The beautiful and charming Shigeko is aware of the war going on throughout the world but isn't really aware of the reality and consequences. So, she blissfully goes about her life, telling us about her fiancé who is in the army, her mother who is in the hospital and her grandmother at home. “The Americans won’t bomb Hiroshima; it is too beautiful a city.”
Leo Szilard is a Jewish scientist who has escaped Budapest on the eve of the Nazi invasion, going first to London and ending up in Long Island. He becomes one of the scientists involved the creation of discoveries and uses of nuclear science.
General Paul Tibbets is the pilot of the Enola Gay and who is heading the team that releases the bomb over Hiroshima.
Szilard doesn’t want the science used as a weapon. Shigeko tries to survive and return to her prewar life. Tibbets is too far above the city to see the victims.
The Manhattan Project was a top-secret, US government nuclear research project which spanned from prewar 1942 to 1946. This led to the development of the first atomic bombs.
Originally developed to use against Germany, when the Japanese rejected the Potsdam Declaration, which called for unconditional surrender, the United States detonated “Little Boy”, a gun-type uranium-based weapon, over Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 killing an estimated 140,000. When the Japanese still didn't surrender, the US dropped “Fat Man”, an implosion-type plutonium-based device over Nagasaki on 9 August killing an estimated 74,000. Survivors faced leukemia, cancers and other terrible side effects.
Surprisingly, the Japanese government was informed of the impending inferno that the Americans were going to let loose over their cities. The world would find out long afterwards that the Japanese government did not warn their citizens. They did not flee the cities; they did not take cover.
The Mistake is an examination of how: on one side is Szilard who is involved in the development of the bomb; on the other side, Shigeko, who speaks for the victims. The play focuses only on the individuals, addressing little of the political opinions and decisions.
Michael Mears plays Leo Szilard as well as General Paul Tibbets, Albert Einstein and others. Riko Nakazono is Shigeko and other voices. Playwright Michael Mears offered a detailed winding account of the events. Director Rosamunde Hutt structures the production so that the audience is always aware of who is speaking and where we are. Scenic designer Mark Friend has created a space to accommodate all the locations and allows the actors to lead the audience through the story. We are in Hiroshima, we are in the Enola Gay, we are in Washington DC. The production team of Claire Windsor (sound design) and Angelo Sagnelli and Richard Willamson (co-lighting designers) enhance the telling.
This is a beautiful and clean production. The title, The Mistake, is the strongest political statement, providing the audience with the facts to make their own judgment.