The 2024 Festival will open with Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance in a vibrant production directed and choreographed by Seán Curran and conducted by Music Director Joseph Colaneri, featuring set and costume designs by James Schuette and lighting by Robert Wierzel. A Gilbert & Sullivan classic, combining soaring vocal lines and slapstick comedy, returns to Glimmerglass for the first time in nearly 20 years. This colorful, family-friendly production features elegant Victorian ladies and an aristocratic band of pirates stuck in perpetual adolescence. Curran’s hit production from Opera Theatre of Saint Louis kicks it up a notch at Glimmerglass with the addition of a corps of professional dancers.

Synopsis

Name: The Pirates of Penzance
Start: 2024-07-22T13:00:00
End: 2024-08-19T13:00:00
Location: Alice Busch Opera Theater

Due to a mistake made by his nurse, Ruth, Frederic is indentured to the Pirates of Penzance until his 21st birthday. When Frederic turns 21, he announces his intention to abandon the Pirates and live an honorable life. The Pirate King is disappointed to lose his apprentice, but he concedes that Frederic is duty-bound to follow his conscience. Ruth asks Frederic to take her with him; as he considers her proposal, a bevy of maidens appears. One of them, Mabel, is deeply moved by Frederic’s situation.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Pirates resolve to take the maidens by force. Mabel reveals that she and the other young women are wards of Major-General Stanley; the Major-General arouses the Pirates’ pity and secures his release by telling them that he, like them, is an orphan. As Frederic takes his leave of the Pirates, Ruth makes a last appeal, but Frederic rejects her in favor of Mabel.

The Major-General and his wards shelter in a chapel, where the Major-General implores the ancestors to forgive him for lying about his orphan status. Frederic appears, closely followed by a band of insecure policemen, resolved to fight against the Pirates. Ruth and the Pirate King inform Frederic of a contractual loophole and appeal to his sense of duty. Frederic, slave to duty that he is, rejoins the Pirates and informs them of the Major-General’s lie. Furious, Ruth and the Pirate King plan an attack. In a confrontation, the police find a way to appeal to the Pirates’ own sense of duty and patriotism. Before the Major General can have the Pirates arrested, Ruth reveals their origins, and all is forgiven.