Ruddigore: Lancashire Telegraph Review

Opera review: Ruddigore @ Lowry, Salford

For long in the shadow of its immediate predecessor The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan's Ruddigore has never had the success it surely deserves. That situation should now change after Opera North's new production at The Lowry.

Gilbert's plot is set in the Cornish town of Rederring where the Murgatroyd family, baronets of Ruddigore, have been cursed to commit a crime a day.
It is a wicked satire on the Victorian fascination for gothic melodrama and all things supernatural.

On the surface there are the stock characters of melodrama: an innocent maiden, the jolly seaman replete with mummerset accent and a kitbag of nautical cliches, apparitions a-plenty not forgetting the obligatory cape swirling villain. But all is not what it seems in this topsy turvy world. Gilbert invests his characters with most disturbing signs of insanity. There are multiple changes of prospective spouses preceded by the chasing of any eligible (or ineligible) female and a visitation by long dead ancestors.

Updated from the early 19th century to sometime after the Great War Jo Davies' terrific production is enhanced by Richard Hudson's superb sets that are evocatively lit in sepia tones by Anna Watson.
The first of many laughs of the evening comes during the overture when a flickering sideshow sets the scene for the events that are to unfold.

Sullivan's music is some of the finest he wrote for the Savoy operas and it fizzes along under John Wilson's direction, especially in the Act 2 ghost scene where Steven Page's marvellous Sir Roderic is on commanding form. Grant Doyle's suave Sir Ruthven together with Amy Freston's svelte Rose Maybud are gorgeously sung and acted. Anne Marie Owens' authoritative yet tender Dame Hannah and Richard Angus' towering hulk of a servant are consistently fine. As the randy skirt-chasing jack tar Hal Cazelet brought boundless energy and brio to the not particularly likeable Dick Dauntless. But then, in this probing production which also explores the ambiguities in Gilbert's masterly libretto, are the protagonists really likeable?

Heather Shipp's Mad Margaret was curiously unsettling yet often hilarious especially when partnered with the excellent Sir Despard of Richard Burkhard in the second act duet. This production must surely restore Ruddigore to its rightful place as one of the great Savoy operas. Set to become a classic, it is a ruddy good show.

Don't miss it!

Ken Bayliss.

Ruddigore, Grand Theatre (Independent on Sunday)

Spared some creaking old traditions, a bright new production of a Gilbert and Sullivan oddity comes up roses.

Reviewed by Anna Picard.

There was a mild kerfuffle over the breakfast tables of Middle England in December when Peter Mandelson was mystified by a mention of Pooh-Bah on Radio 4's Today programme.

The reactions of the political commentators were interesting. While some took the opportunity to riff on Mandelson as a sophisticate – inclined to Verdi, if not verismo – most found it barely credible that a middle-class man in his mid-fifties would not catch a reference to the "Lord High Everything Else" of Gilbert and Sullivan's operetta, The Mikado.

Is it reasonable to assume that the patter songs of G&S are hard-wired into the national consciousness? Not any more. Boosted by Mike Leigh's film Topsy-Turvy, Jonathan Miller's 1986 Mikado has performed well for English National Opera in revival, yet neither The Pirates of Penzance nor The Gondoliers has repeated its success. For the most part, Gilbert and Sullivan has become a heritage industry, something for nostalgics, rarely played or sung at home. How intriguing, then, that Opera North should choose to stage Ruddigore now.

Often dubbed the most operatic of the Savoy operettas, Ruddigore 's subject is not class, bureaucracy, the weather or anything that can be labelled a characteristically British preoccupation, but Gothic melodrama, lovesick insanity and the moonstruck instrumentation of Lucia di Lammermoor. Opportunities for inserting topical jokes are happily few in this tale of a family cursed to commit "one crime a day". There is an obligatory reference to MPs' expenses, however, in Jo Davies's tender, witty staging, which heeds Gilbert's warning that "directly the characters show that they are conscious of the absurdity of their utterances the piece begins to drag".

Opera North has a tight, neat and sweet hit on its hands. Having sassed its way through Weill and Gershwin, the orchestra brings charm and delicacy to Sullivan's pastel apparitions and "blameless dances" under conductor John Wilson. Styled after hand-tinted postcards by designer Richard Hudson, the production is set in the aftermath of the First World War. Though there are shades aplenty in Ruddigore Castle, the ghosts of G&S past are largely exorcised in this brisk tangle of concealed identities, inherited tragedy and love-beyond-the-grave. Instead we have young voices, pertly clipped spoken dialogue, ensembles of madrigalian precision, delightfully agile choreography (Kay Shepherd), and a series of sparkling star turns from Amy Freston (Rose Maybud), Grant Doyle (Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd), Richard Burkhard (Sir Despard Murgatroyd), Heather Shipp (Mad Margaret), Hal Cazalet (Richard Dauntless) and Steven Page (the late Sir Roderic Murgatroyd). Can one production revive a dying genre? The music is too slight to matter, matter, matter. But I'll be smiling next time anyone mentions Basingstoke.

Ruddigore: Aren't they just darling? (Sunday Times review)

From The Sunday Times

February 7, 2010

Opera North’s 1920s opera is an inspired revival that merrily papers over the cracks of Gilbert and Sullivan’s first flop

by Hugh Canning

In January 1887, Ruddigore followed Gilbert and Sullivan’s smash hit of 22 months earlier, The Mikado, mustering only 288 performances compared with its predecessor’s 672, then the second longest run in British theatre history. The New York Times declared it “Their First Flat Failure”, adding portentously that the operetta’s name “is decidedly against it”. Originally entitled Ruddygore, it — hilariously — became acceptable for the Victorians by the substitution of the offending “y” with an innocuous “i”. Gilbert must have been chuckling all the way to the bank.

Ruddigore has remained on the margins of the Savoy Opera repertoire, which makes Opera North’s production all the more welcome. At Leeds’s Grand Theatre, the director Jo Davies and the designer Richard Hudson have achieved the near miracle of concocting the most original and convincing G&S revival since Jonathan Miller’s “Roaring Twenties” Mikado for English National Opera in 1986.

Davies and Hudson also opt for the 1920s, evoking the melodrama of the silent-movie era during the overture — Sullivan’s atmospheric and operatic original, rather than Geoffrey Toye’s usually recorded potpourri of the operetta’s hit tunes for the 1920 D’Oyly Carte revival — and screening the back story of Dame Hannah’s abortive engagement and marriage to Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, 21st Baronet of Ruddigore, who succumbs to the Witch’s Curse of a violent death for failing to commit at least one crime a day. In one of Gilbert’s most contrived denouements, his ghost, having emerged from his portrait to spook the incumbent baronet, is brought back to life to be reconciled with his former betrothed, now the guardian aunt of the operetta’s ditzy heroine, Rose Maybud, whose fast-shifting morals are guided by a book of etiquette.

Even in its revised form, Ruddigore betrays the formulaic routine that was to bedevil the later Utopia Limited and The Grand Duke, and lacks the consistent musical inspiration of The (dramatically flawed) Gondoliers.

Opera North’s staging successfully pastes over the compositional and theatrical cracks of Act I, set in the Cornwall village of Rederring, where Rose can’t make up her mind between the claims of two potential bridegrooms: Robin Oakapple/Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd and his foster brother, Dick Dauntless. She is also the intended prey of Sir Despard — baronet in default of Sir Ruthven, his older brother — who plans to fulfil the dictates of the curse by abducting and forcibly marring her. The tone set by Davies and Hudson’s elegant sets and costumes hovers between EF Benson and PG Wodehouse, all tongue-in-cheek lampooning, with an ever-present band of bridesmaids eagerly showering confetti at the slightest hint of imminent wedding bells. Davies has worked hard getting opera singers to deliver the dialogue snappily, with cut-glass diction, but the first half still drags a bit, thanks to Gilbert’s convoluted plot­ting and less than side-splittingly funny dialogue. The improbabilities and characters are gently sent up rather than grotesquely caricatured — underplaying the satire nearly always yields dividends in G&S.

Hudson’s magnificent set and Sullivan’s brilliant parodies of the spook scenes of Weber’s Der Freischütz and Wagner’s Flying Dutchman bring the show into thrilling focus, however. Sir Roderic’s hit number, When the Night Wind Howls, is thrillingly delivered by Steven Page, and the other musical highlight is his duet with Anne Marie Owens’s uncaricatured, touchingly musical Hannah. Although Rose is a pale rerun of The Mikado’s Yum-Yum, Amy Freston’s light soubrette simpers and sings sweetly, while Grant Doyle is a dashing, young-Alan-Bates-lookalike Sir Ruthven and Richard Burghard manages the transition from snarling bad baronet to urbane bad baronet’s younger bro with nice eyebrow-curling urbanity. Richard Angas is a joy as Robin/Ruthven’s amiable manservant, Adam Goodheart.

Heather Shipp makes a brave stab at a silent-film tragedy-queen Mad Margaret without redeeming one of Gilbert’s most implausible creations. John Wilson, a “light opera” specialist, could have whipped up the tempo of the patter songs, but the pace should tighten during the run. When it does, it will be a classic.

Ruddigore: Opera Britannia

Twenty-four years have passed since Opera North last performed a Gilbert & Sullivan operetta, but their sparkling new production of Ruddigore  was definitely well worth the wait - a real treat from start to finish.  Director Jo Davies has updated the action to the 1920s in a slick and witty staging that contains enough of the traditional-style dancing and unison hand gestures to keep G&S purists happy, while at the same time bringing a freshness and vitality to the piece, including several interpolated topical jokes about MPs’ expense claims which had the audience in stitches. 

Ruddigore  - or The Witch’s Curse was the tenth collaboration between Gilbert and Sullivan, but coming less than two years after The Mikado it inevitably suffered by comparison and struggled to live up to the success of its more famous predecessor.  The first performance at the Savoy Theatre in January 1887 was met with a somewhat hostile reception - the New York Times branded it a failure and reported hissing and shouting from disappointed audience members.  Though other critics were far less severe, the general consensus was that Ruddigore was charming but flawed, and several changes and cuts were made in order to improve the piece.  Even the original title (spelled Ruddygore) proved rather controversial - upsetting all the 19th century Mary Whitehouse types who felt that ‘ruddy’ was too shockingly similar to ‘bloody’, which is why it was quickly changed to a less ‘offensive’ spelling.
Though Ruddigore will never be as popular as The Mikado, HMS Pinafore or The Pirates of Penzance, it still boasts a delightfully tuneful score, amusing dialogue and a preposterously silly melodramatic plot.  Sir Roderic’s song “When the night wind howls” is a real musical gem and displays some extraordinarily imaginative orchestral writing, perfectly capturing the atmosphere of the unfurling ghost story.  But the most famous musical number is probably the brilliant patter trio from Act II  “My eyes are fully open to my awful situation” which contains the fantastic line “This particularly rapid unintelligible patter isn’t generally heard and if it is it doesn’t matter”

Set in Cornwall in a village called Rederring (geddit?) the plot is a parody of a Victorian gothic melodrama, revolving around the ‘Bad Baronets’ of Ruddigore who are condemned by an ancient curse to commit one crime each day or else perish in agony.  Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, the rightful heir to the baronetcy, has run away and disguised himself as Robin, a simple farmer, in order to escape the curse - causing his younger brother Despard to inherit the title.  Robin/Ruthven and his foster-brother Richard (a sailor) are both in love with the virtuous, etiquette-obsessed Rose Maybud, who cannot make up her mind whom she wishes to marry and switches her affections between the two men every five minutes.  And of course there is poor abandoned Mad Margaret who enters in a disheveled state to the strains of a flute solo, an obvious little nod to Lucia di Lammermoor.  Add to the mix some ghosts, the obligatory interrupted wedding scene and several totally implausible plot twists and we reach a classic formulaic G&S happy ending where all the principals neatly pair off and marry each other.   If only real life were that simple!

During the overture we were shown the ‘back story’ of Dame Hannah and Sir Roderic as an old-fashioned black and white silent film projection – a clever means of exposition.  After staging the opening scene in Rose’s bedroom, the Act I set designs by Richard Hudson gave us a seafront promenade (complete with plastic seagull!) and the elegant interior of a village church.  Act II was set entirely inside the dark and gloomy picture gallery of Ruddigore Castle, the long latticed windows dramatically crashing open amidst some genuinely scary thunder and lightning.  Staging the scene where the ghostly ancestors come to life and step out of their picture frames is a challenge for any director, but it was brilliantly achieved here by means of translucent screens – a clever coup de theatre. Costumes by Gabrielle Dalton were elegant and mainly typical of the 1920s period.

To stage any G&S production truly successfully it is essential to have singers who are also good actors, otherwise there is a real danger that much of Gilbert’s dialogue can fall flat in the wrong hands.  Fortunately Opera North’s cast fielded some wonderful acting talent and it is hard to imagine a more ideal Robin/Ruthven than Grant Doyle.  His warm, elegant baritone was attractive in timbre and he sang with great polish and finesse throughout; making light work of the fast patter songs and getting the text across with impeccably clear and suitably posh diction.  His acting and comic timing were brilliant - obviously a G&S ‘natural’, Doyle made a very affable hero in Act I and a very sympathetic villain in Act II.

Soprano Amy Freston seemed slightly less at home with Gilbert’s dialogue, casually throwing away some of Rose’s best lines without pausing to make the most of their comedy potential.  Her bright and chirpy voice is silvery in timbre, although occasionally too piercing in quality for my taste.  However, it does not help that the role requires the soprano to sing so many higher notes on unflattering ‘e’ and ‘i’ vowels (as I discovered myself when I sang this part a few years ago in an amateur production).  A smoother legato line would have been preferable during Rose’s solo which begins the madrigal “When the buds are blossoming”, particularly in the run up to the A, but otherwise Ms Freston turned in a vivacious and winsome performance.

As Richard Dauntless (or Dick, as he is usually called), Hal Cazalet acted the part superbly and was every inch the cocky, uncouth and over-confident sailor.  His light tenor is pleasing on the ear with nice clean diction, although some of his sustained high notes sounded underpowered.  A very agile performer, Cazalet deserves special praise for his extremely impressive Hornpipe dancing skills.

Richard Burkhard makes a splendidly over-the-top Sir Despard.  Another G&S ‘natural’, he was clearly relishing every word of his text and sang with a rich, resonant bass - powerful enough to make a dramatic impact during his song “Oh why am I moody and sad?” but still possessing suitable agility to easily cope with the rapid-fire patter numbers.

Mezzo-soprano Heather Shipp was a genuinely bizarre Mad Margaret; although her crazed acting was so exaggerated that it was difficult to feel sympathy for her as a tragic abandoned woman because all the emphasis was on the comic side of her character.  Ms Shipp possesses a rich and vibrant mezzo but the nature of this role gives her few opportunities to show off the voice properly – although it is heard to its best advantage in the slow section of her aria “To a garden full of posies” which was heartfelt and sung with a beautiful dark timbre.

As the ghost of Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, Steven Page almost stole the show with a stylish and powerfully sung rendition of “When the night wind howls”. Making a dramatic entrance in a long dark cloak, Page’s tall and commanding stage presence was reminiscent of Mozart’s Commendatore and he exuded the same gravitas, acting the role as a stereotypical WWI army general who likes to bellow orders and bully his subordinates.  His love interest Dame Hannah was sung by mezzo Anne-Marie Owens who settled into the role after a somewhat shaky and vocally uneven start.  Coming into her own in Act II, her feisty acting was hilarious in the scene where she threatens the cowardly Sir Ruthven with a gun.    There was also some very strong support from Richard Angas, wonderfully funny in the character role of Old Adam and Gillene Herbert (Zorah) who possesses a delightfully pure and elegant soprano.

The chorus of Opera North were on top form and clearly having just as much fun as the audience.  In the pit, the orchestra under John Wilson gave a spirited rendition of the score with some delightfully vivid and precise playing.  Wilson’s tempi tended to err on the side of caution when it came to the patter numbers – and a piece like “My eyes are fully open” loses some of its comedy potential if it is not taken at an exaggerated breakneck speed.  The version performed used Sullivan’s original, somewhat sedate and leisurely overture, as opposed to Geoffrey Toye’s revised arrangement and also contained Sir Ruthven’s Act II song “Away remorse…..Henceforth all the crimes” which is often cut.

Opera North have scored an indisputable hit with this brilliantly funny show and the audience didn’t stop laughing from the overture until the moment they walked out of the theatre.  Ruddigore will also be performed in Salford Quays, Newcastle and Nottingham throughout February and March – not to be missed!

Faye Courtney
Opera Britannia

Ruddigore: The Arts Desk

Friday, 05 February 2010 08:15 Written by Graham Rickson

A magical Ruddigore: Richard Burkhard as Sir Despard Murgatroyd (left) and Grant Doyle as Robin Oakapple Robert Workman 

The plot of this rarely performed Gilbert and Sullivan spoof melodrama is gloriously amusing. The male heirs of the Murgatroyd family suffer under a witch’s curse which forces them to commit a crime each day, or suffer an agonising death. Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd has fled the ancestral home and now lives under a pseudonym, meaning that his younger brother Despard has had to assume both the baronetcy and the duty to commit the daily crime. Unlike his older brother's dastardly penchant for stealing babies and robbing banks, he finds it hard to progress beyond forging cheques and fiddling expenses.

This Opera North production of Ruddigore is really delightful. Projecting witty silent-film footage over the overture to fill in the back story, director Jo Davies has updated the action to the 1920s. Richard Stilgoe’s lyrics bring the action even further forward, referring to duck houses and Jacqui Smith.

It’s clear from the start that this will be a delicious evening. The complicated ensemble scenes in Act One are full of imaginative detail - right down to the movements of feet and hands, tiny gestures which transform a production from the technically impressive to something magical. There is a lovely moment in the bridesmaids' recreation of a naval battle, the British fleet are defeated by Gallic halitosis. Or when Sir Despard passes on the family title to his sweet-natured brother Ruthven by carefully dressing him in a black cape, top hat and cane. The finale of the first act is stunning - musically clever as well as wonderfully funny. At times I was giggling so much I could barely see what was happening. The moment in Act Two where the ancestral portraits of the impressively solid Ruddigore Castle descend from their canvases to taunt Sir Ruthven is theatrical magic. 

Casting is uniformly successful. Richard Burkard’s Sir Despard almost steals the evening, bursting through the canvas of a Punch and Judy theatre, hollow laugh ringing out as he twirls his moustache. Grant Doyle conveys an endearing, innocent charm as Sir Ruthven, especially in his early scenes with Amy Freston’s Rose Maybud as the two of them struggle to express their feelings for each other. Hats off too to Stephen Page’s Sir Roderic. There is superb lighting by Anna Watson, particularly during some superbly realistic coastal scenes. John Wilson conducts with pace and affection. As a lifetime G&S sceptic, this production may have converted me. It’s that good.

Ruddigore continues at the Grand Theatre in Leeds until 12 February. It then tours to Salford, Newscastle and Nottingham. Details here.

Ruddigore, Grand Theatre (FT Review)

By Andrew Clark

Published: February 2 2010 22:31

Sparkling patter: Grant Doyle and Amy Freston

The UK’s Gilbert and Sullivan heritage is a blessing and a curse. The jokes find a natural home in middle England, but the D’Oyly Carte Company’s long monopoly left the operettas mired in tradition. When it closed in 1982, everyone had their pick and vulgarity took a bow. In recent years the popularity of G&S has dipped: storylines redolent of class and empire come across as old hat in a multicultural society. But when they are performed with verve and style, there’s still fun to be had. That, at least, is the message of Opera North’s first G&S for 24 years.

Written on the back of The Mikado’s success, Ruddigore has more than its share of formulaic writing, but it is a good choice for an opera company with a flair for operetta. It includes a famous ghost scene that, at a stroke, lifts the proceedings out of the frivolous. The morbid turn of Sullivan’s music didn’t go down well with Gilbert, but it has a strong dramatic quotient, giving welcome body to a work otherwise overloaded with grating bridesmaids’ choruses.

Jo Davies’ staging neither vamps up the scene nor trivialises it. What springs to mind is the Wolf’s Glen in Der Freischütz, the witches in Macbeth, the ghost-ship choruses in Der fliegende Holländer: it’s on that scale. Richard Hudson’s handsome set, lit by Anna Watson, translates the normal to the paranormal and back with a magician’s sleight of hand, while scary flutes and shadowy strings weave a chill web of mystique.

The scene brings out the best in Opera North’s ensemble, not least the orchestra under John Wilson. Steven Page creates a suitably authoritarian Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, while Anne-Marie Owens takes her overdue share of the limelight as a plucky Dame Hannah. Grant Doyle, too, plunders the psychic overtones of his surroundings to give substance to the otherwise flimsy Sir Ruthven.There is excellent support from Hal Cazalet, Heather Shipp and Richard Angas, but the 1920s tone of the production – underpinned by Gabrielle Dalton’s costumes and Kay Shepherd’s choreography – is set by Amy Freston’s Rose Maybud, all period looks and sparkling patter. ()

Opera North's Ruddigore (Telegraph Review)

Ruddigore is one of Gilbert & Sullivan's lesser-known works, but Opera North brings it to effervescent life. Rating: * * * *

By Rupert Christiansen
Published: 6:06PM GMT 01 Feb 2010

Delightful: Opera North's Richard Burkhard and Heather Shipp.

An auditorium packed with an audience of all ages was crackling with anticipation before Opera North’s new production of Ruddigore. One of Gilbert & Sullivan’s lesser-known operettas was receiving its first professional performance for two decades: the question was whether the staging might prove a smash hit to match Jonathan Miller’s Mikado or Joseph Papp’s Pirates of Penzance, reinventing a Victorian period piece in a style that could please both traditionalists and modernisers.

Even though I don’t think it quite hits the jackpot, the result is without doubt a delightful show that will give great pleasure. This Ruddigore’s minor shortcomings are much less to do with the performance than the work itself, which suffers from a protracted first act in which Gilbert plods and Sullivan seldom rises above routine.

I felt that the director, Jo Davies, had struggled to know what to do with it. Translating a Cornish village during the Napoleonic wars to a vaguely Wodehousian 1920s ambience provides a bit of incidental fun (the overture is accompanied by a pastiche silent movie and Mad Margaret is vamped up like Theda Bara), but the updating is otherwise pointless: it brings nothing into sharper focus and doesn’t have the topsy-turvy logical inevitability that made Miller’s “Grand Hotel” Mikado so piquant.

Richard Hudson’s photogravure-toned designs look washed-out, and you wonder why some of the characters are talking “thee” and “thine”. The dialogue goes at a fair lick, and it’s all tuneful and amusing enough, but it doesn’t lift off. A 10-minute cut might have helped.

The second act is another story: it’s absolutely terrific. Hudson has conceived a magnificent interior for Ruddigore castle, and the animation of the ancestral portraits is a dazzling coup de théâtre. Sullivan suddenly wakes up and produces a tremendous Gothic ghost scene, and Gilbert does some of his most virtuosic patter (“My eyes are fully open”), as well as a spot-on satire of moral snootiness in Mad Margaret and Sir Despard’s duet.

The cast is top-notch, and Davies has clearly directed every member with sensitivity. The always likeable Grant Doyle blossoms with star quality as Robin Oakapple, nicely pitted against Amy Freston’s simpering Rose Maybud.

Heather Shipp has great fun as a tragedy queen of a Mad Margaret, with Richard Burkhard as the sly, dry Sir Despard. Steven Page, kitted out like Field Marshal Haig, sings Sir Roderic’s “When the night wind howls” with bravado, and Hal Cazalet (Richard Dauntless), Richard Angas (Old Adam) and Anne-Marie Owens (Dame Hannah) are excellent, too.

John Wilson conducts with a light touch, allowing everyone to get the words across without mikes or surtitles – even Gilbert himself would have applauded their virtually impeccable diction. Oh, and Richard Stilgoe has added a witty verse about the expenses scandal for Robin’s Act 2 number.

Whatever my reservations, this is operetta bliss. A must for all G&S fans.