I resolved to read Miguel de Cervantes's Don Quixote (1615) after the World Library declared it the "best literary work ever written," praising it above the book of Job, the Odyssey, and Hamlet. It took a year to complete my quest. In English translation, the novel runs to 391,000 words, four times as long as the first Hunger Games. It feels four times longer than that. I don't mean it's unenjoyable, I just mean it feels as though Cervantes were paid by the word.

He was an interesting guy, Cervantes, and there are times when Man of La Mancha, the 1965 musical adaptation of Don Quixote, is more about the author-playwright than his delusional hidalgo. Cervantes was shot twice in the chest, then lost the use of his left hand to a third bullet in service to the Spanish navy. He spent five years as an Algerian slave. Until the first half of Don Quixote was published, he was penniless. He was arrested twice and subpoenaed by the Seville-based Inquisition for tax fraud. He first conceived of Don Quixote while serving one of his jail terms.

Man of La Mancha finds Cervantes in a dungeon with other prisoners, defending his life by narrating the story of Don Quixote, naïve but faithful Sancho Panza, and scrappy Aldonza. The treatment of Aldonza/Dulcinea in the musical, as opposed to the novel, is deeply disturbing. Cervantes's brawny farm girl is now a prostitute who gets brutally gang-raped in a barn. What's the point of these ugly changes? We're reminded of the Christian tradition that long branded Mary Magdalene a whore, when in fact the Gospels say no such thing.

Tacoma Musical Playhouse deploys undeniable talent, especially in the lead roles. John Cooper, an international veteran, brings comedic and operatic chops to the role of Cervantes/Quixote. I'll likely never see a better Panza than Sam Barker. Nancy Hebert charges through Aldonza so brassily that I doubt most audience members gave her through line much thought. Jeff Barehand portrays a wily Duke, Lance Zielinski a sympathetic Padre. Bruce Haasl's vast dungeon uses every cubic inch of available space, and a brass-heavy orchestra nails Iberian flair.

It's a strongly executed production any way ya slice it, and the audience was rightly impressed by Cooper's soaring rendition of "The Impossible Dream." The literally-third rendition of that song, however, suggests it's the only memorable one. In the novel, Quixote recovers his senses, apologizes for his hallucinatory misadventures, and dies under his true name, Alonso Quixana. Not so the musical Quixote, who's cajoled back into his delusions on his death bed. Even Aldonza now insists she's the virtuous Dulcinea. Leave it to an American musical to shift things around so the female lead's abused, while the male lead's extolled for his fantasies.

MAN OF LA MANCHA, 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, through April 6, Tacoma Musical Playhouse, 7116 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, $20-$29, 253.565.6867