Lost Worlds and “Pansexual Extravaganzas”: Rediscovering Weimar Operetta with Dr. Kevin Clarke

HowlRound Theatre Commons: When we think of operetta, words like “edgy” and “sexy” rarely come to mind. Dr. Kevin Clarke is hoping to change that through his work with the Operetta Research Centre, which focuses on studying and reevaluating works from the first half of the twentieth century. These had long been denigrated as “silver operetta,” as opposed to the supposed Golden Age of the late nineteenth century, when composers like Johann Strauss and Gilbert & Sullivan created some of the most famous examples of the genre.