THE BOOK OF MORMON National Tour Kicks Off in Denver in 2012

THE BOOK OF MORMON, the new Broadway musical nominated for 14 Tony Awards including Best Musical and winner of the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Musical, will launch its national tour in December 2012 at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts (DCPA). A complete tour schedule will be announced in the coming weeks.

"We can't tell you how much it means to us to open the tour in the state in which we grew up. It's like coming home," said "South Park" creator Trey Parker. "We can't wait to play the show across America and the fact that we're getting the chance to start where we grew up is an incredible bonus and very humbling."

"I am honored that Matt, Trey and the entire team have given Denver the nod to open their national tour at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts," said Randy Weeks, President of the DCPA. "The Book of Mormon has reinvented Broadway. It's fantastic that the folks in Colorado will have the first opportunity to see the tour."

THE BOOK OF MORMON features book, music and lyrics by Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone. Parker and Stone are the four-time Emmy Award-winning creators of Comedy Central's landmark animated series, "South Park." Tony Award-winner Lopez is co-creator of the long-running hit musical comedy, Avenue Q. The world premiere musical is choreographed by five-time Tony Award-nominee Casey Nicholaw (Monty Python's Spamalot, The Drowsy Chaperone) and is directed by Nicholaw and Parker.

THE BOOK OF MORMON, which follows a pair of mismatched Mormon boys sent on a mission to a place that's about as far from Salt Lake City as you can get, has been nominated for 14 Tony Awards, including Best Musical; 12 Drama Desk Awards, including Best Musical; 6 Outer Critics Circle Awards, including Best Musical and the Drama League Award for Best Musical. On May 9th, THE BOOK OF MORMON won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Musical.

THE BOOK OF MORMON features set design by Scott Pask, costume design by Ann Roth, lighting design by Brian MacDevitt and sound design by Brian Ronan. Orchestrations are by Larry Hochman and Stephen Oremus. Music direction and vocal arrangements are by Stephen Oremus.

Ghostlight Records will release the Original Broadway Cast Recording for THE BOOK OF MORMON digitally on Tuesday, May 17 and physically on Tuesday, June 7.

As BroadwayWorld announced earlier today, a West End production of the comedy is also rumored to be in the works for 2012. Sonia Friedman (producer of the West End's Legally Blonde, Arcadia, La Cage Aux Folles, A Little Night Music, and many more) is reportedly behind the London transfer, according to whatsonstage.com.

For more information, visit www.bookofmormonbroadway.com.