The translation of a culture—and a translation of a translation at that—this is only the beginning of the beguiling and sometimes bewildering complexities of the new musical "Pacific Overtures." … It is a very serious, almost inordinately ambitious musical, and as such is deserving of equally serious attention.

It is the story of what happened when "four black ships" came to "a land of changeless order." It is all about the Westernization of Japan, and, obliquely and finally, why Seiko watches are today the third largest-selling watch in Switzerland. It is about a change of scene, a change of heart—but stylistically it is also about a type of theater….

[The] musical is to tell the story of Japan's Westernization as if it were a Kabuki drama—but, of course, it soon becomes much more complicated than that. Mr. Sondheim's music is in a style that might...