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The Pirates of Penzance

The Pirates of Penzance; or, The Slave of Duty is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. Its official premiere was at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City on 31 December 1879, where it was well received by both audiences and critics.[1] Its London debut was on 3 April 1880, at the Opera Comique, where it ran for 363 performances.

Drawing of the Act I finale

The story concerns Frederic, who, having completed his 21st year, is released from his apprenticeship to a band of tender-hearted pirates. He meets the daughters of Major-General Stanley, including Mabel, and the two young people fall instantly in love. Frederic soon learns, however, that he was born on the 29th of February, and so, technically, he has a birthday only once each leap year. His indenture specifies that he remain apprenticed to the pirates until his "twenty-first birthday", meaning that he must serve for another 63 years.[2] Bound by his own sense of duty, Frederic's only solace is that Mabel agrees to wait for him faithfully.

Pirates was the fifth Gilbert and Sullivan collaboration and introduced the much-parodied "Major-General's Song". The opera was performed for over a century by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in Britain and by many other opera companies and repertory companies worldwide. Modernized productions include Joseph Papp's 1981 Broadway production, which ran for 787 performances, winning the Tony Award for Best Revival and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Musical, and spawning many imitations and a 1983 film adaptation. Pirates remains popular today, taking its place along with The Mikado and H.M.S. Pinafore as one of the most frequently played Gilbert and Sullivan operas.

Background edit

 
The Pirate Publisher – An International Burlesque that has the Longest Run on Record, from Puck, 1886: Gilbert is seen as one of the British authors whose works are stolen by the pirate publisher.

The Pirates of Penzance was the only Gilbert and Sullivan opera to have its official premiere in the United States. At the time, American law offered no copyright protection to foreigners. After the pair's previous opera, H.M.S. Pinafore, achieved success in London in 1878, approximately 150 American companies quickly mounted unauthorised productions that often took considerable liberties with the text and paid no royalties to the creators.[3][4][5] Gilbert and Sullivan hoped to forestall further "copyright piracy" by mounting the first production of their next opera in America, before others could copy it, and by delaying publication of the score and libretto.[6] They succeeded in keeping for themselves the direct profits of the first American production of The Pirates of Penzance by opening the production themselves on Broadway, prior to the London production, and they also operated profitable US touring companies of Pirates and Pinafore.[3] However, Gilbert, Sullivan, and their producer, Richard D'Oyly Carte, failed in their efforts, over the next decade, to control the American performance copyrights to Pirates and their other operas.[7]

Fiction and plays about pirates were ubiquitous in the 19th century.[8] Walter Scott's The Pirate (1822) and James Fenimore Cooper's The Red Rover were key sources for the romanticised, dashing pirate image and the idea of repentant pirates.[9] Both Gilbert and Sullivan had parodied these ideas early in their careers. Sullivan had written a comic opera called The Contrabandista, in 1867, about a hapless British tourist who is captured by bandits and forced to become their chief. Gilbert had written several comic works that involved pirates or bandits. In Gilbert's 1876 opera Princess Toto, the title character is eager to be captured by a brigand chief. Gilbert had translated Jacques Offenbach's operetta Les brigands, in 1871.[9] As in Les brigands, The Pirates of Penzance absurdly treats stealing as a professional career path, with apprentices and tools of the trade such as the crowbar and life preserver.[10]

Genesis edit

While Pinafore was running strongly at the Opera Comique in London, Gilbert was eager to get started on his and Sullivan's next opera, and he began working on the libretto in December 1878.[11] He re-used several elements of his 1870 one-act piece, Our Island Home, which had introduced a pirate "chief", Captain Bang. Bang was mistakenly apprenticed to a pirate band as a child by his deaf nursemaid. Also, Bang, like Frederic in The Pirates of Penzance, had never seen a woman before and felt a keen sense of duty, as an apprenticed pirate, until the passage of his twenty-first birthday freed him from his articles of indenture.[12][13] Bernard Shaw believed that Gilbert drew on ideas in Les brigands for his new libretto, including the businesslike bandits and the bumbling police.[14] Gilbert and Sullivan also inserted into Act II an idea they first considered for a one-act opera parody in 1876 about burglars meeting police, while their conflict escapes the notice of the oblivious father of a large family of girls.[15] As in Pinafore, "there was a wordful self-descriptive set-piece for Stanley ["The Major-General's Song"], introducing himself much as Sir Joseph Porter had done ... a lugubrious comic number for the Sergeant of Police ... a song of confession for Ruth, the successor [to] Little Buttercup", romantic material for Frederic and Mabel, and "ensemble and chorus music in turn pretty, parodic and atmospheric."[16]

Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte met by 24 April 1879 to make plans for a production of Pinafore and the new opera in America.[17] Carte travelled to New York in the summer of 1879 and made arrangements with theatre manager John T. Ford[18] to present, at the Fifth Avenue Theatre, the authorised productions. He then returned to London.[19] Meanwhile, once Pinafore became a hit in London, the author, composer and producer had the financial resources to produce future shows themselves, and they executed a plan to free themselves from their financial backers in the "Comedy Opera Company". Carte formed a new partnership with Gilbert and Sullivan to divide profits equally among themselves after the expenses of each of their shows.[20]

In November 1879, Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte sailed to America with a company of singing actors, to play both Pinafore and the new opera, including J. H. Ryley as Sir Joseph, Blanche Roosevelt as Josephine, Alice Barnett as Little Buttercup, Furneaux Cook as Dick Deadeye, Hugh Talbot as Ralph Rackstraw and Jessie Bond as Cousin Hebe, some of whom had been in the Pinafore cast in London.[21] To these, he added some American singers, including Signor Brocolini as Captain Corcoran.[22] Alfred Cellier came to assist Sullivan, while his brother François Cellier remained in London to conduct Pinafore there.[23] Gilbert and Sullivan cast talented actors who were not well-known stars and did not command high fees. They then tailored their operas to the particular abilities of these performers.[24] The skill with which Gilbert and Sullivan used their performers had an effect on the audience: as critic Herman Klein wrote, "we secretly marvelled at the naturalness and ease with which [the Gilbertian quips and absurdities] were said and done. For until then no living soul had seen upon the stage such weird, eccentric, yet intensely human beings .... [They] conjured into existence a hitherto unknown comic world of sheer delight."[25] Gilbert acted as stage director for his own plays and operas. He sought naturalism in acting, which was unusual at the time, just as he strove for realistic visual elements. He deprecated self-conscious interaction with the audience and insisted on a style of portrayal in which the characters were never aware of their own absurdity but were coherent internal wholes.[26] Sullivan conducted the music rehearsals.[27]

 
Poster for the copyright performance at Paignton

Sullivan had sketched out the music for Pirates in England. When he arrived in New York, however, he found that he had left the sketches for Act I behind, and he had to reconstruct the first act from memory, or compose new numbers.[28][29] Gilbert told a correspondent many years later that Sullivan was unable to recall his setting of the entrance of the women's chorus, so they substituted the chorus "Climbing over rocky mountain" from their earlier opera, Thespis.[30] Sullivan's manuscript for Pirates contains pages removed from a Thespis score, with the vocal parts of this chorus altered from their original arrangement as a four-part chorus. Some scholars (e.g. Tillett and Spencer, 2000) have suggested that Gilbert and Sullivan had planned all along to re-use "Climbing over rocky mountain," and perhaps other parts of Thespis. They argue that Sullivan's having brought the unpublished Thespis score to New York, when there were no plans to revive Thespis, might not have been accidental.[31] In any case, on 10 December 1879, Sullivan wrote a letter to his mother about the new opera, upon which he was hard at work in New York. "I think it will be a great success, for it is exquisitely funny, and the music is strikingly tuneful and catching."[21] As was his usual practice in his operas, Sullivan left the overture for the last moment, often sketching it out and entrusting completion of "the details" to an assistant, in this case the company's music director, Alfred Cellier.[32]

Pinafore opened in New York on 1 December 1879 and ran for the rest of December. After a reasonably strong first week, audiences quickly fell off, since most New Yorkers had already seen local productions of Pinafore.[33][21] In the meantime, Gilbert and Sullivan raced to complete and rehearse The Pirates of Penzance.[34] The work's title is a multi-layered joke. On the one hand, Penzance was a docile seaside resort in 1879, and not the place where one would expect to encounter pirates.[35] On the other hand, the title was also a jab at the theatrical "pirates" who had staged unlicensed productions of H.M.S. Pinafore in America.[36][37] To secure the British copyright,[38] a D'Oyly Carte touring company gave a perfunctory copyright performance of Pirates the afternoon before the New York premiere, at the Royal Bijou Theatre in Paignton, Devon, organised by Helen Lenoir, who would later marry Richard D'Oyly Carte. The cast, which was performing Pinafore in the evenings in Torquay, received some of the music for Pirates only two days beforehand. Having had only one rehearsal, they travelled to nearby Paignton for the matinee, where they read their parts from scripts carried onto the stage, making do with whatever costumes they had on hand.[39]

Original production and aftermath edit

 
George Grossmith as General Stanley, wearing Wolseley's trademark moustache

Pirates premiered on 31 December 1879 in New York and was an immediate hit.[21] On 2 January 1880, Sullivan wrote, in another letter to his mother from New York, "The libretto is ingenious, clever, wonderfully funny in parts, and sometimes brilliant in dialogue – beautifully written for music, as is all Gilbert does. ... The music is infinitely superior in every way to the Pinafore – 'tunier' and more developed, of a higher class altogether. I think that in time it will be very popular."[40] Shortly thereafter, Carte sent three touring companies around the United States East Coast and Midwest, playing Pirates and Pinafore.[22][41] Sullivan's prediction was correct. After a strong run in New York and several American tours, Pirates opened in London on 3 April 1880, running for 363 performances there.[42] It remains one of the most popular G&S works.[43][44] The London sets were designed by John O'Connor.[45]

The critics' notices were generally excellent in both New York and London.[46][47] The character of Major-General Stanley was widely taken to be a caricature of the popular general Sir Garnet Wolseley. The biographer Michael Ainger, however, doubts that Gilbert intended a caricature of Wolseley, identifying instead General Henry Turner, uncle of Gilbert's wife, as the pattern for the "modern Major-General". Gilbert disliked Turner, who, unlike the progressive Wolseley, was of the old school of officers. Nevertheless, in the original London production, George Grossmith imitated Wolseley's mannerisms and appearance, particularly his large moustache, and the audience recognised the allusion. Wolseley himself, according to his biographer, took no offence at the caricature[48] and sometimes sang "I am the very model of a modern Major-General" for the private amusement of his family and friends.[49]

Roles edit

General Stanley's daughters
  • Ruth, a Piratical Maid of all work (contralto)
  • Chorus of Pirates, Police and General Stanley's Daughters

Synopsis edit

 
Marion Hood: "Yes, 'tis Mabel!"

Act I edit

On the coast of Cornwall, during Queen Victoria's reign, Frederic celebrates the completion of his twenty-first year and the end of his apprenticeship to a gentlemanly band of pirates ("Pour, oh pour the pirate sherry"). The pirates' maid of all work, Ruth, appears and reveals that, as Frederic's nursemaid long ago, she made a mistake "through being hard of hearing": Mishearing Frederic's father's instructions, she apprenticed him to a pirate, instead of to a ship's pilot ("When Frederic was a little lad").

Frederic has never seen any woman other than Ruth, and he believes her to be beautiful. The pirates know better and suggest that Frederic take Ruth with him when he returns to civilisation. Frederic announces that, although it pains him, so strong is his sense of duty that, once free from his apprenticeship, he will be forced to devote himself to the pirates' extermination. He also points out that they are not successful pirates: since they are all orphans, they allow their prey to go free if they too are orphans. Frederic notes that word of this has got about, so captured ships' companies routinely claim to be orphans. Frederic invites the pirates to give up piracy and go with him, so that he need not destroy them, but the Pirate King says that, contrasted with respectability, piracy is comparatively honest ("Oh! better far to live and die"). The pirates depart, leaving Frederic and Ruth. Frederic sees a group of beautiful young girls approaching the pirate lair, and realises that Ruth misled him about her appearance ("Oh false one! You have deceived me!"). Sending Ruth away, Frederic hides before the girls arrive.

 
George Power, the original Frederic in London

The girls burst exuberantly upon the secluded spot ("Climbing over rocky mountain"). Frederic reveals himself ("Stop, ladies, pray!"), startling them. He appeals to them to help him reform ("Oh! is there not one maiden breast?"). The girls are fascinated by him, but all reject him, except one: Mabel responds to his plea, chiding her sisters for their lack of charity ("Oh sisters deaf to pity's name for shame!"). She offers Frederic her pity ("Poor wand'ring one"), and the two quickly fall in love. The other girls discuss whether to eavesdrop or to leave the new couple alone ("What ought we to do?"), deciding to "talk about the weather," although they steal glances at the affectionate couple ("How beautifully blue the sky").

Frederic warns the young ladies that his old associates will soon return ("Stay, we must not lose our senses"), but before they can flee, the pirates arrive and capture the girls, intending to marry them ("Here's a first rate opportunity"). Mabel warns the pirates that the girls' father is a Major-General ("Hold, monsters!"), who soon arrives and introduces himself ("I am the very model of a modern Major-General"). He appeals to the pirates not to take his daughters, leaving him to face his old age alone. Having heard of the famous Pirates of Penzance, he pretends that he is an orphan to elicit their sympathy ("Oh, men of dark and dismal fate"). The soft-hearted pirates release the girls ("Hail, Poetry!"), making Major-General Stanley and his daughters honorary members of their band ("Pray observe the magnanimity").

Act II edit

The Major-General sits in a ruined chapel on his estate, surrounded by his daughters. His conscience is tortured by the lie that he told the pirates, and the girls attempt to console him ("Oh dry the glist'ning tear"). The Sergeant of Police and his corps arrive to announce their readiness to arrest the pirates ("When the foeman bares his steel"). The girls loudly express their admiration of the police for facing likely slaughter by fierce and merciless foes. The police are unnerved by this and leave reluctantly.

 
"Have mercy on us!"

Left alone, Frederic, who is to lead the police, reflects on his opportunity to atone for a life of piracy ("Now for the pirates' lair"), at which point he encounters Ruth and the Pirate King. They have realised that Frederic's apprenticeship was worded so as to bind him to them until his twenty-first birthday – and, because that birthday happens to be on the 29th of February (in a leap year), it means that technically only five birthdays have passed ("When you had left our pirate fold"), and he will not reach his twenty-first birthday until he is in his eighties. Frederic is convinced by this logic and agrees to rejoin the pirates. He then sees it as his duty to inform the Pirate King of the Major-General's deception. The outraged outlaw declares that the pirates' "revenge will be swift and terrible" ("Away, away, my heart's on fire").

Frederic meets Mabel ("All is prepared"), and she pleads with him to stay ("Stay Frederic, stay"), but he feels bound by his duty to the pirates until his 21st birthday – in 1940. They agree to be faithful to each other until then, though to Mabel "It seems so long" ("Oh, here is love, and here is truth"); Frederic departs. Mabel steels herself ("No, I'll be brave") and tells the police that they must go alone to face the pirates. The police muse that an outlaw might be just like any other man, and it is a shame to deprive him of "that liberty which is so dear to all" ("When a felon's not engaged in his employment"). The police hide on hearing the approach of the pirates ("A rollicking band of pirates we"), who have stolen onto the estate, intending to take revenge for the Major-General's lie ("With cat-like tread").

Just then, Major-General Stanley appears, sleepless with guilt, and the pirates also hide ("Hush, hush! not a word"), while the Major-General listens to the soothing breeze ("Sighing softly to the river"). The girls come looking for him. The pirates leap out to seize them, and the Pirate King urges the captured Major-General to prepare for death. The police rush to their defence but are easily defeated. The Sergeant has one stratagem left: he demands that the pirates yield "in Queen Victoria's name"; the pirates, overcome with loyalty to their Queen, do so. Ruth appears and reveals that the pirates are "all noblemen who have gone wrong". The Major-General is impressed by this and all is forgiven. Frederic and Mabel are reunited, and the Major-General is happy to marry his daughters to the noble ex-pirates after all ("Poor Wand'ring Ones" (reprise)).

Musical numbers edit

  • Overture (includes "With cat-like tread", "Ah, leave me not to pine", "Pray observe the magnanimity", "When you had left our pirate fold", "Climbing over rocky mountain", and "How beautifully blue the sky")

Act I

 
Drawing of Richard Temple as the Pirate King
  • 1. "Pour, oh pour, the pirate sherry" (Samuel and Chorus of Pirates)
  • 2. "When Fred'ric was a little lad" (Ruth)
  • 3. "Oh, better far to live and die" (Pirate King and Chorus of Pirates)
  • 4. "Oh! false one, you have deceiv'd me" (Frederic and Ruth)
  • 5. "Climbing over rocky mountain" (Chorus of Girls)
  • 6. "Stop, ladies, pray" (Edith, Kate, Frederic, and Chorus of Girls)
  • 7. "Oh, is there not one maiden breast?" (Frederic and Chorus of Girls)
  • 8. "Poor wand'ring one" (Mabel and Chorus of Girls)
  • 9. "What ought we to do?" (Edith, Kate, and Chorus of Girls)
  • 10. "How beautifully blue the sky" (Mabel, Frederic, and Chorus of Girls)
  • 11. "Stay, we must not lose our senses" ... "Here's a first-rate opportunity to get married with impunity" (Frederic and Chorus of Girls and Pirates)
  • 12. "Hold, monsters" (Mabel, Major-General, Samuel, and Chorus)
  • 13. "I am the very model of a modern Major-General" (Major-General and Chorus)
  • 14. Finale Act I (Mabel, Kate, Edith, Ruth, Frederic, Samuel, King, Major-General, and Chorus)
    • "Oh, men of dark and dismal fate"
    • "I'm telling a terrible story"
    • "Hail, Poetry"
    • "Oh, happy day, with joyous glee"
    • "Pray observe the magnanimity" (reprise of "Here's a first-rate opportunity")
 
Isabel Jay as Mabel
 
Pirate King Henry Lytton denounces Major-General C. H. Workman.

Act II

  • 15. "Oh, dry the glist'ning tear" (Mabel and Chorus of Girls)
  • 16. "Then, Frederic, let your escort lion-hearted" (Frederic and Major-General)
  • 17. "When the foeman bares his steel" (Mabel, Edith, Sergeant, and Chorus of Policemen and Girls)
  • 18. "Now for the pirates' lair!" (Frederic, Ruth, and King)
  • 19. "When you had left our pirate fold" [The "paradox" trio] (Ruth, Frederic, and King)
  • 20. "Away, away! My heart's on fire!" (Ruth, Frederic, and King)
  • 21. "All is prepar'd; your gallant crew await you" (Mabel and Frederic)
  • 22. "Stay, Fred'ric, stay" ... "Ah, leave me not to pine" ... "Oh, here is love, and here is truth" (Mabel and Frederic)
  • 23. "No, I'll be brave" ... "Though in body and in mind" (Reprise of "When the foeman bares his steel") (Mabel, Sergeant, and Chorus of Police)
  • 23a. "Sergeant, approach!" (Mabel, Sergeant of Police, and Chorus of Police)
  • 24. "When a felon's not engaged in his employment" (Sergeant and Chorus of Police)
  • 25. "A rollicking band of pirates we" (Sergeant and Chorus of Pirates and Police)
  • 26. "With cat-like tread, upon our prey we steal" (Samuel and Chorus of Pirates and Police)
  • 27. "Hush, hush, not a word!" (Frederic, King, Major-General, and Chorus of Police and Pirates)
  • 28. Finale, Act II (Ensemble)
    • "Sighing softly to the river"
    • "Now what is this, and what is that?"
    • "You/We triumph now"
    • "Away with them, and place them at the bar!"
    • "Poor wandering ones!"

Critical reception edit

The notices from critics were generally excellent in both New York and London in 1880.[51] In New York, the Herald and the Tribune both dedicated considerable space to their reviews. The Herald took the view that "the new work is in every respect superior to the Pinafore, the text more humorous, the music more elegant and more elaborate."[52] The Tribune called it "a brilliant and complete success", commenting, "The humor of the Pirates is richer, but more recondite. It demands a closer attention to the words [but] there are great stores of wit and drollery ... which will well repay exploration. ... The music is fresh, bright, elegant and merry, and much of it belongs to a higher order of art than the most popular of the tunes of Pinafore."[53] The New York Times also praised the work, writing, "it would be impossible for a confirmed misanthrope to refrain from merriment over it", though the paper doubted if Pirates could repeat the prodigious success of Pinafore.[46]

After the London premiere, the critical consensus, led by the theatrical newspaper The Era, was that the new work marked a distinct advance on Gilbert and Sullivan's earlier works.[47] The Pall Mall Gazette said, "Of Mr. Sullivan's music we must speak in detail on some other occasion. Suffice it for the present to say that in the new style which he has marked out for himself it is the best he has written."[54] The Graphic wrote:

That no composer can meet the requirements of Mr. Gilbert like Mr. Sullivan, and vice versa, is a fact universally admitted. One might fancy that verse and music were of simultaneous growth, so closely and firmly are they interwoven. Away from this consideration, the score of The Pirates of Penzance is one upon which Mr. Sullivan must have bestowed earnest consideration, for independently of its constant flow of melody, it is written throughout for voices and instruments with infinite care, and the issue is a cabinet miniature of exquisitely defined proportions. ... That the Pirates is a clear advance upon its precursors, from Trial by Jury to H.M.S. Pinafore, cannot be denied; it contains more variety, marked character, careful workmanship, and is in fact a more finished artistic achievement … a brilliant success.[55]

There were a few dissenting comments: The Manchester Guardian thought both author and composer had drawn on the works of their predecessors: "Mr. Gilbert ... seems to have borrowed an idea from Sheridan's The Critic; Mr. Sullivan's music is sprightly, tuneful and full of 'go', although it is certainly lacking in originality."[56] The Sporting Times noted, "It doesn't appear to have struck any of the critics yet that the central idea in The Pirates of Penzance is taken from Our Island Home, which was played by the German Reeds some ten years ago."[57] The Times thought Gilbert's wit outran his dramatic invention, and Sullivan's music for the new work was not quite as good as his score for The Sorcerer, which the Times critic called a masterpiece.[58]

Musical analysis edit

The overture to The Pirates of Penzance was composed by Sullivan and his musical assistant Alfred Cellier. It follows the pattern of most Savoy opera overtures: a lively opening (the melody of "With cat-like tread"), a slow middle section ("Ah, leave me not to pine alone"), and a concluding allegro in a compressed sonata form, in which the themes of "How beautifully blue the sky" and "A paradox, a paradox" are combined.[59]

Parody edit

The score parodies several composers, most conspicuously Verdi. "Come, friends, who plough the sea" and "You triumph now" are burlesques of Il trovatore,[60] and one of the best-known choral passages from the finale to Act I, "Hail Poetry", is, according to the Sullivan scholar, Arthur Jacobs, a burlesque of the prayer scene, "La Vergine degli Angeli", in Verdi's La forza del destino.[61] However, another musicologist, Nicholas Temperley, writes, "The choral outburst 'Hail, Poetry' in The Pirates of Penzance would need very little alteration to turn it into a Mozart string quartet."[62] Another well-known parody number from the work is the song for coloratura, "Poor wand'ring one", which is generally thought to burlesque Gounod's waltz-songs,[63] though the music critic of The Times called it "mock-Donizetti".[64] In a scene in Act II, Mabel addresses the police, who chant their response in the manner of an Anglican church service.[65]

Sullivan even managed to parody two composers at once. The critic Rodney Milnes describes the Major-General's Act II song, "Sighing softly to the river", "as plainly inspired by – and indeed worthy of – Sullivan's hero Schubert",[66] and Amanda Holden speaks of the song's "Schubertian water-rippling accompaniment", but adds that it simultaneously spoofs Verdi's Il trovatore, with the soloist unaware of a concealed male chorus singing behind him.[67]

Patter, counterpoint, and vocal writing edit

Writing about patter songs, Shaw, in his capacity as a music critic, praised "the time-honored lilt which Sir Arthur Sullivan, following the example of Mozart and Rossini, chose for the lists of accomplishments of the Major-General in The Pirates or the Colonel in Patience."[68]

This opera contains two well-known examples of Sullivan's characteristic combination of two seemingly disparate melodies. Jacobs suggests that Berlioz's La damnation de Faust, a great favourite in Sullivan's formative years, may have been the model for Sullivan's trademark contrapuntal mingling of the rapid prattle of the women's chorus in Act I ("How beautifully blue the sky") in 2/4 time with the lovers' duet in waltz time. Jacobs writes that "the whole number [shifts] with Schubertian ease from B to G and back again."[43] In Act II, a double chorus combines the policemen's dogged tune, "When the foeman bares his steel" and the soaring line for the women, "Go, ye heroes, go to glory".[69] In adapting the four-part chorus "Climbing over rocky mountain" from Thespis for re-use in Pirates, Sullivan took less trouble: he wrote only a single vocal line, suitable for soprano voices.[70] Despite this, the number ends with another example of Sullivan's counterpoint, with the chorus singing the second melody of the piece ("Let us gaily tread the measure") while the orchestra plays the first ("Climbing over rocky mountain").[71]

Sullivan set a particular vocal challenge for the soprano who portrays Mabel. The Sullivan scholar Gervase Hughes wrote, "Mabel ... must be a coloratura because of 'Poor wand'ring one!', yet 'Dear father, why leave your bed' demands steady beauty of tone throughout the octave F to F, and 'Ah, leave me not to pine' goes a third lower still."[72] In The Music of Arthur Sullivan (1959), Hughes quoted four extracts from Pirates, saying that if hearing each out of context one might attribute it to Schubert, Mendelssohn, Gounod or Bizet respectively, "yet on learning the truth one would kick oneself for not having recognised Sullivan's touch in all four." Hughes concluded by quoting the introductory bars of "When a felon's not engaged in his employment", adding, "There could never be any doubt as to who wrote that, and it is as English as our wonderful police themselves."[73]

Versions edit

 
1880 poster

Because the work was premiered in three different places (the Paignton performance and the full productions in New York and London), there are more variations in the early libretto and score of The Pirates of Penzance than in other Gilbert and Sullivan works. Songs sent from New York to the D'Oyly Carte touring company in England for the Paignton premiere were then altered or omitted during Broadway rehearsals. Gilbert and Sullivan trimmed the work for the London premiere, and Gilbert made further alterations up to and including the 1908 Savoy revival. For example, early versions depicted the Pirate King as the servant of the pirate band,[74] and the words of the opening chorus were, "Pour, O King, the pirate sherry".[75] In the original New York production the revelation by Ruth that the pirates are "all noblemen who have gone wrong" prompted the following exchange (recalling a famous passage in H.M.S. Pinafore):

GENERAL, POLICE & GIRLS: What, all noblemen?
KING & PIRATES: Yes, all noblemen!
GENERAL, POLICE & GIRLS: What, all?
KING: Well, nearly all!
ALL: . . . They are nearly all noblemen who have gone wrong.
Then give three cheers, both loud and strong,
For the twenty noblemen who have gone wrong....

In the original London production, this exchange was shortened to the following:

GIRLS: Oh spare them! They are all noblemen who have gone wrong.
GENERAL: What, all noblemen?
KING: Yes, all noblemen!
GENERAL: What, all?
KING: Well, nearly all!

Gilbert deleted the exchange in the 1900 revival, and the Chappell vocal score was revised accordingly. For the 1908 revival Gilbert had the pirates yielding "in good King Edward's name".[74] Despite Helen Carte's repeated urging, Gilbert did not prepare an authorised version of the libretti of the Savoy operas.[76]

In its 1989 production, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company restored one of the original versions of the finale, which finishes with a variation of "I am the very model of a modern major-general", rather than with the customary reprise of "Poor wand'ring one",[77] but in later revivals, it reverted to the more familiar text.[66]

Production history edit

 
1881 programme cover

The Pirates of Penzance has been one of Gilbert and Sullivan's most popular comic operas. After its unique triple opening in 1879–80, it was revived in London at the Savoy Theatre in 1888 and in 1900, and for the Savoy's repertory season of 1908–09. In the British provinces, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company toured it almost continuously from 1880 to 1884, and again in 1888. It re-entered the D'Oyly Carte touring repertory in 1893 and was never again absent until the company's closure in 1982.[78] New costumes were designed by Percy Anderson in 1919 and George Sheringham in 1929 (who also executed a new Act I set). Peter Goffin created a new touring set in 1957.[45]

In America, after the New York opening on New Year's Eve, 1879, Richard D'Oyly Carte launched four companies that covered the United States on tours that lasted through the following summer.[79] Gilbert and Sullivan themselves trained each of the touring companies through January and early February 1880, and each company's first performance – whether it was in Philadelphia, Newark, or Buffalo – was conducted by the composer. In Australia, its first authorised performance was on 19 March 1881 at the Theatre Royal, Sydney, produced by J. C. Williamson.[16] There was still no international copyright law in 1880, and the first unauthorised New York production was given by the Boston Ideal Opera Company at Booth's Theatre in September of that year.[citation needed] The opera premiered in a German translation by Richard Genée and Camillo Walzel (Die Piraten) in Austria at the Theater an der Wien on 1 March 1889, and in Düsseldorf, Germany, on 1 December 1936.[16]

The first non-D'Oyly Carte professional production in a country that had been subject to Gilbert's copyright (other than Williamsons' authorised productions) was in Stratford, Ontario, Canada, in September 1961, as the copyright expired. In 1979, the Torbay branch of the Gilbert and Sullivan Society presented a centenary tribute to the world premiere performance of Pirates in Paignton, with a production at the Palace Avenue Theatre (situated a few metres from the former Bijou Theatre).[80]

New York has seen over forty major revivals since the premiere.[81] One of these, produced and directed by Winthrop Ames in 1926 at the Plymouth Theatre, ran for 128 performances[82] and gained good notices.[83] A brief 1952 Broadway staging starring Martyn Green, earned Lehman Engel a Tony Award as conductor.[84][85] Repertory companies that have mounted Pirates numerous times Off-Broadway and on tour in the US have included the American Savoyards (1953–67),[86] the Light Opera of Manhattan (1968–89)[87] and the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players (1976–present).[88]

As discussed below, Joseph Papp's 1980–83 Pirates ran for nearly two years each on Broadway and in the West End, boosting the opera's popularity. Professional and amateur productions of the opera continue with frequency. For example, the Chicago Lyric Opera and English National Opera each staged the work in 2004,[89] and in 2007, the New York City Opera and Opera Australia both mounted new productions.[90][91] In 2013, Scottish Opera produced a British touring production of The Pirates of Penzance co-produced by the trustees of the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. Richard Suart played Major-General Stanley and Nicholas Sharratt played Frederic.[92][93] A concert of the opera was presented on Broadway in October 2022 by, and for the benefit of, Roundabout Theatre Company, at the American Airlines Theatre, directed by Scott Ellis with choreography by Warren Carlyle and starring David Hyde Pierce as the Major General, Ramin Karimloo as the Pirate King and Colton Ryan as Frederic; Rupert Holmes adapted the libretto with a New Orleans setting.[94]

The following table shows the history of the D'Oyly Carte productions in Gilbert's lifetime (excluding tours):

 
Drawing from programme of children's Pirates, 1884
Theatre Opening date Closing date Perfs. Details
Bijou Theatre, Paignton 30 December 1879 30 December 1879 1 English copyright performance.
Fifth Avenue Theatre, New York 31 December 1879 6 March 1880 100 Original run in New York. The company toured the Eastern seaboard between 8 March and 15 May. Three other touring companies were launched in January and February 1880.
17 May 1880 5 June 1880
Opera Comique 3 April 1880 2 April 1881 363 Original London run.
Savoy Theatre 23 December 1884 14 February 1885 37 Children's Pirates – series of matinées with a juvenile cast.[95]
Savoy Theatre 17 March 1888 6 June 1888 80 First professional revival.
Savoy Theatre 30 June 1900 5 November 1900 127 Second professional revival.
Savoy Theatre 1 December 1908 27 March 1909 43 Second Savoy repertory season; played with five other operas. (Closing date shown is of the entire season.)

Historical casting edit

The following tables show the casts of the principal original productions and D'Oyly Carte Opera Company touring repertory at various times through to the company's 1982 closure:

Role Paignton
1879[96]
New York
1879[97]
Opera Comique
1880[98]
Savoy Theatre
1888[99]
Savoy Theatre
1900[100]
Major-General Richard Mansfield J. H. Ryley George Grossmith George Grossmith Henry Lytton
Pirate King Frederick Federici Sgr. Brocolini Richard Temple Richard Temple Jones Hewson
Samuel G. J. Lackner Furneaux Cook George Temple Richard Cummings W. H. Leon
James John Le Hay role eliminated
Frederic Llewellyn Cadwaladr Hugh Talbot George Power J. G. Robertson Robert Evett
Sergeant Fred Billington Fred Clifton Rutland Barrington Rutland Barrington Walter Passmore
Mabel Emilie Petrelli Blanche Roosevelt Marion Hood Geraldine Ulmar Isabel Jay
Edith Marian May Jessie Bond Julia Gwynne Jessie Bond Lulu Evans
Kate Lena Monmouth Rosina Brandram Lilian La Rue[101] Nellie Kavanagh Alice Coleman
Isabel Kate Neville Billie Barlow Neva Bond Nellie Lawrence Agnes Fraser
Ruth Fanny Harrison Alice Barnett Emily Cross Rosina Brandram Rosina Brandram
Role Savoy Theatre
1908[102]
D'Oyly Carte
1915 Tour[103]
D'Oyly Carte
1925 Tour[104]
D'Oyly Carte
1935 Tour[105]
D'Oyly Carte
1945 Tour[106]
Major-General Charles H. Workman Henry Lytton Henry Lytton Martyn Green Grahame Clifford
Pirate King Henry Lytton Leicester Tunks Darrell Fancourt Darrell Fancourt Darrell Fancourt
Samuel Leo Sheffield Frederick Hobbs Joseph Griffin Richard Walker Hilton Layland
Frederic Henry Herbert Dewey Gibson Charles Goulding John Dean John Dean
Sergeant Rutland Barrington Fred Billington Leo Sheffield Sydney Granville Richard Walker
Mabel Dorothy Court Elsie McDermid Elsie Griffin Kathleen Frances Helen Roberts
Edith Jessie Rose Nellie Briercliffe Eileen Sharp Marjorie Eyre Marjorie Eyre
Kate Beatrice Boarer Betty Grylls Aileen Davies Maisie Baxter Ivy Sanders
Isabel Ethel Lewis Kitty Twinn Hilary Davies Elizabeth Nickell-Lean Rosalie Dyer
Ruth Louie René Bertha Lewis Bertha Lewis Dorothy Gill Ella Halman
Role D'Oyly Carte
1950 Tour[107]
D'Oyly Carte
1958 Tour[108]
D'Oyly Carte
1968 Tour[109]
D'Oyly Carte
1975 Tour[110]
D'Oyly Carte
1981 Tour[111]
Major-General Martyn Green Peter Pratt John Reed James Conroy-Ward Alistair Donkin
Pirate King Darrell Fancourt Donald Adams Donald Adams John Ayldon John Ayldon
Samuel Donald Harris George Cook Alan Styler Jon Ellison Michael Buchan
Frederic Leonard Osborn Thomas Round Philip Potter Colin Wright Meston Reid
Sergeant Richard Watson Kenneth Sandford George Cook Michael Rayner Clive Harre
Mabel Muriel Harding Jean Hindmarsh Valerie Masterson Julia Goss Vivian Tierney
Edith Joan Gillingham Joyce Wright Peggy Ann Jones Patricia Leonard Jill Pert
Kate Joyce Wright Marian Martin Pauline Wales Caroline Baker Helene Witcombe
Isabel Enid Walsh Jane Fyffe Susan Maisey Rosalind Griffiths Alexandra Hann
Ruth Ella Halman Ann Drummond-Grant Christene Palmer Lyndsie Holland Patricia Leonard

Joseph Papp's Pirates edit

 
Smith, Ronstadt and Kline at the Delacorte Theatre

In 1980, Joseph Papp and the Public Theater of New York City produced a new version of Pirates, directed by Wilford Leach and choreographed by Graciela Daniele, at the Delacorte Theatre in Central Park, as a Shakespeare in the Park summer event. Musical direction and arrangements were by William Elliott. The show played for 10 previews and 35 performances. It then transferred to Broadway, opening on 8 January 1981 for a run of 20 previews and 787 regular performances at the Uris and Minskoff Theatres, the longest run for any Gilbert and Sullivan production in history.[112] This take on Pirates earned enthusiastic reviews[113] and seven Tony Award nominations, winning three, including the award for Best Revival and for Leach as director. It was also nominated for eight Drama Desk Awards, winning five, including Outstanding Musical and director.[114]

Compared with traditional productions of the opera, Papp's Pirates featured a more swashbuckling Pirate King and Frederic, and a broader, more musical comedy style of singing and humour. It did not significantly change the libretto, but it used a new orchestration and arrangements that changed some keys, added repeats, lengthened dance music and made other minor changes in the score. The "Matter Patter" trio from Ruddigore and "Sorry her lot" from H.M.S. Pinafore, two other Gilbert and Sullivan operas, were interpolated into the show.[16] The production also restored Gilbert and Sullivan's original New York ending, with a reprise of the Major-General's song in the Act II finale. Linda Ronstadt starred as Mabel, Rex Smith as Frederic, Kevin Kline as the Pirate King, Patricia Routledge as Ruth (replaced by Estelle Parsons for the Broadway transfer), George Rose as the Major-General, and Tony Azito as the Sergeant of Police. Kline won a Tony Award for his performance. Smith won a Theatre World Award, and Kline and Azito won Drama Desk Awards. Notable replacements during the Broadway run included Karla DeVito, Maureen McGovern and Pam Dawber as Mabel; Robby Benson, Patrick Cassidy and Peter Noone as Frederic; Treat Williams, Gary Sandy, James Belushi and Wally Kurth as the Pirate King; David Garrison as the Sergeant; George S. Irving as the Major-General; and Kaye Ballard as Ruth. The Los Angeles cast of the production featured Barry Bostwick as the Pirate King, Jo Anne Worley as Ruth, Clive Revill as the Major-General, Dawber as Mabel, Paxton Whitehead as the Sergeant, Caroline Peyton as Edith and Andy Gibb as Frederic.[114]

 
Opera Australia's 2007 touring production of Pirates, with Anthony Warlow as the Pirate King

The production opened at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London, on 26 May 1982, to generally warm reviews, for a run of 601 performances, earning an Olivier Award nomination as Outstanding Musical and another for Curry. Notable among the cast were George Cole and Ronald Fraser as the Major-General; Pamela Stephenson as Mabel; Michael Praed and Peter Noone as Frederic; Tim Curry, Timothy Bentinck, Oliver Tobias and Paul Nicholas as the Pirate King; Chris Langham as the Sergeant of Police; Annie Ross as Ruth; Bonnie Langford as Kate; and Louise Gold as Isabel.[115] The Australian production opened in Melbourne in January 1984, opening the new Victorian Arts Centre, directed by John Feraro. It starred Jon English as the Pirate King, Simon Gallaher as Frederic, June Bronhill as Ruth, David Atkins as the Sergeant of Police and Marina Prior as Mabel. The six-week limited season was followed by an Australian national tour from 1984 to 1986 and another tour with same cast in the mid-1990s.[112] In 1985, Papp's Pirates opened the new Queensland Performing Arts Centre in Brisbane, setting attendance records that were not surpassed until many years later by The Phantom of the Opera.[citation needed] Gallaher's Essgee Entertainment version of Pirates was inspired by the Papp version.[112] The Papp version also inspired foreign-language productions in Germany and elsewhere in Europe.[16]

The Papp production was turned into a film in 1983, with the original Broadway principal cast reprising their roles, except that Angela Lansbury replaced Estelle Parsons as Ruth. The minor roles used British actors miming to their Broadway counterparts. The film has been shown occasionally on television. Another film based loosely on the opera and inspired by the success of the Papp version, The Pirate Movie, was released during the Broadway run.[116]

[Papp's version] has been regularly revived on both sides of the Atlantic – a British revival in 2000 transferred from the West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, to the Open Air Theatre in Regents' Park – and has also become well established in the repertoire of amateur student societies. No other production has had as much lasting impact or influence. ... It also helped to promote G&S in places where it has been little performed and bring it to the attention of a much wider and younger audience.[112]

The Papp production design has been widely imitated in later productions of Pirates, even where traditional orchestration and the standard score are used.[112][117] Some modern productions are also influenced by the Disney film franchise Pirates of the Caribbean, combining aspects of the Papp production with the Disney design concepts. Not all of these revivals have generated the same enthusiasm as Papp's 1980s productions. A 1999 UK touring production received this critique: "No doubt when Papp first staged this show in New York and London it had some quality of cheek or chutzpah or pizzazz or irony or something that accounted for its success. But all that's left now ... is a crass Broadway-style musical arrangement ground out by a seven-piece band, and the worst kind of smutty send-up of a historic piece of art."[118]

Recordings edit

The Pirates of Penzance has been recorded many times, and the critical consensus is that it has fared well on record.[119] The first complete recording of the score was in 1921, under the direction of Rupert D'Oyly Carte, but with established recording singers rather than D'Oyly Carte Opera Company performers.[120] In 1929, The Gramophone said of a new set with a mainly D'Oyly Carte cast, "This new recording represents the high-water mark so far as Gilbert and Sullivan opera is concerned. In each of the previous Savoy albums there have been occasional lapses which prevented one from awarding them unqualified praise; but with the Pirates it is happily otherwise; from first to last, and in every bar, a simply delightful production."[121] Of later recordings by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, the 1968 recording (with complete dialogue) is highly regarded: The online Gilbert and Sullivan Discography says, "This recording is one of the best D'Oyly Carte sets of all time, and certainly the best Pirates",[122] and the Penguin Guide to Opera on Compact Disc also recommends it.[123] So too does the Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music, alongside the 1993 Mackerras recording.[124] The opera critic Alan Blyth recommended the D'Oyly Carte recording of 1990: "a performance full of the kind of life that can only come from the experience of stage performances".[125] The online Discography site also mentions the 1981 Papp recording as "excellent", despite its inauthentic 1980 re-orchestrations that "changed some of the timbres so as to appeal to a rock-oriented public".[126]

Of the available commercial videos, the Discography site considers the Brent Walker better than the Papp version.[127] More recent professional productions have been recorded on video by the International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival.[128]

Selected recordings

  • 1929 D'Oyly Carte – Conductor: Malcolm Sargent[129]
  • 1957 D'Oyly Carte – New Symphony Orchestra of London; Conductor: Isidore Godfrey[130]
  • 1961 Sargent/Glyndebourne – Pro Arte Orchestra, Glyndebourne Festival Chorus; Conductor: Sir Malcolm Sargent[131]
  • 1968 D'Oyly Carte (with dialogue) – Royal Philharmonic Orchestra; Conductor: Isidore Godfrey[132]
  • 1981; 1983 Papp's Pirates (with dialogue) – Director: Wilford Leach; Musical Director: William Elliott; Choreographer: Graciela Daniele[133]
  • 1982 Brent Walker Productions (with dialogue) – Ambrosian Opera Chorus, London Symphony Orchestra; Conductor: Alexander Faris; Stage Director: Michael Geliot[134]
  • 1990 New D'Oyly Carte – Conductor: John Pryce-Jones[135]
  • 1993 Mackerras/Telarc – Orchestra and Chorus of the Welsh National Opera; Conductor: Sir Charles Mackerras[136]
  • 1994 Essgee Entertainment (video adaptation) – Director and Choreographer: Craig Schaefer; Orchestrator and Conductor: Kevin Hocking; Additional Lyrics: Melvyn Morrow[137]

Cultural impact edit

Major-General's Song edit

 
The Major-General carries an encyclopedia in this "Bab" drawing.

Pirates is one of the most frequently referenced works of Gilbert and Sullivan. The Major-General's Song, in particular, is frequently parodied, pastiched and used in advertising.[138] Parody versions have been used in political commentary as well as entertainment media.[139] Its challenging patter has proved interesting to comedians; notable examples include Tom Lehrer's song "The Elements" and David Hyde Pierce's monologue, as host of Saturday Night Live.[140] In 2010, comedian Ron Butler released a YouTube pastiche of the song in character as President Obama which, as of September 2021, had garnered more than 1.9 million views.[141][142]

Pastiche examples include the Animaniacs version, "I am the very model of a cartoon individual", in the episode "H.M.S. Yakko";[143] the Doctor Who audio "I am the very model of a Gallifreyan buccaneer" in Doctor Who and the Pirates;[144] the Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip version in the episode "The Cold Open" (2006), where the cast performs "We'll be the very model of a modern network TV show";[145] and the Mass Effect 2 video game version, where the character Mordin Solus sings: "I am the very model of a scientist Salarian".[146]

The song is often used in film and on television, unchanged in many instances, as a character's audition piece, or seen in a "school play" scene. Examples include a VeggieTales episode entitled "The Wonderful World of Auto-Tainment!"; the Frasier episode "Fathers and Sons"; The Simpsons episode "Deep Space Homer"; and the Mad About You episode "Moody Blues", where Paul directs a charity production of Penzance starring his father, Burt, as the Major-General. In The Muppet Show (season 3, episode 4) guest host, comedian Gilda Radner, sings the song with a 7-foot-tall (2.1 m) talking carrot (Parodying the pilot/pirate confusion in Pirates, Radner had requested a 6-foot-tall (1.8 m) talking parrot, but was misheard).[147] In an episode of Home Improvement, Al Borland begins to sing the song when tricked into thinking he is in a soundproof booth. In the Babylon 5 episode "Atonement", Marcus Cole uses the song to drive Dr Stephen Franklin crazy on a long journey to Mars.

Examples of the use of the song in advertising include Martyn Green's pastiche of the song listing all of the varieties of Campbell's Soup[148] and a 2011 Geico commercial in which a couple that wants to save money, but still listen to musicals, finds a roommate, dressed as the Major-General, who awkwardly begins the song while dancing on a coffee table.[149] Gimbels department store had a campaign sung to the tune of the Major-General's Song that began, "We are the very model of a modern big department store."[150] George Washington, in the number "Right Hand Man" from the 2015 musical Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda, refers to himself with irony as "The model of a modern major general", which he rhymes with "men are all" and "pedestal". Miranda commented: "I always felt like 'mineral' wasn't the best possible rhyme."[151]

Film and television edit

Other film references to Pirates include Kate & Leopold, where there are multiple references, including a scene where Leopold sings "I Am The Very Model of A Modern Major-General" while accompanying himself on the piano; and in Pretty Woman, Edward Lewis (Richard Gere) covers a social gaffe by prostitute Vivian Ward (Julia Roberts), who comments that the opera La traviata was so good that she almost "peed [her] pants", by saying that she had said that she liked it better than The Pirates of Penzance". In Walt Disney's cartoon Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers (2004), there is a performance of Pirates that becomes the setting for the climactic battle between the Musketeers and Captain Pete. Pirates songs sung in the cartoon are "With cat-like tread", "Poor wand'ring one", "Climbing over rocky mountain" and the Major-General's song. "Poor wand'ring one" was used in the movie An American Tail.[152] The soundtrack of the 1992 film The Hand That Rocks the Cradle includes "Poor Wand'ring One" and "Oh Dry the Glistening Tear".[153] A nonsense pastiche of the song in the 2017 film Despicable Me 3, sung by Minions, was termed "amusing"[154] and "the film's finest moment";[155] it was uploaded to YouTube by Illumination Entertainment as a singalong challenge, which has garnered more than 19 million views as of 2023.[156]

Television references, in addition to those mentioned above, included the series The West Wing, where Pirates and other Gilbert and Sullivan operas are mentioned in several episodes, especially by Deputy Communications Director, Sam Seaborn, who was recording secretary of his school's Gilbert and Sullivan society. In Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, a poster from Pirates hangs on Matt Albie's office wall. Both TV series were created by Aaron Sorkin. In the pilot episode of the 2008 CTV series Flashpoint, a police officer and his partner sing the policeman's song. In an Assy McGee episode entitled "Pegfinger", Detective Sanchez's wife is a member of a community theatre that performs the opera. In a 1986 episode of the animated television adaptation of The Wind in the Willows entitled A Producer's Lot, several characters put on a production of Pirates.[157] In a 2005 Family Guy episode "Peter's Got Woods", Brian Griffin sings "Sighing Softly", with Peter Griffin's assistance. In a 2012 episode, "Killer Queen", Peter gives a garbled rendition of the Major-General's Song.[158] In the 2009 Criminal Minds episode "The Slave of Duty", Hotch quotes "Oh dry the glist'ning tear".[159] In the 1992 episode "The Understudy" of Clarissa Explains it All, the title character is chosen to understudy Mabel in a school production of Pirates and is unprepared when she must go on; a scene from The Mikado is also heard.[160]

Other references edit

 
Wallpaper showing characters from Pirates and other Savoy operas

Other notable instances of references to Pirates include a New York Times article on 29 February 1940, memorialising that Frederic was finally out of his indentures.[161] Six years previously, the arms granted to the municipal borough of Penzance in 1934 contain a pirate dressed in Gilbert's original costuming, and Penzance had a rugby team called the Penzance Pirates, which is now called the Cornish Pirates. In 1980, Isaac Asimov wrote a short story called "The Year of the Action", concerning whether the action of Pirates took place on 1 March 1873, or 1 March 1877 (depending on whether Gilbert took into account the fact that 1900 was not a leap year).[162] The plot of Laurie R. King's 2011 novel Pirate King centers on a 1924 silent movie adaptation of The Pirates of Penzance.[163]

The music from the chorus of "With cat-like tread", which begins "Come, friends, who plough the sea," was used in the popular American song, "Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here." "With cat-like tread" is also part of the soundtrack, along with other Gilbert and Sullivan songs, in the 1981 film, Chariots of Fire, and it was pastiched in the "HMS Yakko" episode of Animaniacs in a song about surfing a whale.[164] In the case Pierson v. Ray, which established the doctrine of qualified immunity for police officers, the United States Supreme Court held that "[a] policeman's lot is not so unhappy that he must choose between being charged with dereliction of duty if he does not arrest when he had probable cause, and being punished with damages if he does."[165] State courts have cited the same song for other purposes: "Where does this extraordinary situation leave the lower... Courts and State Courts in their required effort to apply the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States...? Like the policeman in Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance, their 'lot is not a happy one.'"[166]

Adaptations edit

Stage
Film and TV
  • The Pirate Movie, a 1982 musical romantic comedy film loosely based on the opera.
  • The Pirates of Penzance, a 1983 film adaptation of Papp's Broadway production.
  • Die Piraten, a German-language version, was premiered on German television in 1968 and starred Arleen Auger as Mabel, Gerd Nienstedt as the Pirate King and Martha Mödl as Ruth, with Franz Marszalek conducting. Mabel falls in love with the Pirate King, among other plot changes. A 2-CD set of the broadcast was issued by Gala Records in 2000.[175]
  • Several other television adaptations of the opera have been made, beginning in 1939.[176]

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ Perry, Helga. Information from the Savoyoperas.org website 7 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine, Savoy Operas, 27 November 2000, accessed 25 July 2009
  2. ^ This figure assumes that Gilbert was ignoring the fact that there was no leap year in 1900. Otherwise, the action of the play would take place in 1873 instead of 1877, and the figure would be 67 years. See Bradley (1996), p. 244
  3. ^ a b Prestige, Colin. "D'Oyly Carte and the Pirates: The Original New York Productions of Gilbert and Sullivan", pp. 113–148 at p. 118, Papers Presented at the International Conference of G&S held at the University of Kansas, May 1970, edited by James Helyar. Lawrence, Kansas: University of Kansas Libraries, 1971
  4. ^ Allen (1979), p. 2
  5. ^ Goodman, Andrew. Gilbert and Sullivan at Law, pp. 204–205, Fairleigh Dickinson University Press (1982), ISBN 0838631797
  6. ^ International copyright pirating 28 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine, Edward Samuels, accessed 25 July 2009
  7. ^ Rosen, Zvi S. "The Twilight of the Opera Pirates: A Prehistory of the Right of Public Performance for Musical Compositions", Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal, Vol. 24, 2007, pp. 1157–1218, 5 March 2007, accessed 24 October 2012
  8. ^ Adams, Cecil, "Why are pirates depicted with a parrot on their shoulder? What's the origin of the skull and crossbones pirate flag?" The Straight Dope, 12 October 2007
  9. ^ a b Williams, p. 130
  10. ^ Williams, pp. 131–132
  11. ^ Ainger, p. 166
  12. ^ Faning, Eaton and Shapcott Wensley. Extra Supplement: Our Island Home in Musical Times, Vol. 55, No. 859 (1 September 1914), pp. 1–12
  13. ^ Gänzl, p. 29
  14. ^ Shaw (Vol. 1), p. 784
  15. ^ , The New York Times, 1 August 1879, p. 3, accessed 22 May 2012
  16. ^ a b c d e Gänzl, Kurt. "The Pirates of Penzance, or The Slave of Duty: Comic opera in 2 acts by Gilbert & Sullivan", Operetta Research Center, 5 October 2016
  17. ^ Ainger, p. 168
  18. ^ Ford had been one of the few managers who had paid Gilbert and Sullivan any kind of fee for performing Pinafore in America, and his reward for a small gesture was great (Stedman, p. 169).
  19. ^ Ainger, p. 169
  20. ^ Sullivan gave notice to the directors of the Comedy Opera Company in early July 1879 that he, Gilbert and Carte would not be renewing their contract to produce Pinafore with them and that he would withdraw his music from the Comedy Opera Company on 31 July. This followed a closure of the Opera Comique for repairs that Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte used to give them an argument that the original run of the production had "closed". See Stedman, pp. 170–172; Ainger, pp. 165–167 and 194–195; and Jacobs, p. 126. Sullivan wrote to a former producer, John Hollingshead of the Gaiety Theatre, saying: "You once settled a precedent for me which may just at present be of great importance to me. I asked you for the band parts of the Merry Wives of Windsor ... and [you] said, 'They are yours, as our run is over....' Now will you please let me have them, and the parts of Thespis also at once. I am detaining the parts of Pinafore, so that the directors shall not take them away from the Comique tomorrow, and I base my claim on the precedent you set." See Rees, p. 89. The Comedy Opera Company directors engaged another theatre to play a rival production of Pinafore, but they had no scenery. On 31 July, they sent a group of thugs to the Opera Comique to seize the scenery and props during the evening performance of Pinafore. See Ainger, p. 170 and Jacobs, pp. 124–125. Stagehands and cast members managed to ward off their backstage attackers and protect the scenery. The police arrived to restore order, and the show continued. See Stedman, pp. 170–171 and Gillan, Don. "The Fracas at the Opera Comique", The Theatre, 1 September 1879, reprinted at the Stage Beauty website, accessed 6 May 2009. See also "The Fracas at the Opera Comique", The Era, 10 August 1879, p. 5 and "The Fracas at the Opera Comique", The Leeds Mercury, 13 August 1879, p. 8. The matter was eventually settled in court, where a judge ruled in Carte's favour about two years later. See Ainger, p. 175
  21. ^ a b c d Jacobs, p. 129
  22. ^ a b Ainger, pp. 182–183
  23. ^ Jacobs, p. 127
  24. ^ Jacobs, p. 111; Ainger, pp. 133–134
  25. ^ Jacobs, p. 113
  26. ^ Cox-Ife, William. W. S. Gilbert: Stage Director. Dobson, 1978 ISBN 0-234-77206-9. See also Gilbert, W. S., "A Stage Play" 30 September 2009 at the Wayback Machine, and Bond, Jessie, Reminiscences, Introduction 21 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine
  27. ^ Ainger, p. 157
  28. ^ Ainger, p. 177
  29. ^ Jacobs, p. 130
  30. ^ Ainger, p. 179
  31. ^ March, Jerry. "Part of Thespis Score Discovered", The Savoyard, Vol. XX, No. 1 (March 1981), p. 25; and Stedman, p. 95, n. 52
  32. ^ Ainger, p. 180
  33. ^ Stedman, p. 174
  34. ^ Jacobs, pp. 130–132
  35. ^ From medieval times and in later centuries, however, Penzance was subject to frequent raiding by Turkish pirates, according to Canon Diggens Archive 1910.
  36. ^ Dexter, Gary. "Title Deed: How the Book Got its Name". The Telegraph, 7 July 2010
  37. ^ Williams, p. 125
  38. ^ Performances had to be given in Britain before publication in order to secure copyright. See Stephens, John Russell. The Profession of the Playwright: British Theatre 1800–1900, Cambridge University Press (1992), pp. 104–115
  39. ^ Ainger, pp. 180–81
  40. ^ Jacobs, p. 133
  41. ^ Stedman, p. 175
  42. ^ Bradley (1982), pp. 86–87
  43. ^ a b Jacobs, Arthur. "Sullivan, Sir Arthur." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online, accessed 30 June 2010 (subscription required)
  44. ^ Smith, Tim. "A consistent Pirates of Penzance",[permanent dead link] The Baltimore Sun, 16 July 2009
  45. ^ a b Rollins and Witts, Appendix, p. VII
  46. ^ a b "Amusements; Fifth-Avenue Theatre". The New York Times, 1 January 1880, p. 5
  47. ^ a b "Opera Comique", The Era, 11 April 1880 p. 5
  48. ^ See Ainger, pp. 181–182, and Kochanski, Halik. Sir Garnet Wolseley: Victorian hero, p. 73, London, Hambledon Press, 1999. ISBN 1-85285-188-0
  49. ^ Bradley (1982), p. 118
  50. ^ a b In the first night version of the libretto, the Sergeant of Police was named Edward, and the Pirate King was named Richard and was titled "A Pirate Chief". See Allen (1975), p. 112
  51. ^ The London theatrical newspaper The Era even gave the ad hoc performance in Paignton a good review: see "Gilbert and Sullivan's New Opera", The Era, 4 January 1880, p. 5
  52. ^ "The Pirates of Penzance", The Daily News, 15 January 1880, p. 6
  53. ^ "The Pirates of Penzance". New York Tribune, 1 January 1880, accessed 27 August 2010
  54. ^ "The Pirates of Penzance", The Pall Mall Gazette, 6 April 1880, p. 12
  55. ^ "Music", The Graphic, 10 April 1880, p. 371
  56. ^ "From Our London Correspondent", The Manchester Guardian, 5 April 1880, p. 4
  57. ^ The Sporting Times, 10 April 1880, p. 1
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  71. ^ Rees, pp. 62–63 suggested that in the original Thespis version, for male as well as female voices, the men would have sung the first theme while the women sang the second.
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  95. ^ The first performance was by invitation only. The official opening was on 26 December 1884. The Times announcement, 20 December 1884, p. 8
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  117. ^ A Papp-style production played at the Savoy Theatre in 2004. See "The Pirates of Penzance – 2004", ThisIsTheatre.com, accessed 17 November 2020. This production, directed by Steven Dexter and presented by Raymond Gubbay, used a new musical arrangement, because Papp's designs and musical arrangements created for the Papp production are protected by copyright; an unlicensed 1982 production mounted in Dublin in advance of Papp's own London production was enjoined from transferring to London by a successful lawsuit. See Bennetts, Leslie. "Pirating of The Pirates of Penzance", The New York Times, 18 August 1982, accessed 11 October 2011
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Sources edit

  • Ainger, Michael (2002). Gilbert and Sullivan – A Dual Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-514769-3.
  • Allen, Reginald (1979). Gilbert and Sullivan in America, The Story of the First D'Oyly Carte Opera Company American Tour. New York: The Pierpont Morgan Library.
  • Allen, Reginald (1975). The First Night Gilbert and Sullivan (2nd ed.). Chappell & Co. Ltd. ISBN 0-903443-10-4.
  • Bond, Jessie (1930). . London: John Lane, The Bodley Head. Archived from the original on 6 September 2015. Retrieved 22 October 2013. (Chapters 5 and 6)
  • Blyth, Alan (1994). Opera on CD. London: Kyle Cathie. ISBN 1-85626-103-4.
  • Bordman, Gerald (1981). American Operetta: From H. M. S. Pinafore to Sweeney Todd. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-502869-4.
  • Bradley, Ian (1982). The Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-070848-0.
  • Bradley, Ian (2005). Oh Joy! Oh Rapture!: The Enduring Phenomenon of Gilbert and Sullivan. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-516700-7.
  • Gänzl, Kurt (1986). The British Musical Theatre—Volume I, 1865–1914. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Holden, Amanda (1997). The Penguin Opera Guide. London: Penguin Books. ISBN 014051385X.
  • Hughes, Gervase (1959). The Music of Sir Arthur Sullivan. London: Macmillan & Co Ltd.
  • Jacobs, Arthur (1986). Arthur Sullivan: A Victorian Musician. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-282033-8.
  • Lamb, Andrew (Spring 1986). "From Pinafore to Porter: United States–United Kingdom Interactions in Musical Theater, 1879–1929". American Music. University of Illinois Press. 4 (1): 34–49. doi:10.2307/3052183. JSTOR 3052183.
  • March, Ivan, ed. (1993). The Penguin Guide to Opera on Compact Discs. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-046957-5.
  • March, Ivan, ed. (2007). The Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. ISBN 978-0-14-103336-5.
  • Rees, Terence (1964). Thespis – A Gilbert & Sullivan Enigma. London: Dillon's University Bookshop.
  • Rollins, Cyril; R. John Witts (1962). The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in Gilbert and Sullivan Operas: A Record of Productions, 1875–1961. London: Michael Joseph. Also, five supplements, privately printed
  • Shaw, Bernard (1981). Laurence, Dan H. (ed.). Shaw's Music: The Complete Musical Criticism of Bernard Shaw. Vol. 1. London: Max Reinhardt. ISBN 0-370-31270-8.
  • Shaw, Bernard (1981). Laurence, Dan H. (ed.). Shaw's Music: The Complete Musical Criticism of Bernard Shaw. Vol. 2. London: Max Reinhardt. ISBN 0-370-31271-6.
  • Tillett, Selwyn; Spencer, Roderick (21 September 2002). (PDF). Sullivan Society Festival weekend. Cirencester. Archived from the original (PDF) on 19 June 2007. Retrieved 25 May 2006.
  • Williams, Carolyn (2010). Gilbert and Sullivan: Gender, Genre, Parody. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-14804-7.

External links edit

General

  • The Pirates of Penzance at The Gilbert & Sullivan Archive
  • 1880 London theatre programme
  • Review of the opening night 7 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine by Clement Scott
  • Papp's version of The Pirates of Penzance at the Music Theatre International website
  • at The Victoria and Albert Museum
  • Televised scenes from Pirates, D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 1955
  •   The Pirates of Penzance public domain audiobook at LibriVox

Lists of productions

  • . Production list at Floormic.com
  • The Pirates of Penzance at The Internet Broadway Database
  • The Pirates of Penzance at IMDb

pirates, penzance, 1983, film, adaptation, film, slave, duty, comic, opera, acts, with, music, arthur, sullivan, libretto, gilbert, official, premiere, fifth, avenue, theatre, york, city, december, 1879, where, well, received, both, audiences, critics, london,. For the 1983 film adaptation see The Pirates of Penzance film The Pirates of Penzance or The Slave of Duty is a comic opera in two acts with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W S Gilbert Its official premiere was at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City on 31 December 1879 where it was well received by both audiences and critics 1 Its London debut was on 3 April 1880 at the Opera Comique where it ran for 363 performances Drawing of the Act I finaleThe story concerns Frederic who having completed his 21st year is released from his apprenticeship to a band of tender hearted pirates He meets the daughters of Major General Stanley including Mabel and the two young people fall instantly in love Frederic soon learns however that he was born on the 29th of February and so technically he has a birthday only once each leap year His indenture specifies that he remain apprenticed to the pirates until his twenty first birthday meaning that he must serve for another 63 years 2 Bound by his own sense of duty Frederic s only solace is that Mabel agrees to wait for him faithfully Pirates was the fifth Gilbert and Sullivan collaboration and introduced the much parodied Major General s Song The opera was performed for over a century by the D Oyly Carte Opera Company in Britain and by many other opera companies and repertory companies worldwide Modernized productions include Joseph Papp s 1981 Broadway production which ran for 787 performances winning the Tony Award for Best Revival and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Musical and spawning many imitations and a 1983 film adaptation Pirates remains popular today taking its place along with The Mikado and H M S Pinafore as one of the most frequently played Gilbert and Sullivan operas Contents 1 Background 1 1 Genesis 1 2 Original production and aftermath 2 Roles 3 Synopsis 3 1 Act I 3 2 Act II 4 Musical numbers 5 Critical reception 6 Musical analysis 6 1 Parody 6 2 Patter counterpoint and vocal writing 7 Versions 8 Production history 9 Historical casting 10 Joseph Papp s Pirates 11 Recordings 12 Cultural impact 12 1 Major General s Song 12 2 Film and television 12 3 Other references 13 Adaptations 14 See also 15 References 16 Sources 17 External linksBackground edit nbsp The Pirate Publisher An International Burlesque that has the Longest Run on Record from Puck 1886 Gilbert is seen as one of the British authors whose works are stolen by the pirate publisher The Pirates of Penzance was the only Gilbert and Sullivan opera to have its official premiere in the United States At the time American law offered no copyright protection to foreigners After the pair s previous opera H M S Pinafore achieved success in London in 1878 approximately 150 American companies quickly mounted unauthorised productions that often took considerable liberties with the text and paid no royalties to the creators 3 4 5 Gilbert and Sullivan hoped to forestall further copyright piracy by mounting the first production of their next opera in America before others could copy it and by delaying publication of the score and libretto 6 They succeeded in keeping for themselves the direct profits of the first American production of The Pirates of Penzance by opening the production themselves on Broadway prior to the London production and they also operated profitable US touring companies of Pirates and Pinafore 3 However Gilbert Sullivan and their producer Richard D Oyly Carte failed in their efforts over the next decade to control the American performance copyrights to Pirates and their other operas 7 Fiction and plays about pirates were ubiquitous in the 19th century 8 Walter Scott s The Pirate 1822 and James Fenimore Cooper s The Red Rover were key sources for the romanticised dashing pirate image and the idea of repentant pirates 9 Both Gilbert and Sullivan had parodied these ideas early in their careers Sullivan had written a comic opera called The Contrabandista in 1867 about a hapless British tourist who is captured by bandits and forced to become their chief Gilbert had written several comic works that involved pirates or bandits In Gilbert s 1876 opera Princess Toto the title character is eager to be captured by a brigand chief Gilbert had translated Jacques Offenbach s operetta Les brigands in 1871 9 As in Les brigands The Pirates of Penzance absurdly treats stealing as a professional career path with apprentices and tools of the trade such as the crowbar and life preserver 10 Genesis edit While Pinafore was running strongly at the Opera Comique in London Gilbert was eager to get started on his and Sullivan s next opera and he began working on the libretto in December 1878 11 He re used several elements of his 1870 one act piece Our Island Home which had introduced a pirate chief Captain Bang Bang was mistakenly apprenticed to a pirate band as a child by his deaf nursemaid Also Bang like Frederic in The Pirates of Penzance had never seen a woman before and felt a keen sense of duty as an apprenticed pirate until the passage of his twenty first birthday freed him from his articles of indenture 12 13 Bernard Shaw believed that Gilbert drew on ideas in Les brigands for his new libretto including the businesslike bandits and the bumbling police 14 Gilbert and Sullivan also inserted into Act II an idea they first considered for a one act opera parody in 1876 about burglars meeting police while their conflict escapes the notice of the oblivious father of a large family of girls 15 As in Pinafore there was a wordful self descriptive set piece for Stanley The Major General s Song introducing himself much as Sir Joseph Porter had done a lugubrious comic number for the Sergeant of Police a song of confession for Ruth the successor to Little Buttercup romantic material for Frederic and Mabel and ensemble and chorus music in turn pretty parodic and atmospheric 16 Gilbert Sullivan and Carte met by 24 April 1879 to make plans for a production of Pinafore and the new opera in America 17 Carte travelled to New York in the summer of 1879 and made arrangements with theatre manager John T Ford 18 to present at the Fifth Avenue Theatre the authorised productions He then returned to London 19 Meanwhile once Pinafore became a hit in London the author composer and producer had the financial resources to produce future shows themselves and they executed a plan to free themselves from their financial backers in the Comedy Opera Company Carte formed a new partnership with Gilbert and Sullivan to divide profits equally among themselves after the expenses of each of their shows 20 In November 1879 Gilbert Sullivan and Carte sailed to America with a company of singing actors to play both Pinafore and the new opera including J H Ryley as Sir Joseph Blanche Roosevelt as Josephine Alice Barnett as Little Buttercup Furneaux Cook as Dick Deadeye Hugh Talbot as Ralph Rackstraw and Jessie Bond as Cousin Hebe some of whom had been in the Pinafore cast in London 21 To these he added some American singers including Signor Brocolini as Captain Corcoran 22 Alfred Cellier came to assist Sullivan while his brother Francois Cellier remained in London to conduct Pinafore there 23 Gilbert and Sullivan cast talented actors who were not well known stars and did not command high fees They then tailored their operas to the particular abilities of these performers 24 The skill with which Gilbert and Sullivan used their performers had an effect on the audience as critic Herman Klein wrote we secretly marvelled at the naturalness and ease with which the Gilbertian quips and absurdities were said and done For until then no living soul had seen upon the stage such weird eccentric yet intensely human beings They conjured into existence a hitherto unknown comic world of sheer delight 25 Gilbert acted as stage director for his own plays and operas He sought naturalism in acting which was unusual at the time just as he strove for realistic visual elements He deprecated self conscious interaction with the audience and insisted on a style of portrayal in which the characters were never aware of their own absurdity but were coherent internal wholes 26 Sullivan conducted the music rehearsals 27 nbsp Poster for the copyright performance at PaigntonSullivan had sketched out the music for Pirates in England When he arrived in New York however he found that he had left the sketches for Act I behind and he had to reconstruct the first act from memory or compose new numbers 28 29 Gilbert told a correspondent many years later that Sullivan was unable to recall his setting of the entrance of the women s chorus so they substituted the chorus Climbing over rocky mountain from their earlier opera Thespis 30 Sullivan s manuscript for Pirates contains pages removed from a Thespis score with the vocal parts of this chorus altered from their original arrangement as a four part chorus Some scholars e g Tillett and Spencer 2000 have suggested that Gilbert and Sullivan had planned all along to re use Climbing over rocky mountain and perhaps other parts of Thespis They argue that Sullivan s having brought the unpublished Thespis score to New York when there were no plans to revive Thespis might not have been accidental 31 In any case on 10 December 1879 Sullivan wrote a letter to his mother about the new opera upon which he was hard at work in New York I think it will be a great success for it is exquisitely funny and the music is strikingly tuneful and catching 21 As was his usual practice in his operas Sullivan left the overture for the last moment often sketching it out and entrusting completion of the details to an assistant in this case the company s music director Alfred Cellier 32 Pinafore opened in New York on 1 December 1879 and ran for the rest of December After a reasonably strong first week audiences quickly fell off since most New Yorkers had already seen local productions of Pinafore 33 21 In the meantime Gilbert and Sullivan raced to complete and rehearse The Pirates of Penzance 34 The work s title is a multi layered joke On the one hand Penzance was a docile seaside resort in 1879 and not the place where one would expect to encounter pirates 35 On the other hand the title was also a jab at the theatrical pirates who had staged unlicensed productions of H M S Pinafore in America 36 37 To secure the British copyright 38 a D Oyly Carte touring company gave a perfunctory copyright performance of Pirates the afternoon before the New York premiere at the Royal Bijou Theatre in Paignton Devon organised by Helen Lenoir who would later marry Richard D Oyly Carte The cast which was performing Pinafore in the evenings in Torquay received some of the music for Pirates only two days beforehand Having had only one rehearsal they travelled to nearby Paignton for the matinee where they read their parts from scripts carried onto the stage making do with whatever costumes they had on hand 39 Original production and aftermath edit nbsp George Grossmith as General Stanley wearing Wolseley s trademark moustachePirates premiered on 31 December 1879 in New York and was an immediate hit 21 On 2 January 1880 Sullivan wrote in another letter to his mother from New York The libretto is ingenious clever wonderfully funny in parts and sometimes brilliant in dialogue beautifully written for music as is all Gilbert does The music is infinitely superior in every way to the Pinafore tunier and more developed of a higher class altogether I think that in time it will be very popular 40 Shortly thereafter Carte sent three touring companies around the United States East Coast and Midwest playing Pirates and Pinafore 22 41 Sullivan s prediction was correct After a strong run in New York and several American tours Pirates opened in London on 3 April 1880 running for 363 performances there 42 It remains one of the most popular G amp S works 43 44 The London sets were designed by John O Connor 45 The critics notices were generally excellent in both New York and London 46 47 The character of Major General Stanley was widely taken to be a caricature of the popular general Sir Garnet Wolseley The biographer Michael Ainger however doubts that Gilbert intended a caricature of Wolseley identifying instead General Henry Turner uncle of Gilbert s wife as the pattern for the modern Major General Gilbert disliked Turner who unlike the progressive Wolseley was of the old school of officers Nevertheless in the original London production George Grossmith imitated Wolseley s mannerisms and appearance particularly his large moustache and the audience recognised the allusion Wolseley himself according to his biographer took no offence at the caricature 48 and sometimes sang I am the very model of a modern Major General for the private amusement of his family and friends 49 Roles editMajor General Stanley comic baritone The Pirate King bass baritone 50 Samuel his Lieutenant baritone Frederic the Pirate Apprentice tenor Sergeant of Police bass 50 General Stanley s daughtersMabel soprano Edith mezzo soprano Kate mezzo soprano Isabel speaking role dd Ruth a Piratical Maid of all work contralto Chorus of Pirates Police and General Stanley s DaughtersSynopsis edit nbsp Marion Hood Yes tis Mabel Act I edit On the coast of Cornwall during Queen Victoria s reign Frederic celebrates the completion of his twenty first year and the end of his apprenticeship to a gentlemanly band of pirates Pour oh pour the pirate sherry The pirates maid of all work Ruth appears and reveals that as Frederic s nursemaid long ago she made a mistake through being hard of hearing Mishearing Frederic s father s instructions she apprenticed him to a pirate instead of to a ship s pilot When Frederic was a little lad Frederic has never seen any woman other than Ruth and he believes her to be beautiful The pirates know better and suggest that Frederic take Ruth with him when he returns to civilisation Frederic announces that although it pains him so strong is his sense of duty that once free from his apprenticeship he will be forced to devote himself to the pirates extermination He also points out that they are not successful pirates since they are all orphans they allow their prey to go free if they too are orphans Frederic notes that word of this has got about so captured ships companies routinely claim to be orphans Frederic invites the pirates to give up piracy and go with him so that he need not destroy them but the Pirate King says that contrasted with respectability piracy is comparatively honest Oh better far to live and die The pirates depart leaving Frederic and Ruth Frederic sees a group of beautiful young girls approaching the pirate lair and realises that Ruth misled him about her appearance Oh false one You have deceived me Sending Ruth away Frederic hides before the girls arrive nbsp George Power the original Frederic in LondonThe girls burst exuberantly upon the secluded spot Climbing over rocky mountain Frederic reveals himself Stop ladies pray startling them He appeals to them to help him reform Oh is there not one maiden breast The girls are fascinated by him but all reject him except one Mabel responds to his plea chiding her sisters for their lack of charity Oh sisters deaf to pity s name for shame She offers Frederic her pity Poor wand ring one and the two quickly fall in love The other girls discuss whether to eavesdrop or to leave the new couple alone What ought we to do deciding to talk about the weather although they steal glances at the affectionate couple How beautifully blue the sky Frederic warns the young ladies that his old associates will soon return Stay we must not lose our senses but before they can flee the pirates arrive and capture the girls intending to marry them Here s a first rate opportunity Mabel warns the pirates that the girls father is a Major General Hold monsters who soon arrives and introduces himself I am the very model of a modern Major General He appeals to the pirates not to take his daughters leaving him to face his old age alone Having heard of the famous Pirates of Penzance he pretends that he is an orphan to elicit their sympathy Oh men of dark and dismal fate The soft hearted pirates release the girls Hail Poetry making Major General Stanley and his daughters honorary members of their band Pray observe the magnanimity Act II edit The Major General sits in a ruined chapel on his estate surrounded by his daughters His conscience is tortured by the lie that he told the pirates and the girls attempt to console him Oh dry the glist ning tear The Sergeant of Police and his corps arrive to announce their readiness to arrest the pirates When the foeman bares his steel The girls loudly express their admiration of the police for facing likely slaughter by fierce and merciless foes The police are unnerved by this and leave reluctantly nbsp Have mercy on us Left alone Frederic who is to lead the police reflects on his opportunity to atone for a life of piracy Now for the pirates lair at which point he encounters Ruth and the Pirate King They have realised that Frederic s apprenticeship was worded so as to bind him to them until his twenty first birthday and because that birthday happens to be on the 29th of February in a leap year it means that technically only five birthdays have passed When you had left our pirate fold and he will not reach his twenty first birthday until he is in his eighties Frederic is convinced by this logic and agrees to rejoin the pirates He then sees it as his duty to inform the Pirate King of the Major General s deception The outraged outlaw declares that the pirates revenge will be swift and terrible Away away my heart s on fire Frederic meets Mabel All is prepared and she pleads with him to stay Stay Frederic stay but he feels bound by his duty to the pirates until his 21st birthday in 1940 They agree to be faithful to each other until then though to Mabel It seems so long Oh here is love and here is truth Frederic departs Mabel steels herself No I ll be brave and tells the police that they must go alone to face the pirates The police muse that an outlaw might be just like any other man and it is a shame to deprive him of that liberty which is so dear to all When a felon s not engaged in his employment The police hide on hearing the approach of the pirates A rollicking band of pirates we who have stolen onto the estate intending to take revenge for the Major General s lie With cat like tread Just then Major General Stanley appears sleepless with guilt and the pirates also hide Hush hush not a word while the Major General listens to the soothing breeze Sighing softly to the river The girls come looking for him The pirates leap out to seize them and the Pirate King urges the captured Major General to prepare for death The police rush to their defence but are easily defeated The Sergeant has one stratagem left he demands that the pirates yield in Queen Victoria s name the pirates overcome with loyalty to their Queen do so Ruth appears and reveals that the pirates are all noblemen who have gone wrong The Major General is impressed by this and all is forgiven Frederic and Mabel are reunited and the Major General is happy to marry his daughters to the noble ex pirates after all Poor Wand ring Ones reprise Musical numbers editOverture includes With cat like tread Ah leave me not to pine Pray observe the magnanimity When you had left our pirate fold Climbing over rocky mountain and How beautifully blue the sky Act I nbsp Drawing of Richard Temple as the Pirate King1 Pour oh pour the pirate sherry Samuel and Chorus of Pirates 2 When Fred ric was a little lad Ruth 3 Oh better far to live and die Pirate King and Chorus of Pirates 4 Oh false one you have deceiv d me Frederic and Ruth 5 Climbing over rocky mountain Chorus of Girls 6 Stop ladies pray Edith Kate Frederic and Chorus of Girls 7 Oh is there not one maiden breast Frederic and Chorus of Girls 8 Poor wand ring one Mabel and Chorus of Girls 9 What ought we to do Edith Kate and Chorus of Girls 10 How beautifully blue the sky Mabel Frederic and Chorus of Girls 11 Stay we must not lose our senses Here s a first rate opportunity to get married with impunity Frederic and Chorus of Girls and Pirates 12 Hold monsters Mabel Major General Samuel and Chorus 13 I am the very model of a modern Major General Major General and Chorus 14 Finale Act I Mabel Kate Edith Ruth Frederic Samuel King Major General and Chorus Oh men of dark and dismal fate I m telling a terrible story Hail Poetry Oh happy day with joyous glee Pray observe the magnanimity reprise of Here s a first rate opportunity nbsp Isabel Jay as Mabel nbsp Pirate King Henry Lytton denounces Major General C H Workman Act II 15 Oh dry the glist ning tear Mabel and Chorus of Girls 16 Then Frederic let your escort lion hearted Frederic and Major General 17 When the foeman bares his steel Mabel Edith Sergeant and Chorus of Policemen and Girls 18 Now for the pirates lair Frederic Ruth and King 19 When you had left our pirate fold The paradox trio Ruth Frederic and King 20 Away away My heart s on fire Ruth Frederic and King 21 All is prepar d your gallant crew await you Mabel and Frederic 22 Stay Fred ric stay Ah leave me not to pine Oh here is love and here is truth Mabel and Frederic 23 No I ll be brave Though in body and in mind Reprise of When the foeman bares his steel Mabel Sergeant and Chorus of Police 23a Sergeant approach Mabel Sergeant of Police and Chorus of Police 24 When a felon s not engaged in his employment Sergeant and Chorus of Police 25 A rollicking band of pirates we Sergeant and Chorus of Pirates and Police 26 With cat like tread upon our prey we steal Samuel and Chorus of Pirates and Police 27 Hush hush not a word Frederic King Major General and Chorus of Police and Pirates 28 Finale Act II Ensemble Sighing softly to the river Now what is this and what is that You We triumph now Away with them and place them at the bar Poor wandering ones Critical reception editThe notices from critics were generally excellent in both New York and London in 1880 51 In New York the Herald and the Tribune both dedicated considerable space to their reviews The Herald took the view that the new work is in every respect superior to the Pinafore the text more humorous the music more elegant and more elaborate 52 The Tribune called it a brilliant and complete success commenting The humor of the Pirates is richer but more recondite It demands a closer attention to the words but there are great stores of wit and drollery which will well repay exploration The music is fresh bright elegant and merry and much of it belongs to a higher order of art than the most popular of the tunes of Pinafore 53 The New York Times also praised the work writing it would be impossible for a confirmed misanthrope to refrain from merriment over it though the paper doubted if Pirates could repeat the prodigious success of Pinafore 46 After the London premiere the critical consensus led by the theatrical newspaper The Era was that the new work marked a distinct advance on Gilbert and Sullivan s earlier works 47 The Pall Mall Gazette said Of Mr Sullivan s music we must speak in detail on some other occasion Suffice it for the present to say that in the new style which he has marked out for himself it is the best he has written 54 The Graphic wrote That no composer can meet the requirements of Mr Gilbert like Mr Sullivan and vice versa is a fact universally admitted One might fancy that verse and music were of simultaneous growth so closely and firmly are they interwoven Away from this consideration the score of The Pirates of Penzance is one upon which Mr Sullivan must have bestowed earnest consideration for independently of its constant flow of melody it is written throughout for voices and instruments with infinite care and the issue is a cabinet miniature of exquisitely defined proportions That the Pirates is a clear advance upon its precursors from Trial by Jury to H M S Pinafore cannot be denied it contains more variety marked character careful workmanship and is in fact a more finished artistic achievement a brilliant success 55 There were a few dissenting comments The Manchester Guardian thought both author and composer had drawn on the works of their predecessors Mr Gilbert seems to have borrowed an idea from Sheridan s The Critic Mr Sullivan s music is sprightly tuneful and full of go although it is certainly lacking in originality 56 The Sporting Times noted It doesn t appear to have struck any of the critics yet that the central idea in The Pirates of Penzance is taken from Our Island Home which was played by the German Reeds some ten years ago 57 The Times thought Gilbert s wit outran his dramatic invention and Sullivan s music for the new work was not quite as good as his score for The Sorcerer which the Times critic called a masterpiece 58 Musical analysis editThe overture to The Pirates of Penzance was composed by Sullivan and his musical assistant Alfred Cellier It follows the pattern of most Savoy opera overtures a lively opening the melody of With cat like tread a slow middle section Ah leave me not to pine alone and a concluding allegro in a compressed sonata form in which the themes of How beautifully blue the sky and A paradox a paradox are combined 59 Parody edit The score parodies several composers most conspicuously Verdi Come friends who plough the sea and You triumph now are burlesques of Il trovatore 60 and one of the best known choral passages from the finale to Act I Hail Poetry is according to the Sullivan scholar Arthur Jacobs a burlesque of the prayer scene La Vergine degli Angeli in Verdi s La forza del destino 61 However another musicologist Nicholas Temperley writes The choral outburst Hail Poetry in The Pirates of Penzance would need very little alteration to turn it into a Mozart string quartet 62 Another well known parody number from the work is the song for coloratura Poor wand ring one which is generally thought to burlesque Gounod s waltz songs 63 though the music critic of The Times called it mock Donizetti 64 In a scene in Act II Mabel addresses the police who chant their response in the manner of an Anglican church service 65 Sullivan even managed to parody two composers at once The critic Rodney Milnes describes the Major General s Act II song Sighing softly to the river as plainly inspired by and indeed worthy of Sullivan s hero Schubert 66 and Amanda Holden speaks of the song s Schubertian water rippling accompaniment but adds that it simultaneously spoofs Verdi s Il trovatore with the soloist unaware of a concealed male chorus singing behind him 67 Patter counterpoint and vocal writing edit nbsp Major General s Song source source George Baker sings the I am the very model of a modern Major General conducted by George W Byng 1920 Problems playing this file See media help Writing about patter songs Shaw in his capacity as a music critic praised the time honored lilt which Sir Arthur Sullivan following the example of Mozart and Rossini chose for the lists of accomplishments of the Major General in The Pirates or the Colonel in Patience 68 This opera contains two well known examples of Sullivan s characteristic combination of two seemingly disparate melodies Jacobs suggests that Berlioz s La damnation de Faust a great favourite in Sullivan s formative years may have been the model for Sullivan s trademark contrapuntal mingling of the rapid prattle of the women s chorus in Act I How beautifully blue the sky in 2 4 time with the lovers duet in waltz time Jacobs writes that the whole number shifts with Schubertian ease from B to G and back again 43 In Act II a double chorus combines the policemen s dogged tune When the foeman bares his steel and the soaring line for the women Go ye heroes go to glory 69 In adapting the four part chorus Climbing over rocky mountain from Thespis for re use in Pirates Sullivan took less trouble he wrote only a single vocal line suitable for soprano voices 70 Despite this the number ends with another example of Sullivan s counterpoint with the chorus singing the second melody of the piece Let us gaily tread the measure while the orchestra plays the first Climbing over rocky mountain 71 Sullivan set a particular vocal challenge for the soprano who portrays Mabel The Sullivan scholar Gervase Hughes wrote Mabel must be a coloratura because of Poor wand ring one yet Dear father why leave your bed demands steady beauty of tone throughout the octave F to F and Ah leave me not to pine goes a third lower still 72 In The Music of Arthur Sullivan 1959 Hughes quoted four extracts from Pirates saying that if hearing each out of context one might attribute it to Schubert Mendelssohn Gounod or Bizet respectively yet on learning the truth one would kick oneself for not having recognised Sullivan s touch in all four Hughes concluded by quoting the introductory bars of When a felon s not engaged in his employment adding There could never be any doubt as to who wrote that and it is as English as our wonderful police themselves 73 Versions edit nbsp 1880 posterBecause the work was premiered in three different places the Paignton performance and the full productions in New York and London there are more variations in the early libretto and score of The Pirates of Penzance than in other Gilbert and Sullivan works Songs sent from New York to the D Oyly Carte touring company in England for the Paignton premiere were then altered or omitted during Broadway rehearsals Gilbert and Sullivan trimmed the work for the London premiere and Gilbert made further alterations up to and including the 1908 Savoy revival For example early versions depicted the Pirate King as the servant of the pirate band 74 and the words of the opening chorus were Pour O King the pirate sherry 75 In the original New York production the revelation by Ruth that the pirates are all noblemen who have gone wrong prompted the following exchange recalling a famous passage in H M S Pinafore GENERAL POLICE amp GIRLS What all noblemen KING amp PIRATES Yes all noblemen GENERAL POLICE amp GIRLS What all KING Well nearly all ALL They are nearly all noblemen who have gone wrong Then give three cheers both loud and strong For the twenty noblemen who have gone wrong In the original London production this exchange was shortened to the following GIRLS Oh spare them They are all noblemen who have gone wrong GENERAL What all noblemen KING Yes all noblemen GENERAL What all KING Well nearly all Gilbert deleted the exchange in the 1900 revival and the Chappell vocal score was revised accordingly For the 1908 revival Gilbert had the pirates yielding in good King Edward s name 74 Despite Helen Carte s repeated urging Gilbert did not prepare an authorised version of the libretti of the Savoy operas 76 In its 1989 production the D Oyly Carte Opera Company restored one of the original versions of the finale which finishes with a variation of I am the very model of a modern major general rather than with the customary reprise of Poor wand ring one 77 but in later revivals it reverted to the more familiar text 66 Production history edit nbsp 1881 programme coverThe Pirates of Penzance has been one of Gilbert and Sullivan s most popular comic operas After its unique triple opening in 1879 80 it was revived in London at the Savoy Theatre in 1888 and in 1900 and for the Savoy s repertory season of 1908 09 In the British provinces the D Oyly Carte Opera Company toured it almost continuously from 1880 to 1884 and again in 1888 It re entered the D Oyly Carte touring repertory in 1893 and was never again absent until the company s closure in 1982 78 New costumes were designed by Percy Anderson in 1919 and George Sheringham in 1929 who also executed a new Act I set Peter Goffin created a new touring set in 1957 45 In America after the New York opening on New Year s Eve 1879 Richard D Oyly Carte launched four companies that covered the United States on tours that lasted through the following summer 79 Gilbert and Sullivan themselves trained each of the touring companies through January and early February 1880 and each company s first performance whether it was in Philadelphia Newark or Buffalo was conducted by the composer In Australia its first authorised performance was on 19 March 1881 at the Theatre Royal Sydney produced by J C Williamson 16 There was still no international copyright law in 1880 and the first unauthorised New York production was given by the Boston Ideal Opera Company at Booth s Theatre in September of that year citation needed The opera premiered in a German translation by Richard Genee and Camillo Walzel Die Piraten in Austria at the Theater an der Wien on 1 March 1889 and in Dusseldorf Germany on 1 December 1936 16 The first non D Oyly Carte professional production in a country that had been subject to Gilbert s copyright other than Williamsons authorised productions was in Stratford Ontario Canada in September 1961 as the copyright expired In 1979 the Torbay branch of the Gilbert and Sullivan Society presented a centenary tribute to the world premiere performance of Pirates in Paignton with a production at the Palace Avenue Theatre situated a few metres from the former Bijou Theatre 80 New York has seen over forty major revivals since the premiere 81 One of these produced and directed by Winthrop Ames in 1926 at the Plymouth Theatre ran for 128 performances 82 and gained good notices 83 A brief 1952 Broadway staging starring Martyn Green earned Lehman Engel a Tony Award as conductor 84 85 Repertory companies that have mounted Pirates numerous times Off Broadway and on tour in the US have included the American Savoyards 1953 67 86 the Light Opera of Manhattan 1968 89 87 and the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players 1976 present 88 As discussed below Joseph Papp s 1980 83 Pirates ran for nearly two years each on Broadway and in the West End boosting the opera s popularity Professional and amateur productions of the opera continue with frequency For example the Chicago Lyric Opera and English National Opera each staged the work in 2004 89 and in 2007 the New York City Opera and Opera Australia both mounted new productions 90 91 In 2013 Scottish Opera produced a British touring production of The Pirates of Penzance co produced by the trustees of the D Oyly Carte Opera Company Richard Suart played Major General Stanley and Nicholas Sharratt played Frederic 92 93 A concert of the opera was presented on Broadway in October 2022 by and for the benefit of Roundabout Theatre Company at the American Airlines Theatre directed by Scott Ellis with choreography by Warren Carlyle and starring David Hyde Pierce as the Major General Ramin Karimloo as the Pirate King and Colton Ryan as Frederic Rupert Holmes adapted the libretto with a New Orleans setting 94 The following table shows the history of the D Oyly Carte productions in Gilbert s lifetime excluding tours nbsp Drawing from programme of children s Pirates 1884Theatre Opening date Closing date Perfs DetailsBijou Theatre Paignton 30 December 1879 30 December 1879 1 English copyright performance Fifth Avenue Theatre New York 31 December 1879 6 March 1880 100 Original run in New York The company toured the Eastern seaboard between 8 March and 15 May Three other touring companies were launched in January and February 1880 17 May 1880 5 June 1880Opera Comique 3 April 1880 2 April 1881 363 Original London run Savoy Theatre 23 December 1884 14 February 1885 37 Children s Pirates series of matinees with a juvenile cast 95 Savoy Theatre 17 March 1888 6 June 1888 80 First professional revival Savoy Theatre 30 June 1900 5 November 1900 127 Second professional revival Savoy Theatre 1 December 1908 27 March 1909 43 Second Savoy repertory season played with five other operas Closing date shown is of the entire season Historical casting editThe following tables show the casts of the principal original productions and D Oyly Carte Opera Company touring repertory at various times through to the company s 1982 closure Role Paignton1879 96 New York1879 97 Opera Comique1880 98 Savoy Theatre1888 99 Savoy Theatre1900 100 Major General Richard Mansfield J H Ryley George Grossmith George Grossmith Henry LyttonPirate King Frederick Federici Sgr Brocolini Richard Temple Richard Temple Jones HewsonSamuel G J Lackner Furneaux Cook George Temple Richard Cummings W H LeonJames John Le Hay role eliminatedFrederic Llewellyn Cadwaladr Hugh Talbot George Power J G Robertson Robert EvettSergeant Fred Billington Fred Clifton Rutland Barrington Rutland Barrington Walter PassmoreMabel Emilie Petrelli Blanche Roosevelt Marion Hood Geraldine Ulmar Isabel JayEdith Marian May Jessie Bond Julia Gwynne Jessie Bond Lulu EvansKate Lena Monmouth Rosina Brandram Lilian La Rue 101 Nellie Kavanagh Alice ColemanIsabel Kate Neville Billie Barlow Neva Bond Nellie Lawrence Agnes FraserRuth Fanny Harrison Alice Barnett Emily Cross Rosina Brandram Rosina BrandramRole Savoy Theatre1908 102 D Oyly Carte1915 Tour 103 D Oyly Carte1925 Tour 104 D Oyly Carte1935 Tour 105 D Oyly Carte1945 Tour 106 Major General Charles H Workman Henry Lytton Henry Lytton Martyn Green Grahame CliffordPirate King Henry Lytton Leicester Tunks Darrell Fancourt Darrell Fancourt Darrell FancourtSamuel Leo Sheffield Frederick Hobbs Joseph Griffin Richard Walker Hilton LaylandFrederic Henry Herbert Dewey Gibson Charles Goulding John Dean John DeanSergeant Rutland Barrington Fred Billington Leo Sheffield Sydney Granville Richard WalkerMabel Dorothy Court Elsie McDermid Elsie Griffin Kathleen Frances Helen RobertsEdith Jessie Rose Nellie Briercliffe Eileen Sharp Marjorie Eyre Marjorie EyreKate Beatrice Boarer Betty Grylls Aileen Davies Maisie Baxter Ivy SandersIsabel Ethel Lewis Kitty Twinn Hilary Davies Elizabeth Nickell Lean Rosalie DyerRuth Louie Rene Bertha Lewis Bertha Lewis Dorothy Gill Ella HalmanRole D Oyly Carte1950 Tour 107 D Oyly Carte1958 Tour 108 D Oyly Carte1968 Tour 109 D Oyly Carte1975 Tour 110 D Oyly Carte1981 Tour 111 Major General Martyn Green Peter Pratt John Reed James Conroy Ward Alistair DonkinPirate King Darrell Fancourt Donald Adams Donald Adams John Ayldon John AyldonSamuel Donald Harris George Cook Alan Styler Jon Ellison Michael BuchanFrederic Leonard Osborn Thomas Round Philip Potter Colin Wright Meston ReidSergeant Richard Watson Kenneth Sandford George Cook Michael Rayner Clive HarreMabel Muriel Harding Jean Hindmarsh Valerie Masterson Julia Goss Vivian TierneyEdith Joan Gillingham Joyce Wright Peggy Ann Jones Patricia Leonard Jill PertKate Joyce Wright Marian Martin Pauline Wales Caroline Baker Helene WitcombeIsabel Enid Walsh Jane Fyffe Susan Maisey Rosalind Griffiths Alexandra HannRuth Ella Halman Ann Drummond Grant Christene Palmer Lyndsie Holland Patricia LeonardJoseph Papp s Pirates edit nbsp Smith Ronstadt and Kline at the Delacorte TheatreIn 1980 Joseph Papp and the Public Theater of New York City produced a new version of Pirates directed by Wilford Leach and choreographed by Graciela Daniele at the Delacorte Theatre in Central Park as a Shakespeare in the Park summer event Musical direction and arrangements were by William Elliott The show played for 10 previews and 35 performances It then transferred to Broadway opening on 8 January 1981 for a run of 20 previews and 787 regular performances at the Uris and Minskoff Theatres the longest run for any Gilbert and Sullivan production in history 112 This take on Pirates earned enthusiastic reviews 113 and seven Tony Award nominations winning three including the award for Best Revival and for Leach as director It was also nominated for eight Drama Desk Awards winning five including Outstanding Musical and director 114 Compared with traditional productions of the opera Papp s Pirates featured a more swashbuckling Pirate King and Frederic and a broader more musical comedy style of singing and humour It did not significantly change the libretto but it used a new orchestration and arrangements that changed some keys added repeats lengthened dance music and made other minor changes in the score The Matter Patter trio from Ruddigore and Sorry her lot from H M S Pinafore two other Gilbert and Sullivan operas were interpolated into the show 16 The production also restored Gilbert and Sullivan s original New York ending with a reprise of the Major General s song in the Act II finale Linda Ronstadt starred as Mabel Rex Smith as Frederic Kevin Kline as the Pirate King Patricia Routledge as Ruth replaced by Estelle Parsons for the Broadway transfer George Rose as the Major General and Tony Azito as the Sergeant of Police Kline won a Tony Award for his performance Smith won a Theatre World Award and Kline and Azito won Drama Desk Awards Notable replacements during the Broadway run included Karla DeVito Maureen McGovern and Pam Dawber as Mabel Robby Benson Patrick Cassidy and Peter Noone as Frederic Treat Williams Gary Sandy James Belushi and Wally Kurth as the Pirate King David Garrison as the Sergeant George S Irving as the Major General and Kaye Ballard as Ruth The Los Angeles cast of the production featured Barry Bostwick as the Pirate King Jo Anne Worley as Ruth Clive Revill as the Major General Dawber as Mabel Paxton Whitehead as the Sergeant Caroline Peyton as Edith and Andy Gibb as Frederic 114 nbsp Opera Australia s 2007 touring production of Pirates with Anthony Warlow as the Pirate KingThe production opened at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane London on 26 May 1982 to generally warm reviews for a run of 601 performances earning an Olivier Award nomination as Outstanding Musical and another for Curry Notable among the cast were George Cole and Ronald Fraser as the Major General Pamela Stephenson as Mabel Michael Praed and Peter Noone as Frederic Tim Curry Timothy Bentinck Oliver Tobias and Paul Nicholas as the Pirate King Chris Langham as the Sergeant of Police Annie Ross as Ruth Bonnie Langford as Kate and Louise Gold as Isabel 115 The Australian production opened in Melbourne in January 1984 opening the new Victorian Arts Centre directed by John Feraro It starred Jon English as the Pirate King Simon Gallaher as Frederic June Bronhill as Ruth David Atkins as the Sergeant of Police and Marina Prior as Mabel The six week limited season was followed by an Australian national tour from 1984 to 1986 and another tour with same cast in the mid 1990s 112 In 1985 Papp s Pirates opened the new Queensland Performing Arts Centre in Brisbane setting attendance records that were not surpassed until many years later by The Phantom of the Opera citation needed Gallaher s Essgee Entertainment version of Pirates was inspired by the Papp version 112 The Papp version also inspired foreign language productions in Germany and elsewhere in Europe 16 The Papp production was turned into a film in 1983 with the original Broadway principal cast reprising their roles except that Angela Lansbury replaced Estelle Parsons as Ruth The minor roles used British actors miming to their Broadway counterparts The film has been shown occasionally on television Another film based loosely on the opera and inspired by the success of the Papp version The Pirate Movie was released during the Broadway run 116 Papp s version has been regularly revived on both sides of the Atlantic a British revival in 2000 transferred from the West Yorkshire Playhouse Leeds to the Open Air Theatre in Regents Park and has also become well established in the repertoire of amateur student societies No other production has had as much lasting impact or influence It also helped to promote G amp S in places where it has been little performed and bring it to the attention of a much wider and younger audience 112 The Papp production design has been widely imitated in later productions of Pirates even where traditional orchestration and the standard score are used 112 117 Some modern productions are also influenced by the Disney film franchise Pirates of the Caribbean combining aspects of the Papp production with the Disney design concepts Not all of these revivals have generated the same enthusiasm as Papp s 1980s productions A 1999 UK touring production received this critique No doubt when Papp first staged this show in New York and London it had some quality of cheek or chutzpah or pizzazz or irony or something that accounted for its success But all that s left now is a crass Broadway style musical arrangement ground out by a seven piece band and the worst kind of smutty send up of a historic piece of art 118 Recordings editThe Pirates of Penzance has been recorded many times and the critical consensus is that it has fared well on record 119 The first complete recording of the score was in 1921 under the direction of Rupert D Oyly Carte but with established recording singers rather than D Oyly Carte Opera Company performers 120 In 1929 The Gramophone said of a new set with a mainly D Oyly Carte cast This new recording represents the high water mark so far as Gilbert and Sullivan opera is concerned In each of the previous Savoy albums there have been occasional lapses which prevented one from awarding them unqualified praise but with the Pirates it is happily otherwise from first to last and in every bar a simply delightful production 121 Of later recordings by the D Oyly Carte Opera Company the 1968 recording with complete dialogue is highly regarded The online Gilbert and Sullivan Discography says This recording is one of the best D Oyly Carte sets of all time and certainly the best Pirates 122 and the Penguin Guide to Opera on Compact Disc also recommends it 123 So too does the Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music alongside the 1993 Mackerras recording 124 The opera critic Alan Blyth recommended the D Oyly Carte recording of 1990 a performance full of the kind of life that can only come from the experience of stage performances 125 The online Discography site also mentions the 1981 Papp recording as excellent despite its inauthentic 1980 re orchestrations that changed some of the timbres so as to appeal to a rock oriented public 126 Of the available commercial videos the Discography site considers the Brent Walker better than the Papp version 127 More recent professional productions have been recorded on video by the International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival 128 Selected recordings 1929 D Oyly Carte Conductor Malcolm Sargent 129 1957 D Oyly Carte New Symphony Orchestra of London Conductor Isidore Godfrey 130 1961 Sargent Glyndebourne Pro Arte Orchestra Glyndebourne Festival Chorus Conductor Sir Malcolm Sargent 131 1968 D Oyly Carte with dialogue Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Conductor Isidore Godfrey 132 1981 1983 Papp s Pirates with dialogue Director Wilford Leach Musical Director William Elliott Choreographer Graciela Daniele 133 1982 Brent Walker Productions with dialogue Ambrosian Opera Chorus London Symphony Orchestra Conductor Alexander Faris Stage Director Michael Geliot 134 1990 New D Oyly Carte Conductor John Pryce Jones 135 1993 Mackerras Telarc Orchestra and Chorus of the Welsh National Opera Conductor Sir Charles Mackerras 136 1994 Essgee Entertainment video adaptation Director and Choreographer Craig Schaefer Orchestrator and Conductor Kevin Hocking Additional Lyrics Melvyn Morrow 137 Cultural impact editMain article Cultural influence of Gilbert and Sullivan Major General s Song edit Main article Major General s Song nbsp The Major General carries an encyclopedia in this Bab drawing Pirates is one of the most frequently referenced works of Gilbert and Sullivan The Major General s Song in particular is frequently parodied pastiched and used in advertising 138 Parody versions have been used in political commentary as well as entertainment media 139 Its challenging patter has proved interesting to comedians notable examples include Tom Lehrer s song The Elements and David Hyde Pierce s monologue as host of Saturday Night Live 140 In 2010 comedian Ron Butler released a YouTube pastiche of the song in character as President Obama which as of September 2021 had garnered more than 1 9 million views 141 142 Pastiche examples include the Animaniacs version I am the very model of a cartoon individual in the episode H M S Yakko 143 the Doctor Who audio I am the very model of a Gallifreyan buccaneer in Doctor Who and the Pirates 144 the Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip version in the episode The Cold Open 2006 where the cast performs We ll be the very model of a modern network TV show 145 and the Mass Effect 2 video game version where the character Mordin Solus sings I am the very model of a scientist Salarian 146 The song is often used in film and on television unchanged in many instances as a character s audition piece or seen in a school play scene Examples include a VeggieTales episode entitled The Wonderful World of Auto Tainment the Frasier episode Fathers and Sons The Simpsons episode Deep Space Homer and the Mad About You episode Moody Blues where Paul directs a charity production of Penzance starring his father Burt as the Major General In The Muppet Show season 3 episode 4 guest host comedian Gilda Radner sings the song with a 7 foot tall 2 1 m talking carrot Parodying the pilot pirate confusion in Pirates Radner had requested a 6 foot tall 1 8 m talking parrot but was misheard 147 In an episode of Home Improvement Al Borland begins to sing the song when tricked into thinking he is in a soundproof booth In the Babylon 5 episode Atonement Marcus Cole uses the song to drive Dr Stephen Franklin crazy on a long journey to Mars Examples of the use of the song in advertising include Martyn Green s pastiche of the song listing all of the varieties of Campbell s Soup 148 and a 2011 Geico commercial in which a couple that wants to save money but still listen to musicals finds a roommate dressed as the Major General who awkwardly begins the song while dancing on a coffee table 149 Gimbels department store had a campaign sung to the tune of the Major General s Song that began We are the very model of a modern big department store 150 George Washington in the number Right Hand Man from the 2015 musical Hamilton by Lin Manuel Miranda refers to himself with irony as The model of a modern major general which he rhymes with men are all and pedestal Miranda commented I always felt like mineral wasn t the best possible rhyme 151 Film and television edit Other film references to Pirates include Kate amp Leopold where there are multiple references including a scene where Leopold sings I Am The Very Model of A Modern Major General while accompanying himself on the piano and in Pretty Woman Edward Lewis Richard Gere covers a social gaffe by prostitute Vivian Ward Julia Roberts who comments that the opera La traviata was so good that she almost peed her pants by saying that she had said that she liked it better than The Pirates of Penzance In Walt Disney s cartoon Mickey Donald Goofy The Three Musketeers 2004 there is a performance of Pirates that becomes the setting for the climactic battle between the Musketeers and Captain Pete Pirates songs sung in the cartoon are With cat like tread Poor wand ring one Climbing over rocky mountain and the Major General s song Poor wand ring one was used in the movie An American Tail 152 The soundtrack of the 1992 film The Hand That Rocks the Cradle includes Poor Wand ring One and Oh Dry the Glistening Tear 153 A nonsense pastiche of the song in the 2017 film Despicable Me 3 sung by Minions was termed amusing 154 and the film s finest moment 155 it was uploaded to YouTube by Illumination Entertainment as a singalong challenge which has garnered more than 19 million views as of 2023 156 Television references in addition to those mentioned above included the series The West Wing where Pirates and other Gilbert and Sullivan operas are mentioned in several episodes especially by Deputy Communications Director Sam Seaborn who was recording secretary of his school s Gilbert and Sullivan society In Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip a poster from Pirates hangs on Matt Albie s office wall Both TV series were created by Aaron Sorkin In the pilot episode of the 2008 CTV series Flashpoint a police officer and his partner sing the policeman s song In an Assy McGee episode entitled Pegfinger Detective Sanchez s wife is a member of a community theatre that performs the opera In a 1986 episode of the animated television adaptation of The Wind in the Willows entitled A Producer s Lot several characters put on a production of Pirates 157 In a 2005 Family Guy episode Peter s Got Woods Brian Griffin sings Sighing Softly with Peter Griffin s assistance In a 2012 episode Killer Queen Peter gives a garbled rendition of the Major General s Song 158 In the 2009 Criminal Minds episode The Slave of Duty Hotch quotes Oh dry the glist ning tear 159 In the 1992 episode The Understudy of Clarissa Explains it All the title character is chosen to understudy Mabel in a school production of Pirates and is unprepared when she must go on a scene from The Mikado is also heard 160 Other references edit nbsp Wallpaper showing characters from Pirates and other Savoy operasOther notable instances of references to Pirates include a New York Times article on 29 February 1940 memorialising that Frederic was finally out of his indentures 161 Six years previously the arms granted to the municipal borough of Penzance in 1934 contain a pirate dressed in Gilbert s original costuming and Penzance had a rugby team called the Penzance Pirates which is now called the Cornish Pirates In 1980 Isaac Asimov wrote a short story called The Year of the Action concerning whether the action of Pirates took place on 1 March 1873 or 1 March 1877 depending on whether Gilbert took into account the fact that 1900 was not a leap year 162 The plot of Laurie R King s 2011 novel Pirate King centers on a 1924 silent movie adaptation of The Pirates of Penzance 163 The music from the chorus of With cat like tread which begins Come friends who plough the sea was used in the popular American song Hail Hail the Gang s All Here With cat like tread is also part of the soundtrack along with other Gilbert and Sullivan songs in the 1981 film Chariots of Fire and it was pastiched in the HMS Yakko episode of Animaniacs in a song about surfing a whale 164 In the case Pierson v Ray which established the doctrine of qualified immunity for police officers the United States Supreme Court held that a policeman s lot is not so unhappy that he must choose between being charged with dereliction of duty if he does not arrest when he had probable cause and being punished with damages if he does 165 State courts have cited the same song for other purposes Where does this extraordinary situation leave the lower Courts and State Courts in their required effort to apply the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States Like the policeman in Gilbert and Sullivan s The Pirates of Penzance their lot is not a happy one 166 Adaptations editStageDi Yam Gazlonim a Yiddish adaptation of Pirates by Al Grand 145 that continues to be performed in North America The 2006 production at the National Yiddish Theater Folksbiene was nominated for the 2007 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival The Montreal Express wrote in 2009 Grand s adaptation is a delightfully whimsical treatment 167 The Parson s Pirates by Opera della Luna premiered in 1995 Pirates Or Gilbert and Sullivan Plunder d 2006 is a musical comedy set on a Caribbean island involving a voodoo curse that makes the pirates landsick It was first presented 1 November 2006 at Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam Connecticut then in 2007 at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn New Jersey in 2009 at the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston Massachusetts and at The Muny in St Louis Missouri in 2012 Other Gilbert and Sullivan numbers such as the Nightmare song from Iolanthe are interpolated 168 169 Pirates of Penzance The Ballet premiered in 1991 Essgee Entertainment produced an adapted version in 1994 in Australia and New Zealand 170 Their producer Simon Gallaher Frederic in the Australian Papp production produced another adaptation of Pirates that toured Australia from 2001 to 2003 171 All male versions of the opera include a long running adaptation by Sasha Regan at the Union Theatre in 2009 which transferred to Wilton s Music Hall in London in 2010 172 and toured in Australia in 2012 173 174 Film and TVThe Pirate Movie a 1982 musical romantic comedy film loosely based on the opera The Pirates of Penzance a 1983 film adaptation of Papp s Broadway production Die Piraten a German language version was premiered on German television in 1968 and starred Arleen Auger as Mabel Gerd Nienstedt as the Pirate King and Martha Modl as Ruth with Franz Marszalek conducting Mabel falls in love with the Pirate King among other plot changes A 2 CD set of the broadcast was issued by Gala Records in 2000 175 Several other television adaptations of the opera have been made beginning in 1939 176 See also editOur Island Home one of the sources of the libretto for PiratesReferences edit Perry Helga Information from the Savoyoperas org website Archived 7 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine Savoy Operas 27 November 2000 accessed 25 July 2009 This figure assumes that Gilbert was ignoring the fact that there was no leap year in 1900 Otherwise the action of the play would take place in 1873 instead of 1877 and the figure would be 67 years See Bradley 1996 p 244 a b Prestige Colin D Oyly Carte and the Pirates The Original New York Productions of Gilbert and Sullivan pp 113 148 at p 118 Papers Presented at the International Conference of G amp S held at the University of Kansas May 1970 edited by James Helyar Lawrence Kansas University of Kansas Libraries 1971 Allen 1979 p 2 Goodman Andrew Gilbert and Sullivan at Law pp 204 205 Fairleigh Dickinson University Press 1982 ISBN 0838631797 International copyright pirating Archived 28 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine Edward Samuels accessed 25 July 2009 Rosen Zvi S The Twilight of the Opera Pirates A Prehistory of the Right of Public Performance for Musical Compositions Cardozo Arts amp Entertainment Law Journal Vol 24 2007 pp 1157 1218 5 March 2007 accessed 24 October 2012 Adams Cecil Why are pirates depicted with a parrot on their shoulder What s the origin of the skull and crossbones pirate flag The Straight Dope 12 October 2007 a b Williams p 130 Williams pp 131 132 Ainger p 166 Faning Eaton and Shapcott Wensley Extra Supplement Our Island Home in Musical Times Vol 55 No 859 1 September 1914 pp 1 12 Ganzl p 29 Shaw Vol 1 p 784 A Talk With Mr Sullivan The New York Times 1 August 1879 p 3 accessed 22 May 2012 a b c d e Ganzl Kurt The Pirates of Penzance or The Slave of Duty Comic opera in 2 acts by Gilbert amp Sullivan Operetta Research Center 5 October 2016 Ainger p 168 Ford had been one of the few managers who had paid Gilbert and Sullivan any kind of fee for performing Pinafore in America and his reward for a small gesture was great Stedman p 169 Ainger p 169 Sullivan gave notice to the directors of the Comedy Opera Company in early July 1879 that he Gilbert and Carte would not be renewing their contract to produce Pinafore with them and that he would withdraw his music from the Comedy Opera Company on 31 July This followed a closure of the Opera Comique for repairs that Gilbert Sullivan and Carte used to give them an argument that the original run of the production had closed See Stedman pp 170 172 Ainger pp 165 167 and 194 195 and Jacobs p 126 Sullivan wrote to a former producer John Hollingshead of the Gaiety Theatre saying You once settled a precedent for me which may just at present be of great importance to me I asked you for the band parts of the Merry Wives of Windsor and you said They are yours as our run is over Now will you please let me have them and the parts of Thespis also at once I am detaining the parts of Pinafore so that the directors shall not take them away from the Comique tomorrow and I base my claim on the precedent you set See Rees p 89 The Comedy Opera Company directors engaged another theatre to play a rival production of Pinafore but they had no scenery On 31 July they sent a group of thugs to the Opera Comique to seize the scenery and props during the evening performance of Pinafore See Ainger p 170 and Jacobs pp 124 125 Stagehands and cast members managed to ward off their backstage attackers and protect the scenery The police arrived to restore order and the show continued See Stedman pp 170 171 and Gillan Don The Fracas at the Opera Comique The Theatre 1 September 1879 reprinted at the Stage Beauty website accessed 6 May 2009 See also The Fracas at the Opera Comique The Era 10 August 1879 p 5 and The Fracas at the Opera Comique The Leeds Mercury 13 August 1879 p 8 The matter was eventually settled in court where a judge ruled in Carte s favour about two years later See Ainger p 175 a b c d Jacobs p 129 a b Ainger pp 182 183 Jacobs p 127 Jacobs p 111 Ainger pp 133 134 Jacobs p 113 Cox Ife William W S Gilbert Stage Director Dobson 1978 ISBN 0 234 77206 9 See also Gilbert W S A Stage Play Archived 30 September 2009 at the Wayback Machine and Bond Jessie Reminiscences Introduction Archived 21 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine Ainger p 157 Ainger p 177 Jacobs p 130 Ainger p 179 March Jerry Part of Thespis Score Discovered The Savoyard Vol XX No 1 March 1981 p 25 and Stedman p 95 n 52 Ainger p 180 Stedman p 174 Jacobs pp 130 132 From medieval times and in later centuries however Penzance was subject to frequent raiding by Turkish pirates according to Canon Diggens Archive 1910 Dexter Gary Title Deed How the Book Got its Name The Telegraph 7 July 2010 Williams p 125 Performances had to be given in Britain before publication in order to secure copyright See Stephens John Russell The Profession of the Playwright British Theatre 1800 1900 Cambridge University Press 1992 pp 104 115 Ainger pp 180 81 Jacobs p 133 Stedman p 175 Bradley 1982 pp 86 87 a b Jacobs Arthur Sullivan Sir Arthur Grove Music Online Oxford Music Online accessed 30 June 2010 subscription required Smith Tim A consistent Pirates of Penzance permanent dead link The Baltimore Sun 16 July 2009 a b Rollins and Witts Appendix p VII a b Amusements Fifth Avenue Theatre The New York Times 1 January 1880 p 5 a b Opera Comique The Era 11 April 1880 p 5 See Ainger pp 181 182 and Kochanski Halik Sir Garnet Wolseley Victorian hero p 73 London Hambledon Press 1999 ISBN 1 85285 188 0 Bradley 1982 p 118 a b In the first night version of the libretto the Sergeant of Police was named Edward and the Pirate King was named Richard and was titled A Pirate Chief See Allen 1975 p 112 The London theatrical newspaper The Era even gave the ad hoc performance in Paignton a good review see Gilbert and Sullivan s New Opera The Era 4 January 1880 p 5 The Pirates of Penzance The Daily News 15 January 1880 p 6 The Pirates of Penzance New York Tribune 1 January 1880 accessed 27 August 2010 The Pirates of Penzance The Pall Mall Gazette 6 April 1880 p 12 Music The Graphic 10 April 1880 p 371 From Our London Correspondent The Manchester Guardian 5 April 1880 p 4 The Sporting Times 10 April 1880 p 1 The Times 5 April 1880 p 4 Hughes p 134 Hulme David Russell The Pirates of Penzance The New Grove Dictionary of Opera Grove Music Online Oxford Music Online accessed 30 June 2010 subscription required Jacobs p 135 Temperley Nicholas Mozart s Influence on English Music Music amp Letters vol 42 issue 4 October 1961 pp 307 318 Oxford University Press accessed 1 July 2010 subscription required Hughes p 151 Guthrie s Irreverent Pirates The Times 16 February 1962 p 15 Maddocks Fiona These pirates have real swagger Evening Standard 20 February 2008 accessed 2 July 2010 a b Putting the Jolly in Roger The Times 26 April 2001 Holden p 402 Shaw Vol 2 p 492 Hughes p 80 Hughes p 88 Rees pp 62 63 suggested that in the original Thespis version for male as well as female voices the men would have sung the first theme while the women sang the second Hughes pp 92 93 Hughes pp 50 51 a b Bradley 1982 pp 90 159 Anderson W R Changes in the Pirates Gramophone June 1950 p 14 Bradley 1982 p 7 See Bradley 1982 pp 158 159 Rollins and Witts pp 11 18 22 35 et passim Bradley 1982 p 86 The Pirates of Penzance Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine The Gilbert and Sullivan Society Torbay Branch accessed 23 January 2014 Hischak Thomas Pirates of Penzance The The Oxford Companion to the American Musical Oxford University Press 2009 Oxford Reference Online accessed 2 July 2010 subscription required The Pirates of Penzanzance Internet Broadway Database accessed 25 October 2013 Hurley G M Gilbert and Sullivan and Winthrop Ames The New Yorker 6 June 1931 p 70 The Pirates of Penzance Internet Broadway Database accessed 25 October 2013 Stone David Martyn Green Archived 5 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine Who Was Who in the D Oyly Carte Opera Company 2003 accessed 25 October 2013 Moore Frank Ledlie compiler Handbook of Gilbert and Sullivan Introduction by Dorothy Raedler Producer Director The American Savoyards Schocken Books New York 1975 Kenrick John A Brief History of LOOM Musicals101 com 2002 accessed 26 October 2013 See NYGASP Theatre Programs Prime Time G amp S 20th Anniversary Celebration 24 April 1994 Symphony Space New York City and Laxson Erica The Pirates of Penzance at Wolf Trap Archived 29 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine DCMetroTheaterArts com 30 June 2012 Hall George Leave the laughs to us you swabs dead link The Independent 12 December 2004 accessed 30 June 2010 Gates Anita The Happy Return of the Pirate King and His Loyal Swashbucklers The New York Times 26 November 2006 accessed 30 June 2010 Collette Adrian Chief Executive s Report Archived 22 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine Opera Australia Annual Report 2007 p 11 accessed 22 October 2013 Scottish Opera Sails into Town on Pirates Adventure Archived 22 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine Scottish Opera April 2013 Nickalls Susan The Pirates of Penzance Theatre Royal Glasgow review The Daily Telegraph 17 May 2013 Gans Andrew Ramin Karimloo Lilli Cooper David Hyde Pierce More Will Star in Roundabout s The Pirates of Penzance Concert on Broadway Playbill September 6 2022 and Inside a Broadway Benefit Reading of The Pirates of Penzance Town amp Country October 18 2022 The first performance was by invitation only The official opening was on 26 December 1884 The Times announcement 20 December 1884 p 8 Rollins and Witts p 30 Rollins and Witts p 32 Rollins and Witts p 7 Rollins and Witts p 11 Rollins and Witts p 18 Ganzl Kurt Miss La Rue Who Are You Kurt of Gerolstein 2 September 2016 Rollins and Witts p 22 Rollins and Witts p 132 Rollins and Witts p 148 Rollins and Witts p 160 Rollins and Witts p 170 Rollins and Witts p 175 Rollins and Witts p 183 Rollins and Witts 2nd Supplement p 15 Rollins and Witts 3rd Supplement p 28 Rollins and Witts 4th Supplement p 42 a b c d e Bradley 2005 pp 76 77 Rich Frank Stage Pirates of Penzance on Broadway The New York Times 9 January 1981 accessed 2 July 2010 a b Awards The Pirates of Penzance Internet Broadway Database accessed 24 October 2013 Theatre Record 19 May 1982 to 2 June 1982 p 278 Shepherd Marc The G amp S Operas on Film A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 3 September 2008 accessed 2 July 2010 A Papp style production played at the Savoy Theatre in 2004 See The Pirates of Penzance 2004 ThisIsTheatre com accessed 17 November 2020 This production directed by Steven Dexter and presented by Raymond Gubbay used a new musical arrangement because Papp s designs and musical arrangements created for the Papp production are protected by copyright an unlicensed 1982 production mounted in Dublin in advance of Papp s own London production was enjoined from transferring to London by a successful lawsuit See Bennetts Leslie Pirating of The Pirates of Penzance The New York Times 18 August 1982 accessed 11 October 2011 McMillan Joyce Sinking a Victorian classic The Pirates of Penzance Archived 17 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine The Scotsman 31 October 2001 p 11 accessed 11 October 2014 Lamb Andrew The Pirates of Penzance Gramophone November 1993 p 162 Rollins and Witts p x The Gramophone September 1929 p 25 Shepherd Marc The 1968 D Oyly Carte Pirates A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 7 September 2008 accessed 30 July 2016 March 1993 pp 437 438 March 2007 p 1338 Blyth p 109 Shepherd Marc Papp s Pirates 1980 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 7 July 2010 accessed 20 August 2009 Shepherd Marc List and assessments of recordings of the opera A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 9 July 2009 accessed 30 July 2016 Professional Shows from the Festival Archived 26 June 2012 at the Wayback Machine Musical Collectibles catalogue website accessed 15 October 2012 Shepherd Marc The 1929 D Oyly Carte Pirates A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 29 March 2009 accessed 20 August 2009 Shepherd Marc The 1957 D Oyly Carte Pirates A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 29 March 2009 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc The Sargent EMI Pirates 1961 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 12 July 2009 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc The 1968 D Oyly Carte Pirates A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 7 September 2008 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc Papp s Pirates 1980 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 7 July 2010 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc The Brent Walker Pirates 1982 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 11 November 2009 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc The New D Oyly Carte Pirates 1990 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 2 December 2001 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc The Mackerras Telarc Pirates 1993 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 8 September 2008 accessed 30 July 2016 Shepherd Marc The Essgee Pirates 1994 A Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 9 July 2009 accessed 30 July 2016 Zetland Earl Modern Major General Parodies accessed 7 May 2012 Hinkle A Barton Hinkle The Attorney General s Song Richmond Times Dispatch 10 May 2010 David Hyde Pierce s Monologue Archived 20 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine SNL transcripts accessed 15 February 2010 Butler Ron Obama A Modern U S President musical spoof YouTube 11 October 2010 Zacher Scotty Gilbert and Sullivan spoof A Modern US President Fun Archived 8 November 2011 at the Wayback Machine Chicago Theatre Beat 18 October 2010 accessed 7 May 2012 Animaniacs Cartoon Individual YouTube accessed 15 February 2010 Doctor Who Gallifreyan Buccaneer YouTube accessed 15 February 2010 Other songs from Pirates Pinafore and Ruddigore are also parodied in the recording a b Schillinger Liesl Dress British Sing Yiddish The New York Times 22 October 2006 Mass Effect 2 Mordin Singing YouTube 23 January 2010 The Muppet Show Archived 8 May 2008 at the Wayback Machine TV com accessed 25 July 2009 Stone David Martyn Green Archived 5 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine Who Was Who in the D Oyly Carte Opera Company 2003 accessed 2 December 2011 Roommate Easier Way to Save GEICO Commercial Geico accessed 2 December 2011 One of these ads ran in The New York Times on 27 October 1953 as a full page advertisement Mead Rebecca All About the Hamiltons The New Yorker 9 February 2015 Issue 2 December 2015 Soundtrack for An American Tail 1986 Internet Movie Database accessed 22 April 2010 The Hand That Rocks the Cradle soundtrack Internet Movie Database accessed 21 June 2010 Marsh Calum Resistance is futile Why the ubiquity of the Minions cannot and will never be contained National Post 29 June 2017 Prigge Matt Despicable Me 3 finds a loopy series finally running out of gas Metro 26 June 2017 DespicableMeChallenge In Theaters June 30 YouTube Illumination Entertainment 4 July 2019 A Producer s Lot Archived 29 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine TV com accessed 14 March 2011 Pierson Robin Episode 16 Killer Queen The TV Critic 21 March 2012 accessed 29 August 2013 The Slave of Duty Archived 25 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine Criminal Minds Season 5 Episode 10 2009 TV com accessed 24 June 2015 Hotch notes at her funeral that he met his slain ex wife at tryouts for a high school production of The Pirates of Penzance He quotes from Iolanthe and then quotes the opening lines of Oh dry the glist ning tear up to to see their father weep The Understudy permanent dead link Episode Summary TV com accessed 26 July 2011 Frederic Goes Free The New York Times 29 February 1940 p 18 The Year of the Action in Banquets of the Black Widowers 1984 Pirate King Goodreads com accessed 13 July 2013 G amp S Pop culture references Manchester Universities Gilbert and Sullivan Society accessed 30 November 2011 Schwartz Joanna C 2017 How Qualified Immunity Fails Yale Law Journal Yale Law School Retrieved 26 February 2020 Wagonheim v Maryland State Board of Censors 255 Md 297 321 1969 and In re Stevens 119 Cal App 4th 1228 15 Cal Rptr 3d 168 2d Dist 2004 a felon s capacity for innocent enjoyment is just as great as any honest man s The Pirates of Penzance in Yiddish Montreal Express 25 May 2009 Saltzman Simon CurtainUp New Jersey Review 2007 CurtainUp accessed 13 June 2009 Nesti Robert Pirates Or Gilbert and Sullivan Plunder d edgeboston com 8 June 2009 Essgee Entertainment s Pirates Simon Gallaher accessed 25 July 2009 Simon Gallaher DavidSpicer com Retrieved 23 April 2022 Church Michael The Pirates of Penzance Wilton s Music Hall London Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine The Independent 14 April 2010 Spicer David Sasha Regan s The Pirates of Penzance Stage Whispers 2012 Sasha Regan Pirates of Penzance UK Archived 8 April 2013 at the Wayback Machine Arts Projects Australia 2012 Shepherd Marc Die Piraten 1968 Gilbert and Sullivan Discography 13 April 2009 accessed 13 October 2015 List of television and film adaptations permanent dead link Sources editAinger Michael 2002 Gilbert and Sullivan A Dual Biography Oxford Oxford University Press ISBN 0 19 514769 3 Allen Reginald 1979 Gilbert and Sullivan in America The Story of the First D Oyly Carte Opera Company American Tour New York The Pierpont Morgan Library Allen Reginald 1975 The First Night Gilbert and Sullivan 2nd ed Chappell amp Co Ltd ISBN 0 903443 10 4 Bond Jessie 1930 The Life and Reminiscences of Jessie Bond the Old Savoyard as told to Ethel MacGeorge London John Lane The Bodley Head Archived from the original on 6 September 2015 Retrieved 22 October 2013 Chapters 5 and 6 Blyth Alan 1994 Opera on CD London Kyle Cathie ISBN 1 85626 103 4 Bordman Gerald 1981 American Operetta From H M S Pinafore to Sweeney Todd Oxford Oxford University Press ISBN 0 19 502869 4 Bradley Ian 1982 The Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan Harmondsworth England Penguin Books ISBN 0 14 070848 0 Bradley Ian 2005 Oh Joy Oh Rapture The Enduring Phenomenon of Gilbert and Sullivan Oxford England Oxford University Press ISBN 0 19 516700 7 Ganzl Kurt 1986 The British Musical Theatre Volume I 1865 1914 Oxford Oxford University Press Holden Amanda 1997 The Penguin Opera Guide London Penguin Books ISBN 014051385X Hughes Gervase 1959 The Music of Sir Arthur Sullivan London Macmillan amp Co Ltd Jacobs Arthur 1986 Arthur Sullivan A Victorian Musician Oxford Oxford University Press ISBN 0 19 282033 8 Lamb Andrew Spring 1986 From Pinafore to Porter United States United Kingdom Interactions in Musical Theater 1879 1929 American Music University of Illinois Press 4 1 34 49 doi 10 2307 3052183 JSTOR 3052183 March Ivan ed 1993 The Penguin Guide to Opera on Compact Discs Harmondsworth Penguin Books ISBN 0 14 046957 5 March Ivan ed 2007 The Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music Harmondsworth Penguin Books ISBN 978 0 14 103336 5 Rees Terence 1964 Thespis A Gilbert amp Sullivan Enigma London Dillon s University Bookshop Rollins Cyril R John Witts 1962 The D Oyly Carte Opera Company in Gilbert and Sullivan Operas A Record of Productions 1875 1961 London Michael Joseph Also five supplements privately printed Shaw Bernard 1981 Laurence Dan H ed Shaw s Music The Complete Musical Criticism of Bernard Shaw Vol 1 London Max Reinhardt ISBN 0 370 31270 8 Shaw Bernard 1981 Laurence Dan H ed Shaw s Music The Complete Musical Criticism of Bernard Shaw Vol 2 London Max Reinhardt ISBN 0 370 31271 6 Tillett Selwyn Spencer Roderick 21 September 2002 Forty Years ofThespisScholarship PDF Sullivan Society Festival weekend Cirencester Archived from the original PDF on 19 June 2007 Retrieved 25 May 2006 Williams Carolyn 2010 Gilbert and Sullivan Gender Genre Parody New York Columbia University Press ISBN 978 0 231 14804 7 External links edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to The Pirates of Penzance nbsp Wikiquote has quotations related to The Pirates of Penzance nbsp Wikisource has original text related to this article The Pirates of Penzance General The Pirates of Penzance at The Gilbert amp Sullivan Archive Sullivan s autograph manuscript 1879 1880 London theatre programme Review of the opening night Archived 7 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine by Clement Scott Papp s version of The Pirates of Penzance at the Music Theatre International website D Oyly Carte Prompt Books at The Victoria and Albert Museum Televised scenes from Pirates D Oyly Carte Opera Company 1955 nbsp The Pirates of Penzance public domain audiobook at LibriVoxLists of productions The Pirates of Penzance Production list at Floormic com The Pirates of Penzance at The Internet Broadway Database The Pirates of Penzance at IMDb Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title The Pirates of Penzance amp oldid 1185402940, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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