Latest news with #ThePiratesofPenzance
Indianapolis Star
08-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Indianapolis Star
Retro Indy: For nearly half a century Starlight Musicals delighted summer audiences
For nearly 50 years, Starlight Musicals enjoyed a long and entertaining career that treated Indianapolis area residents to concerts and summer musical productions under the stars. The production of Gilbert and Sullivan's 'The Pirates of Penzance' staged at Garfield Park in 1944 helped spark the idea for a permanent summer theater presenting musical fare outdoors. About 20,000 people jammed Garfield Park for the three-night run of the popular light opera. Charles Hedley, then director of the Indianapolis Opera as well as chair of the voice faculty at Jordan Conversatory of Music, directed the performance. Buoyed by its success, the following summer Hedley and his collaborators brought a three-night, free performance of the 'H.M.S. Pinafore' to the same stage The troupe operated under the name Indianapolis Theatre Association and later Indianapolis Operetta Associates before finally settling on Starlight Musicals in 1949. Productions of grand opera, concerts, ballet and operettas rotated among Garfield Park, the Butler Bowl and the Indiana State Fairgrounds. But in 1954, an Indianapolis Star story noted that Starlight Musicals had faded in recent years . Just a few months later, however, the Indianapolis News reported that an outdoor summer theater program was coming soon to Butler. Summer 1955 saw a $350,000 outdoor amphitheater constructed on the south end zone seating area of the Butler Bowl. Dressing rooms, workshops and rehearsal rooms were located under the stage. The 3,200-seat Hilton U. Brown Theatron (Greek for 'theater') opened with a six-week series of shows that included classics such as 'Kiss Me Kate' and 'Show Boat.' That first year 70% of the actors in the production of "South Pacific" were Equity members and had appeared in the national or original company for the show, the Indianapolis Star reported in July. The only complaint that the Indianapolis Star's theater critic Corbin Patrick had with the show, he wrote, in July 1955, was that an ill-time summer rain shortly before curtain time kept the audience at about 1,800, far below capacity. At some point, the theatron's facilities were enhanced years later, with an additional 4,000 seats and a roof over the seating and stage. In 1962, Starlight incorporated the 'star system,' which added a big-name stage or screen star to anchor its productions. Carol Channing, Mitzi Gaynor, Jane Powell, Yul Brynner, Carol Burnett, Debbie Reynolds, Jack Benny, Dick Van Dyke — the list of notable stars who appeared on the stage was long. Stars such as Perry Como, Liberace, Liza Minnelli and Sammy Davis Jr. also performed on their own on the Starlight stage. For many years, Starlight operated as a local musical theater company, employing Indianapolis area musicians and actors. Tried-and-true productions of Rodgers and Hammerstein and Lerner and Loewe drew crowds. Each summer, Starlight became a mini-city of carpenters, painters, electricians, stagehands, set and prop designers and, of course, the actors. By the 1980s, traveling theatrical production companies were used. By the end of the 1980s, interest in the theater waned, and Starlight struggled financially. Andrew Lloyd Webber's 'Evita' was one of the last successful shows Starlight Musicals presented in August 1992. Still, throughout the spring of 1993, Starlight was announcing plans for season that summer. Then in early June, the company abruptly announced it was closing, after coming up about $300,000 short in early ticket sales, according to a June 11 story in the Indianapolis Star.
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
How Actress Samantha Williams Harnesses the Headstrong Heroine In Tony-nominated ‘Pirates! The Penzance Musical'
'I'm just happy that our work is being recognized. [It's] super crazy,' says actress Samantha Williams on a Zoom call, just hours after finding out 'Pirates! The Penzance Musical' has been nominated for the Tony Award for best revival of a musical. Perhaps nearly as thrilling as the Tony nom, Williams is also fresh off a performance for a group of young students, which she says felt like headlining at Madison Square Garden. For Williams, the journey with this New Orleans-set, jazz-inspired adaptation of the comic opera 'The Pirates of Penzance,' has been this exhilarating since Day One. Williams stars as Mabel, the headstrong heroine, alongside David Hyde Pierce (who plays her father), Jinkx Monsoon and Ramin Karimloo in 'Pirates! The Penzance Musical' at the Todd Haimes Theatre through July 27. More from WWD EXCLUSIVE: Kiehl's Is Back in the Locker Room With Life Time Nicole Scherzinger Makes a Fashion Statement in LaQuan Smith and Thigh-high Boots at Broadway's Big Luncheon Honoring Idina Menzel Ana de Armas on 'Ballerina,' Breaking Barriers and Finding Balance in Hollywood 'Pirates! The Penzance Musical' follows a young man, Frederic, accidentally forced into being a pirate until he turns 21. Gearing up for his birthday, he meets and falls in love with Williams' character Mabel. However, a slew of challenges arise, deterring their relationship — and hilarity ensues. While many theater fanatics are familiar with the original Gilbert & Sullivan work, this adaptation has been surprising attendees since its opening night with this new setting and 'silly' approach, according to Williams. It also surprised Williams, who was originally reluctant to audition for the role when she was first approached about a one-night-only concert rendition in October 2022. According to Williams, it was a complete change of pace from the type of work she'd been doing. 'I was like, 'Girl, I don't really think that's my vibe,' because I was doing more serious contemporary theater,' she recalls. 'I was like, 'A lot of young people don't really know it.' I learned about it in theater school, but I passed on the original audition for the concert. Then the team, specifically Joseph Joubert, who rewrote all the music — he was my music director and the orchestrator on 'Caroline, or Change' — wrote to my agents like, 'She has to come in…it's not what she thinks it is. They've changed it all.'' Williams adds: 'The world of Gilbert and Sullivan, I'd never seen a Black girl. I was like, 'I don't really see where I would fit in that world,' and so it was more like the preconceived ideas of what that [world] is and what that looks like, that society has put on all of us, actors and theater makers alike, that I was giving into.' Upon digging into the updated score and production, Williams was hooked and did go on to star in the concert alongside many of her current cast members. The jazzy orchestration and new take on the character of Mabel in particular stood out to her. 'Mabel is very headstrong and in tune with her sexuality in this version. She knows what she wants, and she gets it,' Williams says. 'She's the one sister that's always up to her own thing, whereas the rest of the sisters work as a school of fish… It's been fun to dive into bringing this character back in a way that's not so much damsel in distress and has more ownership over what she wants.' Of the vocals, Williams says: 'It has the jazz, the soprano, a little belt. It is all over the place, so it's been really fun and a great challenge for me.' The show comes with some other challenges, most notably holding in laughter, particularly in scenes with costars Pierce and Karimloo, Williams says. 'We laugh a lot on stage… The audience loves when you break during a comedy. They eat it up,' Williams says, adding this was especially true of the student audience. In terms of who breaks the most with laughter, Williams immediately says: ' It's me, and [the cast] would all say me too.' While Monsoon, Pierce and Karimloo are constantly causing Williams to crack up on stage, she's grateful to be working with such a stacked cast. 'All three [are] so gracious and humble… We're only around each other. We don't really have lives, and so [I] kind of forget who they are until someone [is like] 'how is it working with these icons?'' she says. 'My mom is obsessed with David Hyde Pierce and 'Frasier.' She was fan-girling when she met him at opening. David is just so subtle with everything, which is what makes him so good, and Ramin [has] that voice, and Jinx is just such an icon.' Upon opening, 'Pirates! The Penzance Musical' was already set for a limited engagement, something that Williams is used to as she completed a short run of 'Titanic' at New York City Center last summer alongside Karimloo. 'I love being able to be like, 'OK, we did that. Now, let's jump to the next thing.' There's always something to learn with that,' she says. 'At the same time, it is a little bit scary because you just don't know what the next thing is going to be, and you have to just trust that something will come that's meant to be.' As far as what is next, Williams jokes about writing a 'Cheetah Girls' musical with her friends, adding that she's always been a Galleria, the character played by Raven-Symoné. 'It would be for a very specific audience, though, like our age girlies, [but] we can we make a dent,' she jokes, adding that she's been listening to the song 'Cinderella' from the first movie. As thoughts of a potential 'Cheetah Girls' musical rattle around Williams' brain, she says a bit more seriously that she is a part of several hopefully Broadway-bound new musicals. She's also ready to do something on television. 'What's next?' she asks herself. 'Lots of fun!' Best of WWD Celebrating Lenny Kravitz, Rock Icon, Actor, Author, Designer and Style Star: Photos Cannes Film Festival 1970s: Flashbacks, Celebrities and Fashion Highlights from WWD's 'Eye' Pages [PHOTOS] A Look Back at Cannes Film Festival's Best Dressed Red Carpet Stars: Blake Lively, Angelina Jolie, Princess Diana and More Photos
New York Times
02-05-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Stephen Mo Hanan, Who Played Three Roles in ‘Cats,' Dies at 78
Stephen Mo Hanan, a vibrant performer who sang arias and other music as a busker in San Francisco before playing Kevin Kline's lieutenant in the acclaimed 1981 Broadway production of 'The Pirates of Penzance' and three felines in the original Broadway cast of 'Cats,' died on April 3 at his home in Manhattan. He was 78. Gary Widlund, his husband and only immediate survivor, said the cause was a heart attack. At his audition for 'Cats,' Mr. Hanan (pronounced HAN-un) told Andrew Lloyd Webber, the composer, and Trevor Nunn, the director, that he had spent several years singing and accompanying himself on a concertina at a ferry terminal at the foot of Market Street in San Francisco. 'As a matter of fact, I've brought my concertina,' he recalled telling Mr. Nunn in an interview with The Washington Post in 1982. 'He said, 'Give me something in Italian.' Well, I've never had a problem with shyness. I sang 'Funiculi, Funicula.'' Mr. Hanan was ultimately cast in three parts: Bustopher Jones, a portly cat, and the dual role of Asparagus, an aging theater cat, who, while reminiscing, transforms (with help from an inflatable costume) into a former role, Growltiger, a tough pirate, and performs a parody of Puccini's 'Turandot.' During rehearsals, Mr. Hanan kept a detailed journal, which he published in 2002 as 'A Cat's Diary.' In an entry about the second day of rehearsal, he described an assignment from Mr. Nunn: to 'pick a cartoon cat we know of, withdraw to ourselves and prepare a vignette of that cat, then return to the circle and each in turn will present.' He continued: 'I choose Fritz the Cat,' the Robert Crumb character, 'making a pass at some kitty. Watching the others is a gas — people's individualities are beginning to emerge.' He and another cast member, Harry Groener, were both nominated for the Tony Award for best featured actor in a musical. They both lost; the tap dancer Charles (Honi) Coles won for 'My One and Only.' In the years following 'Cats,' Mr. Hanan's many roles included Moonface Martin in 'Anything Goes,' at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis; the double role of Voltaire and Dr. Pangloss in 'Candide,' at the Huntington Theater in Boston; and another dual role, Mr. Darling and Captain Hook, in 'Peter Pan,' on Broadway and on tour. He also portrayed the villainous innkeeper Thenardier in 'Les Miserables' in London. In 1999, Mr. Hanan created a stage role of his own: Al Jolson, the popular vaudevillian who performed in blackface, sang on Broadway and starred in 'The Jazz Singer,' the pioneering sound motion picture. 'Jolson & Co.,' which Mr. Hanan wrote with Jay Berkow, was staged Off Broadway, at the York Theater Company. Al Jolson 'was pure id,' Mr. Hanan, who bore a physical resemblance to him, told Harvard magazine in 2002, when the show was revived at the Century Center for the Performing Arts in Manhattan. 'He didn't censor himself, neither his joy nor his rage. With Jolson you can be completely over the top; you have to be. His personality demands that kind of size.' 'Jolson & Co.' recreates a 1946 radio interview with Barry Gray as a way of looking back on his remarkable life. Mr. Hanan sang many of the songs Mr. Jolson was known for, including 'Swanee' and 'California, Here I Come.' Reviewing the show in New York magazine, John Simon praised Mr. Hanan's performance as 'mostly impersonation but, as such, unbeatable.' He added, 'On top of the Jolson looks, the incarnator has absorbed all the vocal, facial, and kinetic mannerisms as if he had stolen the man's very soul.' Mr. Hanan was born Stephen Hanan Kaplan on Jan. 7, 1947, in Washington. His mother, Lottie (Klein) Kaplan, was a high school English teacher; his father, Jonah Kaplan, was a pharmacist. While attending Harvard College, Stephen performed in theatrical productions at the Loeb Drama Center and with the Hasty Pudding Club. He acquired the nickname Mo on a trip to Bermuda during college, after a friend, the future Broadway librettist John Weidman, observed that his outfit made him look like 'some guy named Mo who cleans cabanas in the Catskills,' Mr. Hanan told the website TheaterMania in 2002. After graduating in 1968 with a bachelor's degree in English literature, he studied for a year at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art on a Fulbright fellowship. Back in New York, he had difficulty landing roles, so in 1971 he moved to San Francisco, where he lived on a commune and spent six years singing for money, mostly at the ferry terminal, which earned him enough to spend winters in Mexico and Guatemala. Once, outside the stage door at the War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco, he encountered Luciano Pavarotti, who had just performed in Verdi's 'Un Ballo in Maschera,' and summoned the nerve to sing for the great tenor. 'I raced to the money note and he, exclaiming 'Che voce d'oro' — or 'What a golden voice' — beckoned me over amid applause,' Mr. Hanan wrote in an unpublished essay. After returning to New York again, he landed small parts in New York Shakespeare Festival productions of 'All's Well That Ends Well' and 'The Taming of the Shrew' in Central Park in 1978. (Around that time, he dropped his surname and began using his middle name instead, because there was another actor with a similar name.) In 1980, the director Wilford Leach cast him as Samuel, the second in command to Mr. Kline's Pirate King, in the Shakespeare in the Park production of the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operetta 'The Pirates of Penzance,' which also starred Linda Ronstadt. Mr. Hanan stayed with the show when it moved to Broadway in 1981. Rex Smith, who played Frederic, the male romantic lead, said in an interview that Mr. Hanan 'embodied all that was required to be the Pirate King's lieutenant, and for that you had to stand and deliver every night — if you're not going to be keelhauled.' In 2006, Mr. Hanan moved up in rank to play the Major-General in a Yiddish-language version of 'Pirates' (called 'Di Yam Gazlonim!'), put on by the National Yiddish Theater Folksbiene at the Jewish Community Center in Manhattan (now the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan). Allen Lewis Rickman, the director, of that show recalled that Mr. Hanan did not know Yiddish and had to learn his lines phonetically. 'He was quite a character and very entertaining, one of those people who you know is a real pro,' Mr. Rickman said in an interview. 'He had a clownish streak — that was his first instinct — but not in a scene-stealing way.'
Time Out
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Pirates! The Penzance Musical
Broadway review by Adam Feldman This show is of a kind that I shall dub an operettical: A British-Broadway hybrid that is cleverly synthetical. It starts with operetta of the comical variety That Sullivan and Gilbert wrote to tickle high society. The Pirates of Penzance, a pageant witty and Victorian, Premiered in 1880 on our calendar Gregorian. It still is entertaining but perhaps not in a date-night way; It seems a bit too fusty for revival on the Great White Way. So Rupert Holmes has come along to pump some Broadway jazz in it: To add a little spice and put some Dixieland pizzazz in it. And thanks to these injections, neither rev'rent nor heretical, We now have Holmes's model for a modern operettical. Pirates! The Penzance Musical | Photograph: Courtesy Joan Marcus Best known for Drood (and also for his hit 'Piña Colada Song'), He hasn't wrecked the story or egregiously forgot a song. But to ensure the whole endeavor's jazzier and bluer leans, He takes the show from Cornwall and resets it down in New Orleans. The Crescent City's sass and brass have quite rejuvenated it As Joe Joubert and Daryl Waters have reorchestrated it. (They've also added melodies that never here have been afore, On loan from Iolanthe, The Mikado and from Pinafore.) With silliness and energy the show is chockablock, well-set Amid the brightly colored NOLA streets of David Rockwell's set. And now that we have looked at questions musico-aesthetical, We move on to the plot of this diverting operettical. Pirates! The Penzance Musical | Photograph: Courtesy Joan Marcus The Pirate King swashbuckles on a large if not momentous ship Where Frederic, turning 21, is ending his apprenticeship. And when this duty-driven laddie reaches his majority His conscience will demand that he accept the law's authority. Upon that time, young Frederic knows, though he may feel a loss acute, His former pals, the pirates, he will have to fight and prosecute. (Unless, that is, some hitherto-undreamed-of technicality Should come to light and complicate his noble plan's legality.) But what if Frederic's former nurse, the sorely misbegotten Ruth, Discovers in some document an old and long-forgotten truth? It might, if this scenario's not strictly theoretical, Entail a major conflict in this model operettical. Pirates! The Penzance Musical | Photograph: Courtesy Joan Marcus Scott Ellis's direction is all tongue-in-cheek dramatical And Warren Carlyle's dances are enjoyably emphatical But notwithstanding those behind-the-scenesters' benefactions here, It's fair to say the actors are the principal attractions here. The Pirate King's embodied by a glist'ning Ramin Karimloo (Inspiring more dropped panties than you'd find in any harem loo) And you could comb through New Orleans and all surrounding parishes, And never find a Frederic as pluperfect as Nick Barasch's. The Drag Race legend Jinkx Monsoon, all blowsy eccentricity, Brings Ruth to life with vocal chops and facial elasticity. Performances italicized (and not just parenthetical) Combine to lift the spirits of this lively operettical. Pirates! The Penzance Musical | Photograph: Courtesy Joan Marcus Samantha Williams makes a lusty Mabel; Preston Truman Boyd Delivers his tap-dancing like an ably-programmed humanoid. But David Hyde Pierce steals the show, I say with no cajolery. His Major-Gen'ral is a master class in brilliant drollery: A rapid-patter songster with aplomb matched by no other's style (And daughters pirates yearn for, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers –style). In glorious precision, Pierce elicits every gazer's smiles As lovably and nimbly as he did when he played Frasier 's Niles. Pirates! The Penzance Musical | Photograph: Courtesy Joan Marcus The modern world is full of stress, so go and have a party, brah, And shake it like a necklace made of gaudy beads at Mardi Gras. Enjoy this Broadway hybrid that is tuneful and poetical: A most delightful model of a modern operettical. Pirates! The Penzance Musical. Todd Haimes Theatre (Broadway). Music by Arthur Sullivan. Libretto by W.S. Gilbert. Adapted by Rupert Holmes. Directed by Scott Ellis. With David Hyde Pierce, Ramin Karimloo, Nicholas Barasch, Jinkx Monsoon, Samantha Williams, Preston Truman Boyd. Running time: 2hrs 30mins. One intermission. Post scriptum: These rhymes of mine, I grant you, may not all be perfect, but they were The best that I could do—and face it, standards are not what they were. I'm just a humble swimmer in this lyrical aquarium; If W.S. Gilbert's what you want, then go unbury him.
Chicago Tribune
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Review: ‘Pirates! The Penzance Musical' is a delightful bit of Gilbert and Sullivan, back on Broadway
NEW YORK — W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan's 'The Pirates of Penzance' is a foundational musical. First seen in New York in 1879, this wacky yarn of swashbuckling pirates, Monty Pythonesque coppers and the comely daughters of a naval major general taught a young Broadway how to structure a musical comedy. Sitting at the Todd Haimes Theatre and listening to a character named Mabel warble a ditty called 'Ah, Leave Me Not to Pine Alone,' I was suddenly struck by how similar the song was to 'Alone At A Drive-In Movie' from 'Grease.' Sensibilities have changed, of course, since 1879. And since Gilbert and Sullivan helpfully reside in the public domain, they can be adapted with impunity. In this latest case, now a relatively rare outing for the pair on Broadway with the Roundabout Theatre Company, they've been given an overhaul by adapter Rupert Holmes and a new sexed-up title, being as producers these days panic whenever a title lacks a 'banger,' as we say in journalism. Ergo, the doings of the Cornish buccaneers now goes by 'Pirates! The Penzance Musical,' as if Gilbert and Sullivan had given a damn about that particular town, beyond its alliterative properties. At least they'd have appreciated the commercial practicalities. As they would Holmes' decision to juice up the 'Pirates' score with songs actually written for 'Iolanthe,' 'The Mikado,' and 'H.M.S. Pinafore.' Why not? That's been done with Cole Porter and George Gershwin and we won't be seeing 'The Mikado' anytime soon. Naturally, 'Pirates' has a star in David Hyde Pierce. The good news is that said celebrity is fully equal to the formidable performative demands of one of the greatest patter songs of all time, 'I Am the Very Model of the Modern Major-General,' which he performed flawlessly, and ever more rapidly, on the night I was there. Hyde Piece is perfect for Gilbert and Sullivan: he's droll, a tad dotty, curiously understated and generous with fellow actors, and there is a perpetual twinkle in his been-there-done-that eyes. Add a handle-bar mustache, and what more do you need? Ramin Karimloo, the dubious pirate monarch, certainly adds to the party. Half Kevin Kline and half Hugh Jackman, the bare-chested Karimloo swaggers around as the fun demands alongside Frederic (Nicholas Barasch), the duty-bound young fellow apprenticed to the pirates and whose complications and affection for Mabel (Samantha Williams) inform most of the plot. Barasch looks and acts like the long-lost child of Conan O'Brien; he's funny too, in the straight-man kind of way that Gilbert and Sullivan demands. Frederic has to fight off the machinations of his guardian Ruth, who is spiced up a tad by Jinkx Monsoon, a shrewd bit of casting that I suspect was intended to make that whole relationship more fun and, well, a little less creepy. The director, Scott Ellis, is clever with those kinds of choices (Preston Truman Boyd is well cast as the police sergeant) and Ellis is joined here by choreographer Warren Carlyle, who keeps all of these wacky characters on their toes, including the show's famous Chaplinesque constables, here rendered as the New Orleans Volunteer Police, since the whole show now takes place in New Orleans in 1880 with a Creole kinda vibe and new syncopations added to the score. My one caveat on what is a highly entertaining and most genial evening of daffy, escapist Broadway, is that some of it feels a bit much, especially movement and new orchestrations-wise. Gilbert's internal rhymes were never equalled until Stephen Sondheim came along with comparable talent and there are times when the puns and quips get a tad overwhelmed by the Monty Python walks, the jazzy stylings and what not. Occasionally, the material needed to be better trusted. But those are minor caveats. Holmes, best known for writing 'The Mystery of Edwin Drood,' gives the show a fresh and loving applied coat of paint, even writing Gilbert and Sullivan themselves into the experience, taking a leaf from Jamie Lloyd's little homage to Andrew Lloyd Webber in the current 'Sunset Blvd.' But Ellis also has delivered an old-school analog pleasure in a Broadway season much seduced by digital temptation. In their graves, Gilbert and Sullivan must be turning topsy-turvy with delight.
