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THE MIKADO program Note

by David Wannen and David Auxier-Loyola

The Mikado is undoubtedly the most popular piece of musical theatre of all time, when its 135-year history is taken into account. For decades, a production of G&S’s satirical opera could be seen somewhere in the English-speaking world every day of the year. Its libretto has found its way into our language, with expressions such as the “grand Pooh-Bah” and “Let the punishment fit the crime.” Several films have been made of or about the work, including Mike Leigh’s 1999 film Topsy-Turvy, which presented an intimate portrait of the characters of W.S. Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, and the repertory cast of the original D’Oyly Carte Opera Company, following G&S’s inspiration and development of the very first Mikado production.

In 2016 New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players created the production of The Mikado that you are about to see. Our goal was simple and it remains the same now: to forge a path through the 21st century so that The Mikado can be forever enjoyed by all audiences and artists. The show opened to sold out crowds and critical acclaim in December of 2016, was revived in 2019, and has been on tour all over the USA. We are proud to share this production, which upholds The Mikado’s musical score, setting, characters, storytelling, themes, and most of all its universal satire of human nature, with you today.

Our reimagined production starts with a short, original prologue. After you enjoy the soaring overture brilliantly played by the NYGASP Orchestra, the curtain opens not on the fictional Japanese town of Titipu, but on the imagined offices of the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company on the morning after their successful opening night of Princess Ida, which Gilbert & Sullivan wrote immediately before The Mikado. This short scene sets the stage for our concept of The Mikado as a story imagined (in real time) inside the mind of our author, W. S. Gilbert, who was inspired by the Japanese artifacts he has just seen, the conversations he has just had and the colleagues with whom he has just interacted. At the end of the Prologue, we are launched dramatically into a Titipu of Pure Imagination, and we are right back to Sullivan's score and Gilbert's libretto that we all know and love!

Our company has also, for its entire history, firmly held the belief that modern topical references are appropriate to make the audience’s experience as immediate as it was for the audiences of the 19th century. Londoners would have understood many of Gilbert’s references to popular figures and places of the time. We believe that theatre is a living medium and that judicious revisions are appropriate, whether they be for reasons of entertainment, understanding, or changing cultural sensibilities. Therefore, our long established practice of inserting topical references is ever present for the audience to enjoy in this production.

However, it is the universal truth of The Mikado that has endured and delighted us through the decades. There is nothing more universal than death, and in The Mikado, Gilbert’s dark humor makes us laugh at this most common of all aspects of the human condition. Vanity, acting before thinking of the consequences, the artifices of social behavior, the corrupting influence of power, and many other easily identifiable foibles are all the objects of Gilbert’s wit. Are these not deliciously topical in today’s socio-political environment?

Add to this heady mixture an element of genuine pathos for the piece’s villainess and one quickly recognizes why this story still intrigues and fascinates us 135 years after its creation. We hope you enjoy our new production of The Mikado. Please pass your love of Gilbert & Sullivan to our youth, so that they may sing its beauty “with joyous shout and ringing cheer” for the ages to come.

The Mikado Advisory Committee
Robert Lee & Scott Watanabe – Lead Advisors
Cáitlín Burke, Randal Eng, Steven Eng, Dr. Jonathan Ichikawa, Christine Toy Johnson,
Daniel Larsen, Orville Mendoza, Erin Quill, Minami Yusui, Katherine Zhao