Mormon Missionaries in Popular Culture
Mormon missionaries have been portrayed in various popular culture media. Missionaries are the main focus of LDS cinema films God's Army (1999), The Other Side of Heaven (2001), The Best Two Years (2003), The R.M. (2003), God's Army 2: States of Grace (2005), Return with Honor (2007), and The Errand of Angels (2008). The musical Saturday's Warrior (1973) was also made into a film in 1989. There is also a DVD series, "Liken the Scriptures" that occasionally show missionaries.
Missionaries were featured in the PBS documentary Get the Fire (2003), as well as in the Tony Award-winning satirical Broadway musical The Book of Mormon. Hollywood portrayed missionaries in Yes Man (2008) starring Jim Carrey, and British film Millions also mentioned missionaries. Films portraying missionaries gone astray include Trapped by the Mormons (1922), Orgazmo (1997) and Latter Days (2003).
In 2008, former missionary Chad Hardy was subjected to church discipline after releasing a pin-up calendar titled "Men on a Mission," which consisted of pictures of scantily clad returned missionaries.
Read more about this topic: Missionary (LDS Church)
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