The Pirates of Penzance

by Sir Arthur Sullivan, libretto by W. S. Gilbert

seen by live streaming from the Coliseum on 19 May 2015

Mike Leigh directs English National Opera's new production of this G&S favourite, with Andrew Shore as Major-General Stanley, Joshua Bloom as the Pirate King, Robert Murray as Frederic, Claudia Boyle as Mabel and Rebecca de Pont Davies as Ruth. Sets and costumes are by Alison Chitty, lighting by Paul Pyant and choreography by Francesca James.

Musically, the singing was fine but the pace occasionally slackened. Andrew Shore was an excellent Major-General Stanley, delivering the patter song with impressive agility and clarity, and later playing up the ridiculousness of his position for all it was worth. Robert Murray was a sweet-voiced Frederic, and Claudia Boyle a wonderfully accomplished Mabel. Rebecca de Pont Davies sang Ruth with conviction but no sentimentality, and contrived to look convincingly piratical. Joshua Bloom's Pirate King dominated his men with a fine voice and wonderful swagger.

The problems of pace were perhaps a function of presenting a frothy operetta in a large auditorium. The overture took some time to begin to fizz; but the pirates' choruses and the daughters' animated chatter were excellently done. However, the constables' lugubrious song of complaint was taken so slowly and seriously that it was more like a dirge. One should not of course merely play it for laughs; but equally, it should be possible to laugh at it. By contrast, to show what could be done to surprise, the immediately following 'cat-like tread' of the pirates turned burglars was sung loudly with thunderous foot-stamping, a real tonic replacing the more usual business of stage-whispers and creeping about.

With a set that looks as if it has been constructed with the brightly coloured blocks of a giant-child's toybox we are far removed from the intensely realist style of Mike Leigh's films. A brilliant red ship deck tilts sharply forward through a huge circle in a blue wall in the first scene; the two huge semi-circles are split apart in the second scene to reveal a series of vertiginous bright green slopes representing the coast, and to allow for more acting space for the bustling daughters of the Major-General and for the irruption of the pirates into their idyll. In the second act, set at night, the bold primary colours are replaced by nocturnal shades of purple, and there is a cross and the hint of a Gothic window added to the simple blocks and curves.

In these playful but abstracted spaces the visual excitement and focus is provided by the costumes - chaotically varied pirate costumes, cleverly co-ordinated pastel greens and blues for the bustle dresses on the 'beach' (in the second act replaced by mauve dresses toned to the set, and simple white nightdresses later), and predictably stolid policemen's uniforms (surmounted by varieties of extravagant side-whiskers). The Major-General's scarlet jacket is absolutely startling by contrast, marking him out as the only character not arising from a group of similar sorts.

An enjoyable evening, but perhaps not a classic production.