Princess Ida

[watervole]

Had a thoroughly enjoyable evening last night when I took micavity and entorien to see Princess Ida at Poole Lighthouse.

The costumes were glorious, a cheerful mixture of classical Greek and medieval. Prince Hilarion and his friends in short Greek skirts looked great (why don't men show their calves more often?) and the combinations of red, purple and white made the stage a joy to look at.

The music was good, the singers, obviously enjoying themselves. The script had been updated (as all good Gilbert and Sullivan performances always have been right since the first performance) to make the jokes topical - Prince Hilarion looks down into the orchestra pit and complains about Arts Council grants; Ida jokes about Blair and Brown, and Posh and Becks.

The commedy scenes with Ida's brothers worked wonderfully and King Gama reminded us of Fagin (Ron Moody) from Oliver with his scheming and complaining. Hilarion and his friends in drag are hysterical - one of the tutors rapidly spots that the three new 'girls' at the university are 'two tenors and a baritone'!

The last act was the weakest, but even that was given strength by Ida's bravery as she is deserted by her women (who quite understandably quail at the thought of being soldiers).

I'm happy to say that entorien has become a convert to Gilbert and Sullivan (this was the first one she'd seen) and I hope to take them both to see The Gondoliers next year!

I've loved 'The Gondoliers' ever since I used to listen to it on my father's reel to reel tape recorder as a little girl, but I'm not sure that I've ever, actually, seen it on stage.

Comments

[frandowdsofa.livejournal.com]

The Mikado was always my favourite. We went, years ago, to see the Black Mikado on stage in London, with extra rhythm and swing. The Titipu Town Band were a jazz combo, it was ace.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

My favourite Mikado to date was one done by English National Opera in costumes that looked like British upper-class dinner dress. They had a wonderful Katisha - though I forget who the singer was.

Iolanthe always holds a special place for me as it was the first one I ever saw on stage.

[frandowdsofa.livejournal.com]

I saw Iolanthe by the D'Oyly Carte in London during the Jeremy Thorpe scandal. The Americans in the rows behind us couldn't understand why Dad and I were killing ourselves laughing at the very-knowing-wink-wink delivery of some of the lines about fairies in Parliament. And when we explained they were very very shocked.

[lil-shepherd.livejournal.com]

I still have glorious memories of The Ratepayers Iolanthe and The Metropolitan Mikado and I cannot hear "We are pretty little fairies" without seeing bovver-booted leather-and-steel clad thugs stamping onto stage. And Nanki Poo will forever be "Boy Ken".

[cobrabay.livejournal.com]

Your HTML link tags have gone a bit wonky. The four paragraphs after Princess Ida at Poole Lighthouse have been included in the link.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I think I've fixed it now.

[cobrabay.livejournal.com]

Looks fine now.
That production of The Mikado you mentioned, I saw the original production of that version in 1986. ENO have revived it every couple of years or so after, it was on last year, though I haven't seen it since '86 other than the TV version of it. I think my parents still have the VHS release. I saw the DVD of it for sale when I was in the USA the year before last in a theatre memorabilia shop on Broadway, still regret not buying it, though I susepct it was over-priced, everything else in that shop was.