Spamalot
The story is set in medieval England–a nasty, brutish world of mud and filth, plague and war, beheadings and burnings at the stake. King Arthur is traveling round the countryside–“riding” without a horse to the accompaniment of clip-clop coconuts–and recruiting knights to join him in seeking the Holy Grail. (“That’s a king,” one character says of Arthur. “How can you tell?” responds another. “He hasn’t got shit all over ‘im,” the first fellow replies.) As in the legend (and the film), the quest takes each man–Arthur, Sir Robin, Sir Lancelot, Sir Galahad, and Sir Bedevere–on his own adventures. Arthur, for example, finds romance with the Lady of the Lake, a water nymph accompanied by a retinue of cheerleaders, the Laker Girls (ouch). Robin falls in love with the world of musical comedy, a place filled with “people who can sing and dance–often at the same time.” And Lancelot goes on a mission to rescue a princess from a tower, where she’s imprisoned until she agrees to marry according to her father’s wishes. Turns out the princess is a prince (Christian Borle), but what the hell.
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What Spamalot lacks at this point is a central relationship the audience can care about. The Producers and Hairspray, its predecessors in the quest
Where: Shubert Theatre, 22 W. Monroe
