Gilbert & Sullivan: The Mikado
by John Michael Phillips
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DVD details
Actor: Bonaventura Bottone, Eric Idle, Felicity Palmer, Lesley Garrett, Richard Van AllanDirector: John Michael Phillips
Brand: A and E Home Video
Producer: English National Opera
Writer: Gilbert and Sullivan
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo; English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Format: Color, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 130 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2005-12-26
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: A&E Home Video
Product features:
- The irrepressible Eric Idle (Monty Python s Flying Circus) teams up with the English National Opera in this hilarious performance of Gilbert and Sullivan s beloved comic opera, THE MIKADO. This rollicking version of Gilbert and Sullivan s most popular tale relocates the action from ancient Japan to a 1920s English seaside resort. Here the rule of the Mikado is absolute--and often prone to whims
DVD Reviews of Gilbert & Sullivan: The Mikado
DVD Review: A fine performance of Gilbert and Sullivan's "The Mikado," in spite of its director and production design
Summary: 4 Stars
SOURCE: 1986 live performance at the London Coliseum.
CAST: The Mikado, Emperor of Japan - Richard Angas (bass); Ko-Ko, Lord High Executioner of the Town of Titipu - Eric Idle (baritone, sort of); Poo-Bah, all the other ministers of state rolled into one - Richard Van Allan (baritone); Pish-Tush, a gentleman of Titipu - Mark Richardson (baritone); Nanki-Poo, the son of the Mikado disguised as a wandering minstrel - Bonaventura Bottone (tenor); Yum-Yum, Ko-Ko's ward - Lesley Garrett (soprano); Peep-Bo, Yum-Yum's schoolmate - Susan Bullock (mezzo-soprano); Pitti-Sing, Yum-Yum's schoolmate - Ethna Robinson (soprano); Katisha - a lady of the Mikado's court who is engaged to Nanki-Poo - Felicity Palmer (mezzo-soprano).
CONDUCTOR: Peter Robinson with the Orchestra and Chorus of the English National Opera.
PRODUCTION STAFF: Producer and stage director - Jonathan Miller; television director - John Michael Phillips.
DVD EXTRAS: "A Source of Innocent Merriment: The Making of the Mikado"; downloadable libretto in PDF format; thumbnail cast biographies; menu and scene selection.
TEXT: The spoken dialogue is generally faithful to the version Gilbert wrote, despite a couple of pointless omissions and gratuitous additions. The usual silly updatings have been made to Ko-Ko's "list" and the Mikado's "punishments" song. As usual the changes add nothing to the show. The overture is truncated to a little over two minutes.
SETS: At the beginning of Act 1, a card appears on the screen to inform the audience that the show takes place at a seaside off the coast of Japan. It appears to be quite some distance from Japan, perhaps near the Isle of Wight, for the scene appears to be the main lobby of a large, mostly white-painted, very snooty, Edwardian hotel that is jammed full with English luminaries.
COSTUMES: The overall production design is consistently black and white with some dark gray. Even the makeup tends toward very pale. The production has been yanked out of medieval Japan and plunked down in the late 1920s or early 1930s, sometimes making absolute nonsense out of the spoken lines. Whether inappropriate or not, the costumes range from formal to sporting and are handsome and elegant.
TELEVISION IMAGERY: The television director, John Michael Phillips seems to be an incompetent or a fool or perhaps both. He clearly feels that he is required to "improve" on a mere stage piece by nervous cutting, irrelevant camera angles and superimposed images. Each of his directorial touches interrupts the flow of the show and is progressively more and more annoying. Throughout the DVD, there is a subtle hint of fogginess that reminds me of the Vaseline-on-the-lens close-ups of Doris Day in her old films with Rock Hudson.
SOUND: Dolby digital stereo without any particular bells and whistles.
COMMENTARY: This is an example, albeit mostly benign, of "Regietheater," so-called "director-theater." The director, Jonathan Miller, appears on the accompanying "making-of" piece, carefully explaining that author W. S. Gilbert got it wrong and that a hundred years of doing the show his way has been a fluke. At last the genius of Jonathan Miller has penetrated to the truth about "The Mikado:" it is NOT about the Japanese, but about the English. When I heard that, my reaction was, "Big whoop, Jonathan!" It is nice to discover that even such a close-minded creature as a famous and revered stage director can eventually work his way to what has been painfully bleeding obvious to audiences all over the world since the show opened on March 14, 1885.
In accordance with his great revelation, Miller has thrown overboard all the Japanese trappings in favor of ultra-posh, 1930-ish Englishness. Miller was so hyped up on this notion that he spent great effort in duplicating the accents found in early English sound films. (In the making-of feature, there is a scene right out of the old movie musical "42nd Street" during which Miller attempts to get his leading soprano to say "wuhlld" rather than "world." Just like Ruby Keeler, more than fifty years before, she repeats the line over and over without discernable change.) Miller is obviously quite indifferent to the fact that his re-setting of the show makes absolute hash out of the plain meaning of many of the lines, whatever the accent in which they are spoken.
Having now vented on the directorial concept, I must report that the performance is a good one in spite of Millers' brainstorm. The sets and costumes look good, the performers range from more-than-adequate to excellent. Eric Idle is the name star of the show and he is fine as Ko-Ko the upstart former cheap tailor who has been promoted to chief man of his town. (For hard core G&S fans, I must amplify that by adding that while very good, he is no better than such historic Ko-Kos as Henry Lytton, Martyn Green or even John Reed.) Felicity Palmer is a very good Katisha, although, I think, directed to make her voice too harsh from time to time, but she is made up and costumed in far too glamorous a fashion for a love-sick maiden reduced to boasting about the loveliness of her elbow and despairing of finding a new victim ... ahem, lover. Bonaventura Bottone is a remarkably and surprisingly fine G&S tenor, in some ways the real "find" of the show. Mark Richardson offers an unusually strong Pish-Tush, even if he is a bit over-parted with the basso-profundo depths required in Act 2. Richard Van Allan is OK as Poo-Bah, but I have the distinct impression that he would be much better with more experience in the role. Richard Angas in an astonishing costume, is visually impressive as The Mikado but not a great deal more. Garrett, Bullock and Robinson are fine as the three little maids, although hardly memorable.
The male choristers are made up to look like famous individuals of the 1920s. This is amusing at first, but it quickly becomes a nuisance. After all, if Lytton-Strachey and Noel Coward are there, why won't they step forward and say something witty?
This is a production with grievous faults for a knowledgeable G&S fan. Those faults, however, are not of such nature as to bother the great majority of viewers who simply want a good-looking, funny, well-sung version of a show that has plenty of good music and laughs.
Four stars, for not even Miller can stifle a perpetual source of "innocent merriment."
Description of Gilbert & Sullivan: The Mikado
The irrepressible Eric Idle (Monty Python?s Flying Circus) teams up with the English National Opera in this hilarious performance of Gilbert and Sullivan?s beloved comic opera, THE MIKADO. This rollicking version of Gilbert and Sullivan?s most popular tale relocates the action from ancient Japan to a 1920s English seaside resort. Here the rule of the Mikado is absolute--and often prone to whimsy. Ko-Ko (Eric Idle) is sentenced to death for the crime of flirting, but in a strange turn of events is instead named "Lord High Executioner." A delightful farce ensues as Ko-Ko can?t behead anyone without first cutting off his own head. But by the second act, the Mikado demands an execution and Ko-Ko must delicately sing and dance his way around a messy situation involving the Mikado?s son and his secret love Yum Yum. One of the best loved gems in all of opera, this charming production of THE MIKADO adds a unique twist to the timeless music--especially with the madcap talent of Eric Idle in his opera debut! DVD Features: A Source of Innocent Merriment: The Making of The Mikado; Downloadable Libretto; Cast Biographies; Interactive Menus; Scene SelectionSimilar DVDs, VHS Video, Audio CDs
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