The Mikado, introduced at the Savoy Theatre in London on March 14, 1885, was the ninth in the series of comic operas written by W.S. Gilbert with music composed by Sir Arthur Sullivan. The original Savoy Theatre run of The Mikado was over 600 performances, an outstanding number for any production at that time.

The setting of the opera was in the imaginary small town of Titipu in Japan, far away from Britain. The librettist, Gilbert, had used exotic settings for many of his works as a way of “disguising” in part the satirical thrust of his work, which pointed out the foibles and folly of the British aristocracy and government.

British Attitudes about Japan

British views of Asia and in fact the attitudes of the western world in general were still quite narrow in 1885. Barley a generation earlier, United States Navy Commodore Mathew C. Perry, entered Japan’s harbor, in 1853.

Japan at the time was essentially closed to trade with the western nations except for a small trading facility in Nagasaki used by the Dutch. Perry request that Japan's leadership accept a letter from the U.S. President Millard accepting trade with the United States and the outside world was accompanied by an initial show of force. This show of force was sufficient to have the Japanese open their ports to trade.

Some of the art and fashion of Japan had started to trickle into England and aroused amazement and mystery; Gilbert and Sullivan’s opera permitted them to capitalize on this new interest in Japan. It was not merely coincidence that in Knightsbridge, a Japanese Village had opened in January 1885, just prior to the opening of The Mikado. The village was an exhibition which featured approximately one hundred men and women carrying out daily life activities.

Success of The Mikado

The British craze for all things Japanese was to create fervor for the new comic opera. However, the success of The Mikado was not in the end solely a result of the Japanese craze, but in turn flamed the interest in all things Japanese.

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