Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Cambridge Companions to Music
- The Cambridge Companion to Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Musical Examples
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Part I Before Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Part II Being Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Part III The Musicals of Rodgers and Hammerstein
- 7 Oklahoma! A Musical for Its Times
- 8 State Fair and Us
- 9 How Do You Solve a Problem Like Carousel?
- 10 Allegro: A Musical Tale of a Medical Everyman
- 11 Minor Feelings about South Pacific
- 12 The King and I: Beyond Performing Geopolitics
- 13 Me and Juliet: Innovative Metatheatrical Musical Comedy
- 14 Pipe Dream: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Zeitoper?
- 15 Cinderella on Television: The Transformational Power of Adaptive Dramaturgy
- 16 The Bridges of Flower Drum Song
- 17 ‘Climb Ev’ry Mountain’: Places, Mobilities and Identities in The Sound of Music
- Part IV Legacies
- Select Bibliography
- Index
11 - Minor Feelings about South Pacific
from Part III - The Musicals of Rodgers and Hammerstein
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 August 2026
Edited by
Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Cambridge Companions to Music
- The Cambridge Companion to Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Musical Examples
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Part I Before Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Part II Being Rodgers and Hammerstein
- Part III The Musicals of Rodgers and Hammerstein
- 7 Oklahoma! A Musical for Its Times
- 8 State Fair and Us
- 9 How Do You Solve a Problem Like Carousel?
- 10 Allegro: A Musical Tale of a Medical Everyman
- 11 Minor Feelings about South Pacific
- 12 The King and I: Beyond Performing Geopolitics
- 13 Me and Juliet: Innovative Metatheatrical Musical Comedy
- 14 Pipe Dream: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Zeitoper?
- 15 Cinderella on Television: The Transformational Power of Adaptive Dramaturgy
- 16 The Bridges of Flower Drum Song
- 17 ‘Climb Ev’ry Mountain’: Places, Mobilities and Identities in The Sound of Music
- Part IV Legacies
- Select Bibliography
- Index
Summary
This chapter addresses South Pacific’s complex racial politics not only through an analysis of its narrative, World War II historical context and yellowface performances but also through an exploration of how the musical organises affect, a slippery, knotted and somewhat vague term that in the final analysis comes to mean the capacity to move and be moved. Taking into account James Michener’s collection of short stories Tales of the South Pacific (1947), several of which inspired the musical, the chapter addresses how racism and anti-racism resonate in the musical, the creation and embodiment of its Asian and Pacific Islander (API) characters and its promotion of American liberalism. It also discusses in depth the 2021 Chichester Festival Theatre production directed by Daniel Evans and its re-envisioning of the character Bloody Mary, played by Joanna Ampil, and her song ‘Happy Talk’.
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- The Cambridge Companion to Rodgers and Hammerstein , pp. 166 - 185Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2026
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