, God loves Mormons and wants as many as he can get, be they Japanese, French or Ugandan. Elder Price, however, would much rather be baptizing Orlandoans in the shadow of the Epcot Center's ball. Elder Cunningham is just so happy to finally have a friend — even if that friend has been assigned — and he's ready and excited to go anywhere with his pal.

    What surprised me about this filthy, profane musical is how much those South Park guys have created a show that's an affirmation, not just of faith, but of religion in general.

    Elders Price and Cunningham, played by Mark Evans and Christopher John O'Neill respectively, find themselves immediately out of their depth when they minister to a village plagued by an actual plague, poverty and a neighborhood warlord.

    The duo's district head, Elder McKinley, played by Grey Henson — who manages to steal every scene he's in — is not much help with his advice in the song "Turn It Off."

    When faced with real violence and death, Elder Price is ready to abandon his partner and maybe his church, while Elder Cunningham finds new strength by giving in to his phenomenal lying abilities — what his family calls an affliction.

    In any world created by Parker and Stone and sometimes the real world, lying is synonymous with storytelling. As Arnold Cunningham jazzes up the Book of Mormon with Ewoks and Hobbits and adds lessons about preventing the transmission of AIDS and the sacredness of the clitoris, the villagers begin to offer their respect to Arnold and his church, if only because the stories are "so fucking weird."

    The third main character in the show is the innocent and, of course, beautiful villager Nabulungi, played by Samantha Marie Ware. Nabulungi, who brings her family and neighbors into the fold, is the first to believe in the tales and lessons Cunningham "reads" (a euphemism for fabricates) from the Book of Mormon.

    All three characters have inevitable losses of faith, but Ware's depiction of Nabulungi at the moment of the death of her dreamed promised land, free of violence and hunger, is particularly profound.

    Mark Evans has the difficult task of making the audience feel sympathy for Elder Price, a character who even the dream-sequence Jesus calls a dick. Evans usually succeeds; his best scenes are ones in which Elder Price becomes Kevin, a confused kid who can't understand why God no longer seems to have a special destiny for him.

    O'Neill also succeeds in taking Arnold Cunningham from bumbling sidekick to unsung hero to a guy who somehow manages to be an even bigger dick than Elder Price. The character finally lands on prophet, in the way many holy books describe men and women of God, as sometimes lost souls who manage to muddle through by being true to their gifts. In Arnold's case that gift would be the skill to spin a good yarn.

    This was my own baptism into The Book of Mormon, though I've owned the Broadway cast album since 2011. What surprised me about this filthy, profane musical is how much those South Park guys have created a show that's an affirmation, not just of faith, but of religion in general.

    ____

    The Book of Mormon, presented by Gexa Energy Broadway at the Hobby Center, runs through Sept. 15 at the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts. Tickets start at $49 and can be purchased online or by calling 1-800-952-6560.

    Mark Evans in The Book of Mormon first national tour.

    1 The Book of Mormon at the Hobby Center September 2013 Mark Evans
      
    Photo by © Joan Marcus
    Mark Evans in The Book of Mormon first national tour.
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    Movie Review

    New movie Friendship pairs Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd in a bizarre bromance

    Alex Bentley
    May 16, 2025 | 3:30 pm
    Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd in Friendship
    Photo courtesy of A24
    Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd in Friendship.

    Comedian Tim Robinson has gained a cult following thanks to series like Detroiters and I Think You Should Leave, in which his brand of cringe comedy is on full display. The former Saturday Night Live writer/performer has had a few small movie roles over the years, but he’s now getting his first starring role in the off-kilter Friendship.

    Robinson plays Craig, a mild-mannered suburbanite with a wife, Tami (Kate Mara), and son, Steven (Jack Dylan Grazer). Craig has a boring life that involves little more than going to his middle manager job while wearing the same clothes day after day, anticipating the next Marvel movie, and helping Tami out with her at-home floral business.

    He gets a jolt of energy when Austin (Paul Rudd) moves into the neighborhood. The two men seem to hit it off, with Austin — a weatherman at a local TV channel — even taking Craig on a couple of impromptu adventures. But when Craig commits a couple of faux pas at a group gathering at Austin’s house, their bond starts to fracture.

    Even though the film is written and directed by Andrew DeYoung, it’s clear that Robinson had a big influence on the style of comedy it features. There are no big set pieces with a slew of jokes coming one after another. Instead, the film forces the audience to try to vibe with the very particular type of wavelength it’s giving off, one that could almost be called anti-comedy for the way the laughs come out of left field.

    The 100-minute film is full of random comedic moments, like Steven kissing Tami on the lips, Craig being obsessed with his plain brown clothes, a group sing-along, and more. More often than not, it’s the way Craig reacts to both normal and abnormal situations that gets the laughs. The character is needy and oblivious, two traits that combine to make many of his actions cringeworthy.

    Perhaps most importantly for this type of movie, many things in the story go unexplained or don’t make sense. Seemingly crucial elements are brought up only to fade away just as quickly, while other parts that appeared to be throwaway sections get callbacks later in the film. DeYoung and Robinson are determined to keep the audience on their toes the entire time, never knowing what to expect next.

    Robinson has the perfect face for a story like this, one that’s bland enough to blend into the background but memorable enough to sell the jokes. His demeanor is also excellent, never becoming too expressive, even when he gets angry. With long hair, a mustache, and a certain swagger, Rudd is a great complement to Robinson. Only in a film like this would an everyman like Rudd be considered the suave and cool one.

    There will be some that will see Friendship and come away wondering what the hell they just watched. But anyone who goes in knowing that they’re about to witness a comedy that challenges their sensibilities will likely have a great time.

    ---

    Friendship is now playing in select theaters.

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