The Cook County herald. [volume] (Grand Marais, Minn.) 1893-1909, 1907-07-20
COMIC OPERA SUBJECT
OF DIPLOMATIC ACTION
British Government, to Please Japan Prevents Re-
uiual of "7he Mikado.''

Grave diplomats recently laid aside
treaties, budgets and other official pa
pers with which their calling usually
deals, and gravely studied the score
and libretto of a comic opera.
They read the lines, listened to the
music, and after serious debate, de-
cided that the comfy now existing be-
tween the great nations of England
and Japan would not be furthered by
a revival Of Gilbert and Sullivan's
"Mikado" in London.
The opera, one Of the greatest favor
ties of the long line of delightful pro-
auctions by the two masters Of the
light musical production, had been
scheduled for revival next month at
the Savoy theater.
Mrs. D'Oyley Carte, widow of the
well known manager of that name, is
conducting the series of REVEALS on
scale of unequalled magnifcance, and
she had relied on the popularity Of the
"Mikado' to return a liberal profit on
the $4,000 she had already spent to
put it back on the boards again.
But the processes of diplomacy are
far more important than any theatrical
managers plans, and the widow had
no redress when an intimation from
high English official, speaking with
government authority, suggested that
it would be the part of courtesy to
abandon the revival of an opera that
was not agreeable to England's ally,
the now all-powerful Japan.
So the merry little opera that has
made million laugh, goes back to the
scrap heap without another hearing.
Just how the piece of work was
managed no one exactly understands.
The secretiveness and sensitiveness of
the laps are well understood They
would resent having it known that
they took enough interest in the mi
kado' to bother about having it
stopped. yet their extreme satisfaction
over the event is proof positive that
they had some part in it. The proba-
hilties are that that very important
parsonage, the Lord High Chamber
Carte know that the revival would not
be regarded with satisfaction by his
majesty's government. In England
such an apparently mild request is
tantamount to mandate. Mrs. Carte
is as reticent as English and Japanese
ctf1cialdom, but in London this course
Of procedure is believed to have done
the business.
The incident is without parallel. In
stances are not rare, in fact they oc-
cur frequently, Of governments inter
fering with plays Or operas that are
regarded as incendiary, disrespectful
to reigning sovereign or prejudicial
to public morals. Thus Verdi had
great difficulty before he was able to
produce two of his masterpieces, THE
Masked BalI' and "Rigoletto' The
former dealt with the assassination of
ruler, and before he got it past the
Italian censor, he had to shift the
scene to the United States, and make
the libretto wholly ridiculous.
But this interference of a govern
ment for it's own protection in the
case of serious works that might pro-
mote dangerous revolutionary senti~
ment at time when public sentiment
is already inf1amed to the danger point
is far different from the present case.
Here is an opera which is twenty
two years old. It has been sung with
out protest all over the world Its
purpose is frankly to entertain, and it
was probably the last thought that
ever occurred to Gilbert that his mer=
ry little conceit would ever be a SUBJ
ject of diplomatic discussion.
When THE Mikado' was written in
1885, Japan was no more reckoned
with as world power than Afghanis-
tan is now. People of the Occident
classed Japan and China together, and
gave the latter credit of being greater
and stronger.
Nothing was further from the
thoughts of Gilbert than to attempt to
give an accurate picture of conditions
in the land of Nippon. The chances
are that Japan and it's people were
subjects on which his ignorance and
his Indifference were equally COM
plete. He neither knew or cared any,