At a time when dead playwrights and composers often suffer
a dreadful fate in the hands of over-ambitious directors, it’s
nice to see directors who know how to nip and tuck and update,
and come up with something original that still remains true to
the original.
Brooklyn Family Theatre’s production of William S. Gilbert and
Sir Arthur Sullivan’s "The Pirates of Penzance," on
stage at The Church of the Gethsemane through Dec. 1, is directed
by Jonathan Valuckas and Phill Greenland, who also supplied new
arrangements and resetting.
Greenland is the community theater veteran who, with Lorraine
Stobbe, launched Brooklyn Family Theatre last season with his
outstanding production of "Godspell." So it should
come as no surprise that Greenland has been able to make fairly
deep cuts in songs and dialogue, yet do it so subtly and surreptitiously
that when the play ends a mere hour and a half after the lights
dim, it’s hard to figure out how it ended so quickly.
But Greenland has done more than merely shorten Gilbert and Sullivan’s
opera about a group of kindhearted pirates and the major general’s
daughters who fall in love with them. He’s also updated the contents.
There’s talk of "pillaging the Staten Island ferry,"
and the merits of a life of piracy, which "contrasted with
Wall Street is comparatively honest."
When Frederic, the dutiful young apprentice pirate, points out
that the pirates of Penzance always release captives who claim
to be orphans, he adds that as a result, "one would think
that New York’s entire Coast Guard was recruited from orphanages."
There’s been a good deal of gender reversals in this production.
The Pirate King is played by Lorinne Lampert, whose long red
hair and Ethel Merman-style voice and sauciness make one wonder
why the part was ever given to a man. And Justin Zell takes the
role of Ruth, the nanny. Wearing a gray wig, lots of lipstick
and a long dress and apron, Zell takes to its hilarious heights
the notion of an aging, ample-bodied nanny falling in love with
her 21-year-old charge.
Greenland and Valuckas, however, have wisely left the role of
Major General Stanley to a young man from New York University,
Ty Triplett, who looks, acts and sings like "the very model
of a modern major general" and brings down the house with
that show-stopping number.
They also leave the role of Frederic, the unwilling apprentice,
to another former NYU student, the sweet-voiced and sincere Aneesh
Sheth.
Greenland has rearranged much of the music (synthesized and prerecorded)
to give it a very modern and upbeat sound. One has the feeling
Sir Arthur would not have been offended.
Although The Church of the Gethsemane offers only a tiny stage
and not much space for elaborate scenery (this production’s minimal
scenery consists of two billboards with postings of phony local
newspaper articles about the supposed exploits of the pirates
in Brooklyn), it does provide excellent acoustics. Greenland
has enhanced these natural blessings with an excellent sound
system composed of three stage microphones, two body microphones
and an MP3 player.
And the sound is superb. In fact, quite unlike the case with
so many Gilbert and Sullivan stagings, almost every word is clearly
heard and understood. Hats off to modern technology!
"The Pirates of Penzance" is the only Gilbert and Sullivan
opera to have its world premiere outside England – at the Fifth
Avenue Theater in Manhattan. It was an instant hit. Gilbert and
Sullivan were admired and applauded, wined and dined. There were
authorized productions in many other cities across the nation
– from Minnesota to Massachusetts. In fact, impresario D’Oyly
Carte’s main problem was keeping pirated productions off the
stage.
In the 20th century, the opera has continued to be produced by
amateur and professional companies – most notably Joseph Papp
and the New York Shakespeare Festival’s staging for Free Shakespeare
in the Park during the summer of 1980, starring Linda Ronstadt
and Rex Smith.
Now, it is entirely fitting that Brooklyn Family Theatre should
take this opera, first welcomed by an American audience, and
make it their own.
Don’t think you can take an "opportunity of escaping with
impunity." If you miss "The Pirates of Penzance,"
you’ll find "a sad mistake it was to make."
Brooklyn Family Theatre’s production
of "The Pirates of Penzance" plays through Dec.1, Fridays
at 8 pm, Saturdays at 4 and 8 pm and Sundays at 5 pm. The Church
of Gethsemane is located at 1012 Eighth Ave. at 10th Street in
Park Slope. For reservations, call (718) 670-7205.
