San Toy

San Toy, or The Emperor's Own is a "Chinese" musical comedy in two acts, first performed at Daly's Theatre, London, on 21 October 1899, and ran for 768 performances (edging out The Geisha as the second longest run for any musical up to that time). The book was written by Edward Morton, and the musical score was written by Sidney Jones with lyrics by Harry Greenbank and Adrian Ross. Additional songs were written by Lionel Monckton. The cast included Marie Tempest, Scott Russell, Huntley Wright and Rutland Barrington.

The piece enjoyed international success. In America, San Toy opened at the Daly's Theatre on Broadway on 10 October 1900. It was revived at the same theatre in 1901, 1902 and 1905, playing for a total of more than 200 performances in these productions. The piece was regularly performed by amateur theatre groups, particularly in Britain, from 1910 through the 1930s, but it has been produced only rarely since then.

Some of the language and stereotyping in the show reflect the period in which it was written and would not now be considered politically correct. However, a close inspection to the lyrics of such songs as Samee Gamee display a gentle mocking of the pretension of Western superiority.

In the town of Pynka Pong, where Sir Bing Preston is the British Consul, two jade merchants bribe Li, the private secretary of the mandarin Yen How. Li flirts with Dudley, the maid at the British Consulate, but Li is in love with Ko Fan, one of the Emperor's female guards, a service into which all noble daughters are conscripted. The Mandarin, however, has got around the conscription law for his favourite daughter, San Toy, by raising her as a boy. However, the student Fo Hop discovers the secret, and his price for silence is San Toy's hand in marriage. The Mandarin allows this on the condition that no one must ever know that San Toy is a girl, cleverly preventing the marriage from happening. San Toy is in love with the Consul's son, naval Captain Bobby Preston, but a marriage between the two would never be permitted by either of their fathers.

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Wikipedia