First, let me say how much I love Durham's Carolina Theater. It's beautiful.
As a life long Gilbert and Sullivan fan, I must confess to being disappointed in this production. This wasn't a playful rethinking. It seemed at times to actually be making fun of this great comic opera itself.
If you think this opera is ridiculous, don't put it on. Do another instead. I would have assumed that the Durham Savoyards would love G & S works, in particular, the Mikado. But the 'aesthetic' choices made demonstrate an actual distaste for the opera.
I like re-imaginings of great classics. They are stimulating and demonstrate a thorough understanding and PASSION for the work. I offer the recent King Lear film and the NYMet Valkyrie production with The Machine - which supported and added to the epic nature of the piece.
The choices made here for the Mikado did actual violence to the opera. The Brits dressed as Japanese sending up human foibles in general and British society in particular is central to the opera. The choice to make Pooh-bah a drawling (mostly) Southerner was very wrong.
This great story did not need another story clumsily constructed onto it - the tailor bit. Why? If you loved and lived the opera, it provides great depths to explore without incongruous add-ons.
This production was very, very amateurish and for lack of a better word - childish. It was an insult to the work. I could have appreciated the choices made, perhaps, if it had been a high school production. No insult intended to high school productions. But to an ensemble group dedicated to the body of work of Gilbert and Sullivan?
I couldn't recommend this to anyone and don't know if I can ever summon the courage to watch another Durham Savoyard treatment of comedic genius in the clumsiest of hands!