BRATTLEBORO — Following last year's successful Vermont performances of “Trial by Jury,” the Amherst, Mass.-based Valley Light Opera (VLO) is returning to Brattleboro for a second year to perform Gilbert and Sullivan's “H.M.S. Pinafore; or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor.”
In an energetic, funny, and somewhat silly show, “Pinafore” pokes genial fun at the British class system, patriotism, party politics, the Royal Navy, and the rise, into positions of authority, of unqualified persons.
This comic opera in two acts is performed at New England Youth Theatre (NEYT) on Saturday, April 26, at 8 p.m., and Sunday, April 27, at 2 p.m.
W. S. Gilbert, who wrote the witty words, and Arthur Sullivan, who composed the tuneful music, were the phenomenally successful late-19th-century theatrical team that collaborated on 14 comic operas from 1871 to 1896.
Considered the fathers of modern musical theater, Gilbert and Sullivan had worked together on three projects before “Pinafore,” but it was this show that established them as an international sensation.
“Pinafore” opened at London's Opera Comique on May 28, 1878, ran for 571 performances, and became a smash hit in England and the States.
VLO Publicity Manager Jonathan Evans said that, in many ways, “Pinafore” set the standard for many of Gilbert and Sullivan's subsequent successes.
“There's something about this particular libretto and music that draws people in and has made this show one of the most popular pieces of musical theater ever created,” Evans explained.
Valley Light Opera had a successful run of “Pinafore” in November 2013 at Northampton's Academy of Music. NEYT's version is more modest, owing to the smaller space and more limited resources, but the production features period costumes for which VLO is celebrated, live musical accompaniment, and a talented cast of 22 - all reprising their principal parts from November's production.
Celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, Valley Light Opera is a nonprofit founded in 1975 by a group of Gilbert and Sullivan devotees from Massachusetts who had a mission to produce primarily the works of Gilbert and Sullivan.
VLO hoped to provide members of the community with the opportunity to join them at all levels of these productions, as well as enabling participants and audiences to develop a deeper appreciation of light opera.
Jacqueline Haney, VLO stage manager and the show's co-director, explains that VLO began “with a group of visionary people who got together in our founding director Bill Venman's living room in 1975.”
She adds: “We are now carrying on what they put in place, dedicated to the ideals and values they established over 40 years ago. We want them to approve of what we do.”
She also notes one change:
For many years VLO performed in the Amherst High School auditorium, but the company recently moved to the more advantageous space in Northampton's Academy of Music.
“We have a very loyal audience, and after so many years in Amherst, a few were disgruntled about our move but most went with us,” says Evans. “In Northampton we were able to pick up a whole new audience from that area.”
VLO presents a fully staged opera each fall, and less formal productions in late winter or early spring. Over the years, VLO has produced all 14 Gilbert and Sullivan operas, as well works by other master of operetta as Rudolf Friml, Franz Lehár, Jacques Offenbach, and John Philip Sousa.
VLO is not really a touring company, Evans explains: “It is extremely unusual for us to bring our shows out of town, and Brattleboro is about as far from home as we have ranged.”
He says he believes that although the production in Vermont is pared down from what Northampton audiences see, with its shortened text and piano rather than orchestra accompaniment, “Pinafore” in Brattleboro will give a new audience a taste of the fine product that VLO offers.
“'Pinafore' is a great show for the entire family, and we hope to see many families on our visit to Brattleboro,” says Evans.
And “family” is a useful word here, as that's how VLO sees its audience and the company itself.
“I joined VLO because I saw my son in a G&S production and wanted to join the fun,” Evans explains. “Since then I have played many of the tenor parts in the shows, and have come to see the whole company as my family.”
Jacqueline Haney says she believes the concept of family is what makes the members of the all-volunteer VLO so dedicated.
“We are one big family here, in both the figurative and literal sense,” she says. “I call people who have been with us a long time our aunts and uncles, but then again many people are actually related. This production's [character] Rafe's parents were members of VLO, and he is married to [Sir Joseph's] cousin Hebe.”
Many performers have continued with VLO year after year, but Haney also suggests that new blood is vital to each season's success: “About a third of our casts each year is new, which keeps us from getting stale.”
Dedicated to the legacy and style of G&S operettas more than a century old, VLO works to keep these treasures of musical theater evergreen.