The Mikado of the title character as a disrespectful representation of the revered Meiji Emperor; Japanese theatre was prohibited from depicting the emperor on stage. Japanese Prince Komatsu Akihito, who saw an 1886 production in London, took no offence. When Prince Fushimi Sadanaru made a state visit in 1907, the British government banned performances of "The Mikado" from London for six weeks, fearing that the play might offend him – a manoeuvre that backfired when the prince complained that he had hoped to see "The Mikado" during his stay. A Japanese journalist covering the prince's stay attended a proscribed performance and confessed
The Mikado is parodied by "Sumo of the Opera", which credits Sullivan as the composer of most of its songs. The detective novel "Death at the Opera" (1934) by Gladys Mitchell is set against a background of a production of "The Mikado". In 2007, the Asian American theatre company, Lodestone Theatre Ensemble, produced "The Mikado Project", an original play by Doris Baizley and Ken Narasaki. It was a deconstruction of the opera premised on a fictional Asian American theatre company attempting to raise funds, while grappling with perceived racism in productions of "The Mikado", by producing a revisionist version of the opera.