When I visited Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, and vicinity, in late November and early December 2006, I saw a wonderful performance of Opera Australia's production of Gilbert and Sullivan's "The Pirates Of Penzance" at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC). (I was particularly interested in seeing this show, since I already knew DMTC would be doing "Pirates of Penzance" in the fall of 2007, and I had never seen the show).
Very interestingly, when Opera Australia had performed "The Pirates Of Penzance" at the Sydney Opera House the month before, they had filmed the performance for the purposes of producing a DVD, which is now (and has been for some time) available on Amazon.com. I did not know this until now! Thus, I no longer have to do inadequate semaphore to convey to you what a wonderful production this was: you can see for yourself!
Anthony Warlow modeled his look of 'The Pirate King' on Johnny Depp's 'Jack Sparrow' from the very-popular movie series "The Pirates Of The Caribbean". This was a good choice! My only regret is that 'With Cat-Like Tread....' doesn't appear to be on YouTube yet (although versions by other groups are). I thought Opera Australia did a marvelous job with it! Oh well! Guess I'll have to buy the DVD!
It's truly astonishing how popular "The Pirates Of Penzance" (debuted on New Year's Eve, 1880) remains in the English-speaking world. Gilbert and Sullivan go into the Pantheon of theatre along with Shakespeare for consistently-popular and enduring works!
Anthony Warlow - "... I Am A Pirate King!"
John Bolton-Wood - (a portion of) "I Am The Very Model Of A Modern Major-General"
Anthony Warlow (Pirate King), David Hobson (Frederic), and Suzanne Johnston (Ruth) - "My Eyes Are Fully Open", aka "Matter Patter"
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