Innocent merriment: Off-Monroe Players bring back ‘The Mikado’

When the Off-Monroe Players unveil Gilbert and Sullivan’s “The Mikado” tonight, it will be the group’s eighth production of a show that has seen great popularity and a bit of controversy.

The Victorian team of William S. Gilbert (words) and Arthur Sullivan (music) produced a baker’s dozen of operettas in the late 19^th century, including such hits as “HMS Pinafore” and “The Pirates of Penzance.” But their greatest hit was “The Mikado” (1885), which not only ran more than 600 performances in London, but also traveled to the United States, Canada, and Australia, and (in translation) to Germany, Russia, and even Japan. It’s been filmed and shown on television several times.

According to legend, one evening, Gilbert was stomping around his study, lost in thought, and just missed a large Japanese sword that fell from the wall. This gave him the inspiration to set an operetta in Japan, centering on a mythical village named Titipu and its Lord High Executioner, whose tender-heartedness is adversely affecting his job performance. Gilbert added legal quibbles, romantic complications, and colorful supporting characters, and had his newest, and most successful, show.

The setting of “The Mikado” was Japanese, but there are only a few references to Japan in the script. Sullivan incorporated only one traditional Japanese tune. Otherwise, his music sounds thoroughly British, including such famous numbers as “The Flowers that Bloom in the Spring,” “A Wandering Minstrel,” “Three Little Maids from School,” and even a four-voice madrigal.

Recently, “The Mikado” has been called out by some for its inaccurate, potentially insulting appropriation of Japanese elements. Much of the controversy centered on traditional performing practices—“yellow face” and slanted eye makeup, mincing steps, nasal accents, and other clichés of Japanese deportment—which are indeed offensive to modern audiences.

However, the show’s sense of fun is timeless, and “The Mikado” plays just as well without those trappings. In its 2017 production, the Off-Monroe Players removed all references to Japan from the show, setting it instead in “Ro-cha-cha,” with a familiar-looking skyline as the backdrop. This year brings a compromise: Director Amanda Lobaugh has left the script and setting unchanged, and costumer Brian Smith has dressed the cast in a mostly western style, with kimonos and fans as a nod to tradition.

OMP has been producing Gilbert and Sullivan shows regularly since 1977. The group is unique in Rochester not only for its repertoire, but for its no-admission policy; its shows are available to everyone. That’s possible in part because G&S has not been under copyright for many decades.

Like all community theater groups, the Off-Monroe Players are a diverse group of people, both new and experienced. One “Mikado” chorus member has been in almost every production since 1977, and several others joined in the 1980s and 1990s.

One of the “newbies,” in his phrase, is Peter Schermerhorn. He is making his OMP debut in the leading comedy role of Ko-Ko, the feckless tailor who has greatness thrust upon him as Titipu’s Lord High Executioner—but who can’t bring himself to kill anybody.

“I’m nowhere near as immersed in Gilbert and Sullivan as some of our cast members,” says Schermerhorn, “but I was made to feel welcome from the beginning. We have no divas. There’s a wonderful esprit de corps.”

In retirement, Schermerhorn is pursuing his interest in musical theater with acting classes at Monroe Community College and voice lessons at Hochstein.

“I’m enjoying the experience of acting in music,” he says, “and I love working on the character of Ko-Ko. He’s such a boob, but he’s doing what he needs to do to get through.”

Jordu Kelly-Sutliff has been a regular member of the OMP chorus since 1990, with a brief time off. What keeps her coming back to the group? “It’s the friendliness,” she says, “and the humor of the shows.” Her favorites are “The Pirates of Penzance” and “Patience.”

She adds: “I also love that chorus members don’t have to audition,” another longstanding OMP policy. “I’m fine performing with other people doing the same thing. I auditioned for a small part a couple of times and it scared the heck out of me!”

Another chorus member, Thomas Beach, is returning after playing Strephon in “Iolanthe” in 2011, and was happy to see many familiar people still with OMP, and still “funny and nerdy about Gilbert and Sullivan.” “Iolanthe” remains his favorite show, but he hopes to play in “The Yeomen of the Guard,” one of G&S’ grander efforts.

The Tennessee native has sung in opera, and finds G&S “deceptively difficult. When you watch it, it’s so much fun that it seems like anybody can do it. But I think it’s just as hard as grand opera.”

The Gilbert and Sullivan shows can be challenging to a contemporary audience. Gilbert’s wit and verbal dexterity still amuse and amaze, but his formal diction and complicated plots can be difficult to decipher. Sullivan’s tuneful arias and choruses are in a more operatic style than we’re used to in later musicals.

But that has not stopped the Off-Monroe Players and their enthusiastic, supportive audiences. To borrow a Gilbertian phrase from “The Mikado,” OMP hopes to remain “a source of innocent merriment” for a long time to come. Next year will bring the company’s 50^th anniversary, including productions of a W. S. Gilbert farce, “Engaged,” and two G&S staples, “The Gondoliers” and “HMS Pinafore.”

“It’s so light, so clearly fun,” says Schermerhorn of the appeal of “The Mikado” and Gilbert and Sullivan in general. “It’s like a delicious dessert that dissolves on your tongue.”

Off-Monroe Players present Gilbert and Sullivan’s “The Mikado” May 8, 9, 15, and 16 at 7:30 p.m. and May 10 and 17 at 2 p.m. at Downtown United Presbyterian Church, 121 North Fitzhugh St. Admission is free but reservations are encouraged at off-monroeplayers.org

David Raymond is a Rochester Beacon contributing writer.

The Beacon welcomes comments and letters from readers who adhere to our comment policy including use of their full, real name. See “Leave a Reply” below to discuss on this post. Comments of a general nature may be submitted to the Letters page by emailing  [email protected].