The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert, their ninth of fourteen operatic collaborations. It opened on 14 March 1885, in London, where it ran at the Savoy Theatre for 672 performances, the second-longest run for any work of musical theatre and one of the longest runs of any theatre piece up to that time.[1][n 1] By the end of 1885, it was estimated that, in Europe and America, at least 150 companies were producing the opera.[2]
The Mikado is the most internationally successful Savoy opera[3] and has been especially popular with amateur and school productions. The work has been translated into numerous languages and is one of the most frequently played musical theatre pieces in history. The Mikado is a satire of late 19th century British institutions, society and politics. By setting the opera in a fantasy Japan, an exotic locale far away from contemporary Britain, Gilbert was able to satirise British politics more freely and soften the impact of his criticisms of British social institutions, in a similar way that he used other "foreign" settings in Princess Ida, The Gondoliers, Utopia, Limited and The Grand Duke. Nevertheless, some 21st-century productions of the opera in the United States have drawn criticism for promoting stereotypes of East Asians.
- ^ Gillan, Don. Longest runs in the theatre up to 1920. Archived 23 September 2015 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Mencken, H. L. Article on The Mikado Archived 24 September 2008 at the Wayback Machine, Baltimore Evening Sun, 29 November 1910
- ^ Jaffé, Daniel. "The top 10 Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, ranked and rated", BBC Music Magazine, 9 March 2022
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