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Last week, we saw Spamalot at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Milwaukee.  Being a huge Monty Python fan, I had some pretty high expectations.  I would say that overall, those expectations were met.  The show has great production values, with some fairly elaborate sets and video being used in some occasions as well.  Obviously, we didn't get the original Broadway cast, which I would have loved to have seen (David Hyde Pierce, Tim Curry, Hank Azaria), but the travelling cast was great.  And at least I didn't have to see Clay Aiken as Sir Robin.  They even had their own way of mimicing the opening credits of the movie in a way:  There is an opening number with a Finnish setting, and everyone singing a song about Finland, with the cast members not hearing the historian saying England correctly.

Of course, the most important part of an adaptation of "the Holy Grail" is the story, and how well it is converted to a new medium.  I think this was done very well.  I don't want to get into too many details with the story, both because most of it is close to the movie, and also because I wouldn't want to spoil all of the changes and the ending for anyone out there that wants to see it.  However, there were some pretty significant changes that I think worked really well for a Broadway musical.  First, they took some of the characters from the opening scenes (where Arthur is travelling around England to try and find his knights) and made it so that these characters became the knights of the round table.  Dennis becomes Sir Galahad, and the guy collecting the dead and the guy trying to pass off the "not quite dead yet" guy as dead become Sir Robin and Sir Lancelot respectively.  They also make the Lady of the Lake an actual character, so there can be a female lead for the show.  Several of the songs and new scenes make fun of the show itself and musicals and Broadway in general, with varying levels of humor ("You Won't Succeed on Broadway" was hilarious and made me think that it was Mel Brooks and not Eric Idle coming up with the laughs).  Beyond that, some scenes get removed, a few get added or extended, and others get changed or moved around, but it's pretty faithful overall.  The ending is also significantly different from the movie, which I think is good.  Even though I found the ending of the movie to be funny, I still feel that it's the weakest part of the entire film, so changing it drastically for the musical is no big deal to me. 

The only disappointment for me is that the scene on the bridge is completely cut from the musical.  Of course, that's a fairly difficult scene to mimic on stage, so I understand it, but it still makes me sad.  There was also one point where Lancelot disappears from the group without any explanation whatsoever, but I can let that one go.  Most importantly, Erin really liked the show.  I was pretty worried about that, since she didn't really care for the movie at all.  I'm hoping now that I can get her into Monty Python a little more, and maybe she'll give the grail a second chance.