Melody Top's only staging of a Gilbert and Sullivan piece, THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE opened a successful run from July 27 to August 8, 1982 in a production directed and choreographed by George Bunt. While Doug Sheehan from GENERAL HOSPITAL was billed above the title and thrived in his comedic lead as the Pirate King, Mary Ernster and Keith Rice sang beautifully in the roles of young lovers Mabel and Frederic. Carleton Carpenter, from MGM musicals of the 1950s, portrayed a befuddled Major-General Stanley. All of the wonderful photographs on this page were supplied by Midge Lindner-Cobb.
Martha Webster and Doug Sheehan, THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE (1982).
Photos from THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE
Fresh approach for THE PIRATES
By Jay Joslyn, the Milwaukee Sentinel, Wednesday, July 28, 1982
With director-choreographer George Bunt back in charge, a fresh breeze once more blows through the Melody Top Theatre.
Tuesday night's opening of the new version of Gilbert and Sullivan's THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE was marked by compelling energy, infectious fun and splendid teamwork.
Robert D. Soule's set designs again were imaginative and the costumes by Mathew John Hoffman III regained style and line.
What is new in this version of the timeless hit operetta is a kind of American irreverence applied to traditional British subtleties. At the speed Bunt is driving his youthful cast, the irreverence is excusable and at times quite amusing.
Doug Sheehan, the production's name, apparently has done the job for which he was hired. His GENERAL HOSPITAL notoriety is selling tickets.
However, his portrayal of the Pirate King is lacking stylish punch and vocal strength. He is handsome enough, of course.
The real laurels belong to Keith Rice. As the operetta's slave to duty, Rice is brimful of vocal quality, high-style emotions and a mean sense of parody.
His Mabel gives Mary Ernster another opportunity to shine. The resident beauty exercises a splendid coloratura that provoked a show-stopping ovation.
Lanky Carleton Carpenter makes a fine, loose-tongued Major General, and Martha Webster is a delightful nanny.
The pirates, the ladies, along with the constabulary, are great, as is Donald Yap's orchestra, which has outgrown the pit and which attracts attention from the fun-loving actors.
The men, minus Carleton Carpenter as the Major-General, of THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE (1982).
PIRATES is a winner for Melody Top
By James Auer, the Milwaukee Journal, Thursday, July 29, 1982
The Melody Top Theatre has had more than its share of ups and downs this season, but it's on a sustained high with THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE.
This slapstick reworking of Gilbert and Sullivan's 1879 operetta is an absolute delight – a helium-light amalgam of shrewd direction, excellent choral work and energetic ensemble acting.
Yes, ensemble acting, because for once this hard-topped tent, star-ridden for so many years, has managed to slough off its devotion to the big names of Louis B. Mayer's era and cast a complete show to age, type and skill.
Nominal star of the evening is Doug Sheehan (Joe, the advertisements assure us, of television's GENERAL HOSPITAL). He plays the Pirate King and, not unexpectedly, he's earnest, hard-working and likable, if not the greatest singer in the world.
But the real star is the whole cast – Sheehan as augmented by Keith Rice as Frederic, the apprentice pirate; Mary Ernster as Mabel, the apprentice's would-be helpmeet; and Martha Webster as Ruth, the swashbuckling pirate lady who, at 47, is just too old to claim Frederic's 21-year-old body as her own.
Rice, in particular, is a mainstay of the evening, alternately naïve and commanding, wistful and forceful, and all the while ready to uncork at a moment's notice the highly trained voice he first brought to Milwaukee in 1980 in THE STUDENT PRINCE.
Webster, as his former nursemaid and would-be lover, has some wonderful moments, too, thanks to the wit and irony of Sir W.S. Gilbert, who never hesitated to mix cruelty with the treacle and to drop an occasional tear into his parodies of the saccharine plots of the period.
Effective on a somewhat lower level is Carleton Carpenter, the "Aba-Daba" singer of all those MGM musicals of a few decades ago.
Carpenter looks splendid as the senile Major-General who has fathered all those pretty girls the pirates want to marry, and he's gloriously wacky in some of his ganglier moments. But his speech is as incomprehensible as his smile is irrepressible, and his patter songs need a lot more polishing before Gilbert will stop twirling in that carefully tended grave of his.
This is one Melody Top production that is consistently stylish and melodic – as good to look at as to listen to.
Musical director Donald Yap, whose skill has kept more than one exercise in mediocrity afloat, has something to work with here. And he proves that, given the proper material, he can weld voices together in championship style.
George Bunt's direction and choreography are consistently inventive, and Robert D. Soule's scenery is an effervescent adjunct to the sometimes-goofy action. The costumes by Mathew John Hoffman III are garden-party crisp, just this side of ludicrous but at the same time really rather luscious.
The same could be said of the entire production. G&S plus Yap plus Papp (Joseph, that is, who revived PIRATES for the New York Shakespeare Festival) equals hit.
The show runs through August 8. If quality has anything to do with it, tickets will be at a premium.
Doug Sheehan and James K. Seibel enjoyed a cookout on the Melody Top grounds during the run of THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE (1982).
THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE Cast of Characters
| The Pirate King: | Doug Sheehan |
| Samuel, His Lieutenant: | James K. Seibel |
| Frederic: | Keith Rice |
| Ruth, a Pirate Maid: | Martha Webster |
| Major-General Stanley's Daughter: | Debra Dominiak |
| Major-General Stanley's Daughter: | Suzie Jary |
| Major-General Stanley's Daughter: | Donna Morgan |
| Major-General Stanley's Daughter: | Reisa Sperling |
| Major-General Stanley's Daughter: | Deborah Woodhouse |
| Edith: | Deborah Bendixen |
| Kate: | Susanna Wells |
| Isabel: | Mib Bramlette |
| Mabel: | Mary Ernster |
| Major-General Stanley: | Carleton Carpenter |
| The Sergeant: | K. David Short |
| Seymour: | Jim Fredericks |
| Edward: | David Nisbet |
| Pirate and Policeman: | Peter Lerangis |
| Pirate and Policeman: | David Loring |
| Pirate and Policeman: | James Michael |
| Pirate and Policeman: | Greg Schanuel |
| Pirate and Policeman: | Gregg Willis |
| Pirate and Policeman: | Kim Hughes |
| Pirate and Policeman: | James K. Seibel |
| Pirate and Policeman: | David Nisbet |
| Pirate and Policeman: | Jim Fredericks |
THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE Orchestra: First Trumpet, Philip J. Ruecktenwald; Second Trumpet, Thomas Schlueter; Trombone, Kenneth C. Howlett; First Flute and Piccolo, John Hibler; Second Flute and Piccolo, Gale Stolz; Clarinet and Saxophone, Joe Aaron; Bassoon, Monte Perkins; Percussionist, Linda Raymond; Bass, Thomas Alan McGirr; Piano, Jon Olson; Drums, Roy E. Schneider; Contractor, Ed Mumm.