Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado Premieres
Gilbert and Sullivan's *The Mikado* premiered on March 14, 1885, at the Savoy Theatre in London, marking the ninth collaboration between the celebrated British duo of playwright-composer William S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan. Known for their clever satire and catchy melodies, Gilbert and Sullivan had already established a solid reputation with previous works such as *HMS Pinafore* and *The Pirates of Penzance*. *The Mikado* features a whimsical plot that plays on Victorian societal norms, set against an exotic backdrop of Japan, a country that was a subject of fascination in the West during the 1880s.
The production involved significant research into Japanese culture, with Gilbert engaging Japanese tutors to help his cast embody the nuances of court etiquette. The operetta's characters, including the Lord High Executioner Ko-Ko and the pompous Pooh-Bah, provide humorous commentary on governance and authority, all set to an "oriental" musical score. The opening night was a resounding success, with attendees enjoying the vibrant performances, leading to a run of 672 performances. Despite the eventual strains in their partnership, Gilbert and Sullivan's operettas, particularly *The Mikado*, continue to be widely performed and cherished in English-speaking regions today.
Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado Premieres
Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado Premieres
On March 14, 1885, the comic opera The Mikado, by the British playwright-composer duo of William S. Gilbert and Arthur Seymour Sullivan, premiered at the Savoy Theatre in London, England. It was the ninth operetta the duo had created and a particularly elaborate production. The opening was eagerly awaited, for Gilbert and Sullivan had established a solid reputation for witty and tuneful entertainments in the course of their partnership.
William S. Gilbert, the librettist, was born in London in 1836. He was educated at the University of London and qualified as a barrister but made his name as a writer of plays and comic verse. He teamed with Arthur S. Sullivan in 1871. Sullivan was born in 1842, also in London, and educated at the Royal Academy of Music and the Leipzig Conservatory in Germany. He achieved his first success with incidental music for Shakespeare's The Tempest and subsequently became professor of composition at the Royal Academy. Despite their contrasting temperaments—Gilbert being noisily energetic and irascible, Sullivan idealistic and sensitive—they worked together for 25 years, until 1896, creating 14 operettas, including, besides The Mikado, the hugely popular HMS Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, and Iolanthe. An alliance with the impressario Richard D'Oyly Carte, who built the Savoy, gave Gilbert and Sullivan a company and a venue for their productions.
Gilbert delighted in satirizing the mores and institutions of his own Victorian England and the various fads that rippled through its polite society. He soon discovered that the rigid proprieties of Victorian England would look even sillier when displayed in an unlikely setting—aboard a pirate ship, for instance, or in a rather unethereal Fairyland.
According to his own account, he was inspired to set his next story in Japan when an antique Japanese sword he owned fell off the wall of his study. This was a timely omen, for all things Japanese were the rage. The Emperor of Japan had sent a select group of dignitaries to England to observe and study Western ways, and they had established themselves in a tiny showcase colony in London, to the fascination of their new neighbors. Gilbert hastened to observe and study the visiting Japanese and ended by arranging for several of them to tutor his cast in the body-language of the imperial court—the hobbling trot of high-born ladies and the proper use of the fan. He managed every aspect of the production. To further the illusion of authenticity, he had the sumptuous costumes for the show made of imported silk according to traditional designs and sought advice on makeup and hairstyles from a geisha. Attempts to use real Japanese armor onstage proved unsuccessful, however: The pieces were too small and also too heavy for his actors, who were required to do a good deal of pacing and capering about.
All of this was in the service of a classically Gilbertian plot, whose fantastic complications had nothing to do with the actual nation of Japan and everything to do with an insular society closer to home. Audiences were especially amused by Ko-Ko, the Lord High Executioner, and Pooh-Bah, the Lord High Everything Else, a pair of proud and punctilious (and conveniently corruptible) ministers of state, and by their serenely autocratic lord, the Mikado. All of this was also set to melodies which made use of gongs and chimes to give an “oriental” flavor to the score. A patter song (a form Sullivan introduced to the English stage) was assigned to the Mikado himself, who outlines appropriate punishments for society's bores and cads. The performers included Richard Temple (the Mikado), Rosina Brandram (Lady Katisha), Durward Lely (Nanki-Poo), Leonora Braham (Yum-Yum), George Grossmith (Ko-Ko), and Rutland Barrington (Pooh-Bah).
The Mikado received seven encores on opening night and ran for 672 performances. It was one of the most successful operettas Gilbert and Sullivan had ever written and is still frequently revived. Collaboration, however, was becoming more and more difficult, and the relationship finally ended. Sullivan died of kidney failure in 1900 after a long illness, Gilbert of a heart attack in 1911, as he tried to rescue a nonswimmer from deep water. Both men had been knighted, Sullivan in 1883 and Gilbert, whose satirical thrusts had offended Queen Victoria, much later, in 1907.
Ironically, each man believed that his most important work was whatever he had created alone, without the other's help, yet it is their collaborative projects which have survived. Except for a few hymns and songs by Sullivan (“The Lost Chord,” “Onward, Christian Soldiers”) and a few humorous poems by Gilbert (“To the Terrestrial Globe,” “The Yarn of the Nancy Bell”), their individual efforts have been largely forgotten. The operettas, however, are regularly produced in Britain, the United States, and other English-speaking nations.