The Mikado: Why are people still doing it?

This is a post I made to my Facebook back in December of 2019. But it’s still important and informative. So here you go.

Sooo… More companies continue to be putting up Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado. In particular, the New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players (NYGASP). This caught my attention through a Facebook post from Broadway Box linking me to 10 performances of “Three Little Maids from School” from The Mikado. One of these performances is an Alvin and the Chipmunks rendition of this song (oh boy). (Link to BroadwayBox article https://www.broadwaybox.com/daily-scoop/10-performances-of-three-little-maids-from-school-from-the-mikad/?fbclid=IwAR1ZotVbXzX-_Q4GI3aZQOojZ6gIPYd-RiapVD5x6XOm7UZGF-OJIoJoGNI)

Anyway, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of information about this 2019/2020 production that the NYGASP is putting on but it seems to be the same production from 2016/2017 that employed the help of Asian-American performer/director Kelvin Moon Loh in an attempt to make it less offensive/racist. But, the cast is still not fully Asian so… My personal view is that companies should just stop doing The Mikado, unless maybe they do it with all Asians. Here are a couple articles to get an overview of the situation. The main one being a blog post that kind of sums everything up (although this is a 2017 article).

https://www.onstageblog.com/columns/2017/1/15/nygasp-the-mikado-was-it-diverse-enough?fbclid=IwAR0GoA5QmpoFzCYYpOM2sBr1d09Sk5FKIpOmcIpB_eFYPvsSD6X5fDb8r5I

A couple other articles:

An article from 2016 explaining this “re-imagining”:

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/an-asian-american-reimagining-of-gilbert-and-sullivans-the-mikado?fbclid=IwAR1TWp93oYXGbCUYeib-_t3s1nR4gLS8nEweliK1JaQxMBaFY2dwicNx9Zw

2019 Playbill article citing this December/January production as the same one:

https://www.playbill.com/article/cast-set-for-new-york-gilbert-sullivan-players-production-of-the-mikado?fbclid=IwAR2FMDCEH5WS-gnVtSNGBsFqLhiQRZiKAO_9pLm3AMVd2ePRyql_eRr3YSA