A laser projector having a configurable spatial light modulator (SLM) adapted to display various spatial modulation patterns and redirect illumination from a laser to form an image on the viewing screen. The laser projector drives the SLM to change spatial modulation patterns at a rate that causes the corresponding sequence of projected images to fuse to mitigate appearance of speckle in the resulting fused image. The SLM can be designed to redirect the illumination using either diffraction or specular reflection of light from the displayed spatial modulation pattern. In one embodiment, the SLM is a MEMS device having an array of individually addressable mirrors supported over a substrate and adapted to move (e.g., translate and/or rotate) with respect to the substrate.