Below are photo's, reviews
Here are some incredible photos by ROMAIN BLANQUART for the Detroit Free Press - David Curry as Nanki and Adrianna Chuchman as Yum Yum
The Mikado - Cast and Production Team
Nanki-po : David Curry
Yum Yum : Andriana Chuchman
Ko Ko: Mike Wanko
Pooh Bah : Andrew Gray
Mikado : Jamie Offenbach
Katisha : Melissa Parks
Pitty Sing : Monica Sciacky
Peep Bo : Jacquelin King
Pish Tush: Edward Hanlon
Director : Micheal Scarola
Music Director: Mark Flint
Choreographer: Dan Knechtges
Yum Yum : Andriana Chuchman
Ko Ko: Mike Wanko
Pooh Bah : Andrew Gray
Mikado : Jamie Offenbach
Katisha : Melissa Parks
Pitty Sing : Monica Sciacky
Peep Bo : Jacquelin King
Pish Tush: Edward Hanlon
Director : Micheal Scarola
Music Director: Mark Flint
Choreographer: Dan Knechtges
MIKADO PRODUCTION SHOTS- John Grigaitis Photographer
Reviews- Click on the link below for the whole review
The Detroit News
‘The Mikado’ opens MOT season with infectious humor
".........Chuchman offered a disarming blend of spirited charm and vocal brilliance. Both of which were required to match the poise, romantic conviction and effortless singing of tenor David Curry, a G&S veteran who commands this production from his first moment on stage......
http://detnews.com/article/20101017/ENT01/10170312/Review--%E2%80%98The-Mikado%E2%80%99-opens-MOT-season-with-infectious-humor
The Detroit Free Press
Charming 'Mikado' opens MOT’s 40th season
"At the center of the action were terrific performances from two young Canadians, tenor David Curry as Nanki-Poo, the Mikado’s son disguised as a wandering minstrel, and the object of his affection, Yum-Yum (soprano Andriana Chuchman). Bright, strong and charismatic, Curry’s voice projected a sweet yet virile expression, and he’s a natural, limber actor"
http://www.freep.com/article/20101017/ENT05/101017016/1035/ent/Charming-Mikado-opens-MOTs-40th-season
MEDIA COVERAGE BELOW - OPERA NEWS, Detroit Freepress, Detroit News and Windsor Star
OPERA NEWS
The Mikado
Michigan Opera Theatre
10/16/10
Michigan Opera Theatre opened its fortieth season with a 125-year-old masterpiece that seemed as young as tomorrow. The Mikado, the Gilbert and Sullivan opera that first saw light in 1885, bounced across the stage of the Detroit Opera House with relentless gusto, boding well for an opera company struggling with this beleaguered city's economy.
Safe bet, some might say. But by the time the final curtain came down at the opening-night performance on October 16, the large audience responded with justifiable joy, pleased as punch with the near-perfection it had witnessed for the previous several hours.
Top vocal honors went to Canadian tenor David Curry, whose bright, clearly focused voice filled Nanki-Poo's notes with consistently silvery sound. Curry's program biography lists mostly musical comedy roles, but he would seem ripe for Donizetti, Bellini, Rossini and early Verdi assignments.
Curry's fellow Canadian Andriana Chuchman displayed a charming soprano that exuded innocence as Yum-Yum. American bass-baritone Michael Wanko, making his company debut as Ko-Ko, was uproariously funny, although his singing voice didn't quite reach the artistic level of his speaking one. Wanko also had the dubious privilege, in the traditionally acceptable insertion of contemporary items into the script, of marking what I suspect was the debut of Sarah Palin's name on an opera-house stage.
Another American, mezzo-soprano Melissa Parks, brought intense energy to Katisha's music, although her voice began to tire out near the end of the performance. Bass-baritone Jamie Offenbach was a sonorous Mikado, but the feathery headdress he wore made him look like an American Indian chief.
Australian bass-baritone Andrew Gray was a properly dignified Poo-Bah, Edward Hanlon a slightly underpowered Pish-Tush. Jacqueline King (Peep-Bo) and Monica Sciaky (Pitti-Sing) were assets in smaller roles.
Conductor Mark Flint led a taut performance characterized by supple playing from the MOT orchestra and energized singing from the MOT chorus. Stage director Michael Scarola, making his MOT debut, created bright stage pictures that reflected rather than impeded the music's impact. Dan Knechtges's choreography was tasteful. Thierry Bosquet's sets and costumes, originally created for New York City Opera, made the transfer to Detroit handily.
JOHN GUINN
WINDSOR STAR
Travelling light-opera star has local ties
Singing's for losers.
At one time in his life, David Curry firmly believed that.
But at 36, the Chatham native is now making a living singing in the world's great opera halls, so he has revised his opinion.
"I was in university when I told that to someone putting on a Gilbert & Sullivan production," he said. Curry landed the role but his heart wasn't in it -- he only auditioned, he said, "to meet chicks."
He met one, too -- Anita Curry, his wife and mother of their two children.
By his own calculations, Curry has performed in more than 750 productions of light opera, mostly Gilbert & Sullivan, and that's what brings him back to the Windsor-Detroit area. He sings Nanki-Poo in Michigan Opera Theatre's The Mikado, which opens Saturday at the Detroit Opera House.
"You don't grow up wanting to be an opera singer," Curry said. "At least, I didn't."
Though born in Chatham, Curry grew up in Oakville and appeared in high school plays. But he also sat on student council and participated in school sports.
When he went off to the University of Western Ontario the first time, it was to study science and eventually medicine. In fact, he had his eye on a career as a naval doctor.
Curry comes from a family of naval officers -- William Curry, his grandfather, was commanding officer of Windsor's HMCS Hunter.
He joined the naval reserve, then later trained at CFB Chilliwack in British Columbia and entered the Canadian Forces officers' training school.
But after finishing ninth in a class of 121, Curry decided he could pursue a naval career at anytime. "Many of the students in the school were career military people in their 40s," he said.
So he returned to Ontario, moved in briefly with his parents in Oakville, then considered a career on the professional stage. He applied for a job at Theatrics, a supply store next to the Royal Alexandra Theatre in Toronto, and auditioned for the Gilbert & Sullivan Society of Toronto.
He got the part, and went a step further by enrolling at Western for a second time, this time in music.
With his degree in hand, Curry decided to try his hand in England and auditioned at London's prestigious Royal Academy of Music in 1997. He received a scholarship for post-graduate studies and was also chosen as one of 12 singers sponsored by Britain's major opera companies to attend the National Opera Studio.
His performing career was on the fast track.
"It's a pretty amazing program (at the National Opera Studio)," Curry said. "As a member you get to work at the National Theatre."
At the conclusion of his studies in 2001, he immediately set to work on an international career as an opera singer. "I've been working ever since," he said.
Curry's travels have taken him all over Europe and the U.K., Australia, New Zealand and South America. Prior to his MOT performances -- his North American debut -- he performed in Buenos Aires. After Detroit it's off to Norway for a production of The Tales of Hoffman, then France for Sondheim's Sweeney Todd.
It's a peripatetic life singing opera.
In December 2008, Curry and his young family moved back to Canada after 11 years in Great Britain. They now live in Vancouver.
However, his ties to this area are strong. He spent most of his summers as a youth in Windsor and Essex County.
The families on his father's Curry side and his mother's Poisson side trace roots back more than 200 years.
"A lot of my relatives are buried in the St. John's churchyard in Sandwich," he said. "All Saints was the family parish and I was married there, my kids were baptized there."
Stained glass windows over the altar were dedicated to Curry's great-great-great grandmother. Bricks manufactured by one ancestor, William Curry, were used to build Windsor Armouries on University Avenue.
It's a connection Curry hopes someday will come full circle when he sings at the converted concert hall there.
"Windsor needs it," said Curry, who performed with Windsor Symphony Orchestra in a pops concert in 2003 at Chrysler Theatre.
"It was like singing in a sound-booth," he said.
Read more: http://www.windsorstar.com/entertainment/Travelling+light+opera+singer+local+ties/3674622/story.html#ixzz12eew7WaU
At one time in his life, David Curry firmly believed that.
But at 36, the Chatham native is now making a living singing in the world's great opera halls, so he has revised his opinion.
"I was in university when I told that to someone putting on a Gilbert & Sullivan production," he said. Curry landed the role but his heart wasn't in it -- he only auditioned, he said, "to meet chicks."
He met one, too -- Anita Curry, his wife and mother of their two children.
By his own calculations, Curry has performed in more than 750 productions of light opera, mostly Gilbert & Sullivan, and that's what brings him back to the Windsor-Detroit area. He sings Nanki-Poo in Michigan Opera Theatre's The Mikado, which opens Saturday at the Detroit Opera House.
"You don't grow up wanting to be an opera singer," Curry said. "At least, I didn't."
Though born in Chatham, Curry grew up in Oakville and appeared in high school plays. But he also sat on student council and participated in school sports.
When he went off to the University of Western Ontario the first time, it was to study science and eventually medicine. In fact, he had his eye on a career as a naval doctor.
Curry comes from a family of naval officers -- William Curry, his grandfather, was commanding officer of Windsor's HMCS Hunter.
He joined the naval reserve, then later trained at CFB Chilliwack in British Columbia and entered the Canadian Forces officers' training school.
But after finishing ninth in a class of 121, Curry decided he could pursue a naval career at anytime. "Many of the students in the school were career military people in their 40s," he said.
So he returned to Ontario, moved in briefly with his parents in Oakville, then considered a career on the professional stage. He applied for a job at Theatrics, a supply store next to the Royal Alexandra Theatre in Toronto, and auditioned for the Gilbert & Sullivan Society of Toronto.
He got the part, and went a step further by enrolling at Western for a second time, this time in music.
With his degree in hand, Curry decided to try his hand in England and auditioned at London's prestigious Royal Academy of Music in 1997. He received a scholarship for post-graduate studies and was also chosen as one of 12 singers sponsored by Britain's major opera companies to attend the National Opera Studio.
His performing career was on the fast track.
"It's a pretty amazing program (at the National Opera Studio)," Curry said. "As a member you get to work at the National Theatre."
At the conclusion of his studies in 2001, he immediately set to work on an international career as an opera singer. "I've been working ever since," he said.
Curry's travels have taken him all over Europe and the U.K., Australia, New Zealand and South America. Prior to his MOT performances -- his North American debut -- he performed in Buenos Aires. After Detroit it's off to Norway for a production of The Tales of Hoffman, then France for Sondheim's Sweeney Todd.
It's a peripatetic life singing opera.
In December 2008, Curry and his young family moved back to Canada after 11 years in Great Britain. They now live in Vancouver.
However, his ties to this area are strong. He spent most of his summers as a youth in Windsor and Essex County.
The families on his father's Curry side and his mother's Poisson side trace roots back more than 200 years.
"A lot of my relatives are buried in the St. John's churchyard in Sandwich," he said. "All Saints was the family parish and I was married there, my kids were baptized there."
Stained glass windows over the altar were dedicated to Curry's great-great-great grandmother. Bricks manufactured by one ancestor, William Curry, were used to build Windsor Armouries on University Avenue.
It's a connection Curry hopes someday will come full circle when he sings at the converted concert hall there.
"Windsor needs it," said Curry, who performed with Windsor Symphony Orchestra in a pops concert in 2003 at Chrysler Theatre.
"It was like singing in a sound-booth," he said.
Read more: http://www.windsorstar.com/entertainment/Travelling+light+opera+singer+local+ties/3674622/story.html#ixzz12eew7WaU
Detroit Freepress
Skilled Performers Make Light Work of the Difficult Mikado
Performed well, Gilbert and Sullivan's masterpieces seem so effortless, buoyant and charming that they give the impression of being the most natural and easiest thing in the world to stage
The truth is that they are anything but. "I think Gilbert and Sullivan is one of the most difficult things to do well," says tenor David Curry, who performs the role of Nanki-Poo in Michigan Opera Theatre's "The Mikado," which opens the company's 40th anniversary season this weekend. "It involves so many different disciplines -- music, comedy, the literature, the dialogue, fluidity with your colleagues -- and they all have to come together"
The comic operettas of the librettist W.S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan rank among the most beloved works of musical theater in any idiom, as welcome in leading opera houses as high school auditoriums and community theaters. "The Mikado," a send-up of the absurdities of British politics and Victorian morals -- set in an imaginary Japan to soften the punches -- is first among equals in the G&S Big 3, winning even more affection than "Pirates of Penzance" and "H.M.S. Pinafore."
It was, in fact, a hit from Day 1, opening in London in March 1885 and running for nearly two years and 672 performances in its initial production. One standard Gilbert and Sullivan reference book estimates that at one point in 1886 there were 170 separate productions of "The Mikado" on stages across America.
Like all of Gilbert and Sullivan's works, "The Mikado" is so well-built musically and verbally that it's practically indestructible in the sense that almost any group of amateurs can get the piece to speak. But ensuring a sublime evening of musical theater is another matter.
First, comedy is always trickier to pull off than tragedy, says stage director Michael Scarola. And Gilbert's unparalleled verbal felicities -- some consider him the greatest lyricist ever in the English language -- demand especially pinpoint timing. At the same time, the kind of broad slapstick that Gilbert and Sullivan invite in "The Mikado" can easily slip into stylized corn that betrays the passages of surprising intimacy and some of Sullivan's most heartfelt music.
"You really have to find a balance between being respectful to the piece but at the same time allow yourself to almost cross the line," Scarola said. Conductor Mark Flint picked up the thread: "As I told the cast at the first rehearsal, we walk a very thin line when we enter this repertoire. A lot of it is written to go over the top, but you have to be careful."
A Decree Goes AwryThe jumping off point for the plot of "The Mikado" is an edict by the emperor (the Mikado) that makes flirtation a crime punishable by beheading. To thwart the decree, the nobles of the town of Titipu have elevated the man next on the list for execution, Ko-Ko, to the post of Lord High Executioner -- thus placing him in the awkward position of having to cut off his own head before proceeding to the rest of the guilty. Meanwhile, the emperor's son, Nanki-Poo, disguised as a wandering minstrel, is in love with the beautiful Yum-Yum, who is already engaged to Ko-Ko.
Then it gets complicated.
Still, it's easy to follow in the theater, and quite hilarious. One of the signature numbers in the show, Ko-Ko's so-called list song, makes sport of those who would not be missed should they lose their heads to the executioner. Even Gilbert and Sullivan encouraged individual productions to alter the lyrics for the audience in the theater and skewer local politicians, celebrities and other ne'er-do-wells. Detroiters might expect a certain former mayor to get zinged, among others.
"When you watch CNN, you hear everything that's in 'The Mikado,' " Scarola said. "Religious and moral repressions, executions, crooked politicians. We should be mortified in a way, but with Gilbert and Sullivan you're always laughing."
Musically, Sullivan was a master parodist and extraordinarily gifted at setting words to music, and he had a piquant sense of harmony. He harbored grander ambitions than operetta. Still, while he wrote some concert music and an opera, "Ivanhoe," which were successful in their day, they fell into the abyss.
But all of Sullivan's magic is on display in the "Mikado," from lickety-split patter numbers to a sighing duet between Yum-Yum and Nanki-Poo that belongs on a charm bracelet, to an aria for lovelorn elderly Katisha that is almost operatic in its sweep, intensity and characterization. "Most people don't take the music in 'The Mikado' seriously enough," Flint said.
One of the tragedies of Sullivan's life was that he didn't understand how profound his work with Gilbert actually was. Nor could he see far enough into the future to know their influence in America would stretch from certain vaudeville traditions to the flowering of the classic American musical comedy and, finally, to the sophisticated contemporary works of Stephen Sondheim.
"There are a lot of layers to these pieces if you're willing to dig," Scarola said.
Read more: Skilled performers make light work of the difficult 'Mikado' | freep.com | Detroit Free Press http://www.freep.com/article/20101014/ENT04/10140474/1322/Skilled-performers-make-light-work-of-the-difficult-Mikado#ixzz12ehFI15h
The truth is that they are anything but. "I think Gilbert and Sullivan is one of the most difficult things to do well," says tenor David Curry, who performs the role of Nanki-Poo in Michigan Opera Theatre's "The Mikado," which opens the company's 40th anniversary season this weekend. "It involves so many different disciplines -- music, comedy, the literature, the dialogue, fluidity with your colleagues -- and they all have to come together"
The comic operettas of the librettist W.S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan rank among the most beloved works of musical theater in any idiom, as welcome in leading opera houses as high school auditoriums and community theaters. "The Mikado," a send-up of the absurdities of British politics and Victorian morals -- set in an imaginary Japan to soften the punches -- is first among equals in the G&S Big 3, winning even more affection than "Pirates of Penzance" and "H.M.S. Pinafore."
It was, in fact, a hit from Day 1, opening in London in March 1885 and running for nearly two years and 672 performances in its initial production. One standard Gilbert and Sullivan reference book estimates that at one point in 1886 there were 170 separate productions of "The Mikado" on stages across America.
Like all of Gilbert and Sullivan's works, "The Mikado" is so well-built musically and verbally that it's practically indestructible in the sense that almost any group of amateurs can get the piece to speak. But ensuring a sublime evening of musical theater is another matter.
First, comedy is always trickier to pull off than tragedy, says stage director Michael Scarola. And Gilbert's unparalleled verbal felicities -- some consider him the greatest lyricist ever in the English language -- demand especially pinpoint timing. At the same time, the kind of broad slapstick that Gilbert and Sullivan invite in "The Mikado" can easily slip into stylized corn that betrays the passages of surprising intimacy and some of Sullivan's most heartfelt music.
"You really have to find a balance between being respectful to the piece but at the same time allow yourself to almost cross the line," Scarola said. Conductor Mark Flint picked up the thread: "As I told the cast at the first rehearsal, we walk a very thin line when we enter this repertoire. A lot of it is written to go over the top, but you have to be careful."
A Decree Goes AwryThe jumping off point for the plot of "The Mikado" is an edict by the emperor (the Mikado) that makes flirtation a crime punishable by beheading. To thwart the decree, the nobles of the town of Titipu have elevated the man next on the list for execution, Ko-Ko, to the post of Lord High Executioner -- thus placing him in the awkward position of having to cut off his own head before proceeding to the rest of the guilty. Meanwhile, the emperor's son, Nanki-Poo, disguised as a wandering minstrel, is in love with the beautiful Yum-Yum, who is already engaged to Ko-Ko.
Then it gets complicated.
Still, it's easy to follow in the theater, and quite hilarious. One of the signature numbers in the show, Ko-Ko's so-called list song, makes sport of those who would not be missed should they lose their heads to the executioner. Even Gilbert and Sullivan encouraged individual productions to alter the lyrics for the audience in the theater and skewer local politicians, celebrities and other ne'er-do-wells. Detroiters might expect a certain former mayor to get zinged, among others.
"When you watch CNN, you hear everything that's in 'The Mikado,' " Scarola said. "Religious and moral repressions, executions, crooked politicians. We should be mortified in a way, but with Gilbert and Sullivan you're always laughing."
Musically, Sullivan was a master parodist and extraordinarily gifted at setting words to music, and he had a piquant sense of harmony. He harbored grander ambitions than operetta. Still, while he wrote some concert music and an opera, "Ivanhoe," which were successful in their day, they fell into the abyss.
But all of Sullivan's magic is on display in the "Mikado," from lickety-split patter numbers to a sighing duet between Yum-Yum and Nanki-Poo that belongs on a charm bracelet, to an aria for lovelorn elderly Katisha that is almost operatic in its sweep, intensity and characterization. "Most people don't take the music in 'The Mikado' seriously enough," Flint said.
One of the tragedies of Sullivan's life was that he didn't understand how profound his work with Gilbert actually was. Nor could he see far enough into the future to know their influence in America would stretch from certain vaudeville traditions to the flowering of the classic American musical comedy and, finally, to the sophisticated contemporary works of Stephen Sondheim.
"There are a lot of layers to these pieces if you're willing to dig," Scarola said.
Read more: Skilled performers make light work of the difficult 'Mikado' | freep.com | Detroit Free Press http://www.freep.com/article/20101014/ENT04/10140474/1322/Skilled-performers-make-light-work-of-the-difficult-Mikado#ixzz12ehFI15h
Detroit News
Zany "Mikado" Opens MOT
Michigan Opera Theatre doesn't so much kick off its new season as loops into it with Gilbert & Sullivan's satirical broadside of an operetta, "The Mikado." Written 125 years ago, "The Mikado" is one zany romp, at once a sendup of Victorian society and government — though the play is discreetly relocated to the mythic Japanese town of Titipu — and a tender love story. It's also a feast of W.S. Gilbert's wit bundled in Sir Arthur Sullivan's endlessly infectious melodies.
Small wonder it should be, as MOT general director David DiChiera says, the show most requested by the company's patrons
That said, anyone who can recite the convoluted plot line in detail probably should be appointed Lord High Storyteller.
"But the characters are real and they have real human relationships, even if what we're seeing may appear to be superficial at first glance," says tenor David Curry, the MOT co-star whose more serious opera credits are peppered with some 500 performances of G&S shows. "People in relationships are sometimes forced to do things they feel compelled to do through a sense of duty."
Which brings us back to the plot.
Nanki-Poo (Curry), son of the ruling Mikado but disguised as a wandering minstrel, loves Yum-Yum, who is unhappily pledged to marry Ko-Ko, the Lord High Executioner, to whom she is ward.
Ko-Ko got his job as a public convenience. He's a lowlife who was next in line to be beheaded, and since no one could be executed until his head had been lopped off, and it was very unlikely that he could do it, he seemed like an ideal choice for the post.
Meanwhile, Nanki-Poo is being pursued by Katisha, an old lady from the Mikado's court who believes the handsome youth is pledged to her. All purposes converge into happy resolution amid a wealth of memorable tunes and much laughter.
"Sullivan was a serious composer who knew he was writing popular music," says Curry, who's pausing to revisit G&S in an autumn stretch of operas by Janacek, Wagner and Offenbach. "These are very well-constructed melodies, simpler than Italian bel canto but with a direct appeal. You come back to this music after being away from it for a while and you think, 'Gosh, that's good.'"The show is a treat for the eyes as well as the ears, says soprano Andriana Churchman, who's singing her first G&S role ever as Yum-Yum.
"We've done our fittings, and I can tell you the costumes will look gorgeous," she says. "There's also a great scene in which Yum-Yum is bathing in an elaborate bathtub that's quite intricate and colorful."
Even though Yum-Yum is "fresh out of school, 15, young and naïve, she has high self-worth," Churchman says. "She's also very sweet and loving. To play her I have to take myself back to being a teenager and experiencing first love."
The comedy, she says, is a genuine challenge: "It keeps you on your mental toes.
From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20101014/ENT01/10140306/Zany-%E2%80%98Mikado%E2%80%99-opens-MOT#ixzz12ehnb7BN
Rehearsal Photo's
John Grigaitis - Photographer
