 | This article relies largely or entirely on a single source. (April 2021) |
| Xanadu: The Marco Polo Musical | |
|---|---|
 Xanadu: The Marco Polo Musical poster | |
| Music | William Perry William S. Wheeling |
| Lyrics | William Perry William S. Wheeling |
| Productions | 1953 Stuttgart |
Xanadu: The Marco Polo Musical is an original musical written and produced in 1953 by Seventh Army Special Services in Germany, the first of the numerous stage musicals, film musicals and songs inspired in part by the Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem Kubla Khan with its opening lines:
- In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
- A stately pleasure-dome decree
- Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
- Through caverns measureless to man
- Down to a sunless sea.
The play featured the mythical Chinese/Mongol city of Xanadu, which is also a color associated with the Yuan dynasty.
The score was written by songwriting team William P. Perry and William S. Wheeling, both of whom had been drawn into the Armed Forces shortly after their graduation from Harvard University. The cast and other members of the creative team were transferred from military units all over the world, and in spite of frequent cast changes as draftees were returned home, the show ran for five years and played both civilian and military theatres throughout Europe.