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Mike Leigh’s 2015 production gets on with the job, which is no bad thing, but a sense of originality is missing
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The Cast of ENO’s The Pirates of Penzance 2024 (Photo: Craig Fuller)
In a famous scene from Pretty Woman, Julia Roberts is asked if she enjoyed La Traviata. ‘It was so good I almost peed my pants!’ she exclaims. Richard Gere hurriedly clarifies – ‘She said she liked it better than Pirates of Penzance’. At the revival of the latter at ENO, I was not in any danger of joining Ms Roberts.
Mike Leigh’s 2015 production gets on with the job, which is no bad thing, but a sense of originality is missing and other than paring the scenery down to basics there is not much to surprise an audience. The usual mugging, prancing and general capering all remain intact, admittedly well-rehearsed and generally adept. The set is unattractive and impractical. A plain wall with a huge cut-out circle divides the width of the stage. When it is pulled apart, the cast can move freely; but when it is closed they have to step over it to reach the back of the stage – easy if you’re leggy but clumsy for everyone else. Gilbert and Sullivan sits awkwardly today as a lot of the cultural references it lampoons are not familiar to a contemporary audience; for example, how many people get the operatic pastiche that sometimes erupts – notably Frederic and Mabel’s Act II duet. And, at the same time, Pirates itself has become a source of reference and pastiche, notably the Major-General’s song. Do people watching Despicable Me 3 twig that they are laughing at G&S? At the end of the day does it matter – not really, as long as people are enjoying themselves – but Leigh’s production falls down the gap in the middle. It is not old-fashioned enough to be a good nostalgic wallow, but not edgy enough to reinvent the show into something more relevant.
John Savournin, James Creswell & the cast of ENO’s The Pirates of Penzance 2024 (Photo: Craig Fuller)
Three singers stood out. William Morgan cut a suitable dash as Frederic, with bursts of understandable anguish and confusion, his tenor pleasing. Gaynor Keeble proved a feisty Ruth, and James Creswell was best of all as the Sergeant of Police – at last, the operatic confidence that was needed in a theatre of this size. And all three were intelligible. Everybody else worked hard, with variable results. John Savournin’s Pirate King was generic fun. The younger women, notably Isabelle Peters’ Mabel were all good if small-scaled. And Richard Suart’s Major-General amiably wittered into his whiskers, but I was glad of the surtitles. Likewise with the chorus, which was generally unintelligible, though the women fared slightly better than the men. Natalie Murray Beale’s conducting was secure, but perhaps could amp up the contrasts. The audience response was generally warm, so perhaps it is just me – it was rather like being at a party when you would happily be at home with a cup of tea.
