title: Rabbids

text: The earliest "Rayman 4" trailers depicted menacing rabbits, appearing from underground with a blank stare in various shapes and forms, smaller eyes and furry. At this point, trailers showed the game as an adventure game with fight stages, where Rayman would need to punch and kick himself through a horde of zombie-like bunnies. As the game concept evolved, from one of a central objective to minigames, a series of viral videos were created by marketing manager Adrian Lacey and animator Charles Beirnaert which became successful on YouTube. The rabbits slowly evolved into various merchandising products such as the Rabbid figures, which were much more conscious and amusing, changing from merely being enemies to fight through into more characters with various traits and quirks. "Rayman" creator Michel Ancel described the bunnies as "vicious, but at the same time [...] totally stupid".


title: Rabbids

text: In a video interview, project lead Loïc Gounon confirmed the possibility of splitting the "Rayman" and "Rabbid" series apart, mentioning that the "Rabbids" "managed to hit a bit more adult and a bit more older audience than the previous "Raymans"". By 2009's "Rabbids Go Home", Rayman does not make an appearance; when asked about the omission of Rayman during an interview about "Rabbids Go Home", director Jacques Exertier provided an assurance that Rayman would return for more action-adventure video games.


title: Rabbids

text: The music style for the franchise was created by composer Mark Griskey. Griskey worked with audio director Yoan Fanise to define the comedic style of the early games and the style was continued with the further versions of the franchise.


title: Rabbids

text: Rabbids – Rabbids are wild rabbit-like creatures. They like to cause havoc and mischief on Rayman's world, the human world, and others and are gibberish speaking and yell "bwah!" whenever they experience adrenaline rushes. They were originally the antagonists; however, due to increase in popularity, they became the protagonists in "Rabbids Go Home". A notable Rabbid who first appeared in "Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle" is Rabbid Peach.


title: Rabbids

text: Rayman – the main protagonist of the first three games. He always foils the Rabbids' plans. When the Rabbids became the protagonists of the franchise, Rayman was dropped, but continues to appear in his own games. He will appear as a playable character in a "" downloadable content.


title: Rabbids

text: Professor Barranco III – the third leader of the Rabbids who planned out all of their invasions on Rayman's world, Earth and others. He is seen in the games "Rayman Raving Rabbids 2", "Rabbids: Travel in Time" and "Rabbids: Alive and Kicking" as the main antagonist. He is one of the rare smart Rabbids to exist after the events of Rabbids Go Home, but can be easily fooled as well. In "Rabbids: Alive and Kicking" he has a Rabbid scientist as his second in command, who would later go on to become a major character in the TV series. He is heterochromic, with blue and red eyes. He appears in the TV series, but is more of a dictator to his rabbid minions.


title: Rabbids

text: Serguei – Serguei is the main villain of "Rayman Raving Rabbids". He is a large, black rabbid who abducted Rayman and the Globox kids and forced them to take part in the Rabbids Olympics filled with deadly challenges. In the end, Rayman manages to escape and free most of the Globox kids. It is unknown what happens to Serguei at that point, though his absence in further games suggest that he was relieved of his duties due to failure in keeping Rayman.


title: Rabbids

text: The Semi-Leaders – the Semi-leaders are fat, lazy and angry Rabbids who serve as the secondary antagonists of "Rayman Raving Rabbids 2". They constantly force the Rabbids to bring them food and do not do pretty much anything other than sitting or lying around and keeping things in check. They each have different themes in clothing.


title: Rabbids

text: Professor Barranco II- Professor Barranco II is the Supreme leader of all Rabbids, He is seen wearing Black glasses and Surgical equipment, He is responsible for everything in Rayman Raving Rabbids 1, In promotional vidoes he can be seen designing contraptions that would appear in Rayman Raving Rabbids, He along side 3 other leaders is the smartest Rabbid to exist outside of the 2010 TV series


title: Rabbids

text: The Rabbids have made several appearances in games outside of their own series or the "Rayman" franchise. In "Red Steel", the Rabbids appear as enemies in one of the game's later stages. The Wii version of "" includes three different types of Rabbids as playable characters, along with a stage based on "Rabbids Go Home". Toys of the Rabbids appear as hidden easter eggs in "" and "Watch Dogs". In "", a cheat can be used to turn the game's enemies into Rabbids. The song "Here Comes the Hotstepper" in "Just Dance 2" and "" includes a Rabbid who attempts to dance with the choreographer. Another song, "Make the Party (Don't Stop)" in "Just Dance 4", features a Rabbid as the DJ in the background. Also, the alternate version of the song "Naughty Girl" in the Nintendo Switch version of "Just Dance 2018" via the "Just Dance Unlimited" subscription service includes Rabbid Peach from "Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle" as the main choreographer. "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate" features three Rabbids from "Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle" as unlockable spirits and a Rabbid Mii Fighter hat was available as downloadable content on January 28, 2020. On April Fools' Day 2019, "For Honor" featured a limited time event in which Rabbids replaced all of the game's characters. In 2021, they have been featured in "The Crew 2" as their own Live Summit Event, as well as introducing two vanity cosmetic items into the game. The first is roofrack of a Rabbid hanging on to it and the second being a window tint full of Rabbids which can only be acquired by scoring platinum in the Live Summit.


title: Rabbids

text: In October 2010, Ubisoft and Aardman announced a partnership to produce a TV series pilot and several shorts based on the franchise. One year later, it was announced that a series of 7-minute computer generated animated episodes called "Rabbids Invasion" had been commissioned by France Televisions and that it would be produced in-house by Ubisoft Motion Pictures in France. In 2013, The series premiered on France 3 in France and Nickelodeon in the United States. In early 2012, Ubisoft Motion Pictures called on the French animation studio TeamTO to create most of the CGI parts of the series. At E3 2013, it was announced that it would be an interactive show entitled "Rabbids Invasion: The Interactive TV Show" for the Xbox 360, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 with a require of camera devices (Kinect and PlayStation Camera). The show aired for four seasons, with the fourth season premiering on Netflix on July 1, 2019.


title: Rabbids

text: In early 2014, a live-action/animated film based on the franchise was in the works by Columbia Pictures. The following year, Sony Pictures Animation joined in. It was supposed to aim for a late 2016 release, but reasons are unknown why it did not get released during that time. However, in late 2019, Ubisoft signed a deal with Lionsgate to produce the "Rabbids" movie instead, with Todd Strauss-Schulson in talks to direct the film with Todd Lieberman and David Hoberman as producers along with Jason Altman and Margaret Boykin. It is being developed by Lionsgate, Ubisoft Motion Pictures, Mandeville Films, and Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, with Matt Senreich, Tom Sheppard, and Zeb Wells set to write the film, while revised by Todd Rosenberg.


title: Rabbids

text: A comic book series based on the franchise has been released in France, Belgium and Switzerland. They are drawn by the French cartoonist Romaine Pujol and written by Thithaume. There are ten volumes.


title: Rabbids

text: The Rabbids have merchandising such as T-shirts, figurines, plush toys, school equipment, fan club magazines, and for a limited time, a Happy Meal toy. A "Raving Rabbids" themed version of the card game "Jungle Speed" was released in France.


title: Rabbids

text: The Rabbids franchise has also been licensed for the out-of-home entertainment market such as the recent collaboration with arcade game manufacturer LAI Games to produce "Virtual Rabbids: The Big Ride", an attendant-free VR attraction.


title: Rabbids

text: The "Rabbids" series, along with its titular characters, have become very popular. IGN has stated that the Rabbids have "more personality and charisma than 10 of the most popular video game mascots combined", and that the bunnies have literally "upstaged Rayman himself".


title: Rabbids

text: GameSpot noted that the Rabbids themselves are "almost exclusively responsible for [selling the game's humor], as they are, without a doubt, hysterical. They're adorably designed, with their dumb stares, high-pitched shrieks, and a penchant for taking comedic bumps."


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: Isaac Cole Powell (born December 30, 1994) is an American actor and singer. He played the role of Daniel in the Broadway revival of the musical "Once on This Island" and was cast as Tony in the 2020 Broadway revival of "West Side Story".


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: Powell was raised in Greensboro, North Carolina, the youngest of three children born to Terry and Will Powell, a three-time world CrossFit champion. His father is Mixed Native American and African-American; his mother is Caucasian. His sister, Jessica Powell, stars on TLC's My Big Fat Fabulous Life and is a Certified Personal Trainer at their father's fitness studio. Powell began to act in middle school with the Community Theatre of Greensboro. He attended Philip J. Weaver Academy, a performing arts high school, before transferring to a boarding program at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA) during his senior year of high school. He graduated from UNCSA with an acting degree in May 2017.


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: While in college, Powell began to accumulate professional acting credits, playing Nikos in the musical "Legally Blonde" at the Barn Dinner Theatre. After graduation, in the summer of 2017, he appeared in "Newsies" and "Mamma Mia!" with the Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera and originated the title role in "Nikola Tesla Drops the Beat" at the Adirondack Theatre Festival in Glens Falls, New York.


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: Powell played the role of Daniel in the 2017 Broadway revival of "Once on This Island", which began previews in November 2017 and opened officially in December. Jesse Green, writing in "The New York Times" called Powell's solo, "Some Girls," a "quietly sensitive rendering." Robert Hofler, in "TheWrap", wrote that Powell makes the song "the most poignant moment in this revival." TheaterMania's review deemed Powell, "charismatic and silvery-voiced." He recorded his role on the revival's cast album.


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: Powell competed in May 2018 on the live Broadway game show, "I Only Have Lies for You". In the spring of 2018, he signed on with the New Pandemics modeling agency and modeled for Palomo Spain's and NIHL's fall 2019 lines at New York Fashion Week. In "W Magazine", Powell notes that "[M]odeling is a new thing ... I've been basically shooting all the gay publications, which is really, really great." He models in addition to acting, and was featured in the final issue of "Hello Mr."


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: In November 2020, Powell was cast in Universal Pictures and director Stephen Chbosky's film adaptation of "Dear Evan Hansen" as new character Rhys, a high school jock.


title: Isaac Cole Powell

text: Powell is gay and came out at the age of sixteen. In 2016, Powell met Broadway actor, Wesley Taylor, when Taylor was visiting University of North Carolina School of the Arts where Powell was a junior in the school's theatre program. The two then began a relationship in 2017 and were engaged in May 2019. They ended their relationship in 2021.


title: Ross Martin

text: Ross Martin (born Martin Rosenblatt, March 22, 1920 – July 3, 1981) was an American radio, voice, stage, film and television actor. Martin was best known for portraying Artemus Gordon on the CBS Western series "The Wild Wild West", which aired from 1965 to 1969. He was the voice of Doctor Paul Williams in 1972's "Sealab 2020", additional characters in 1973's "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kids", and additional character voices in 1978's "Jana of the Jungle".


title: Ross Martin

text: Martin was born to a Polish Jewish family in Gródek, Poland (now Horodok, Ukraine). He and his parents emigrated to New York City when he was an infant. Recorded as Izak and Sara Rosenblat and infant son Marcus, they boarded the steamship "New Rochelle" at Danzig, which was then a Free City under the League of Nations; the ship sailed on 29 August 1920 and arrived at the Port of New York on 18 September. As they were steerage passengers, they were obliged to go to Ellis Island to undergo U.S. Immigrant Inspection. They settled in The Bronx. Martin spoke Polish, Yiddish and some Russian before learning English and later added French, Spanish and Italian to his repertoire.


title: Ross Martin

text: Martin attended City College of New York, where he graduated "magna cum laude", then earned a law degree from the National University School of Law (later part of the George Washington University).


title: Ross Martin

text: Despite academic training in business, instruction, and law, Martin chose a career in acting. He was partners in a comedy team with Bernie West for several years, then appeared on many radio and live TV broadcasts, including playing Wyatt Earp in the January 20, 1952 episode of "The Gabby Hayes Show". He made his Broadway debut in "Hazel Flagg" in 1953.


title: Ross Martin

text: Martin's first film was the George Pal 1955 production "Conquest of Space", followed by a brief but memorable appearance in "The Colossus of New York" (1958), as the scientist father of Charles Herbert. In 1959, Martin appeared in the episode "Echo" on "". He appeared in two 1959 episodes of David Janssen's crime drama series, "Richard Diamond, Private Detective". Soon after, he caught the eye of Blake Edwards, who cast him in a number of widely varied roles; as Sal in the 1959 "Peter Gunn" episode "The Fuse", his breakout role as the comic sidekick Andamo in the 1959 CBS drama series "Mr. Lucky", the asthmatic kidnapper Red Lynch in the 1962 thriller "Experiment in Terror", culminating with a role in "The Great Race," as the smoothly villainous Baron Rolfe Von Stuppe. He was also a regular on "Stump the Stars" from 1962-1963.


title: Ross Martin

text: After his performance in "The Great Race", CBS cast Martin in what was to become his most famous role, Secret Service agent Artemus Gordon in "The Wild Wild West", opposite Robert Conrad. The Artemus Gordon character was a master gadgeteer and disguise artist, and these attributes fitted Martin perfectly. Martin himself created most of his disguises for the show, and most of the cast had no idea what he would look like until seeing him during the shooting of the episode. The recent DVD release of the first season of the series includes a recently discovered pre-production sketch Martin had made of his very first make-up design for the pilot episode. Another episode revealed another of Martin's talents: he was a concert-trained violinist.


title: Ross Martin

text: In 1968, Martin broke his leg and then suffered a near-fatal heart attack, forcing "The Wild Wild West" to replace him with other actors, including Charles Aidman, William Schallert and Alan Hale Jr for nine episodes. He was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series, for the fourth and final season of "The Wild Wild West". The series was cancelled in 1969 in the midst of a national controversy over violence on television.


title: Ross Martin

text: After "The Wild, Wild West" ended, Martin continued his career in various guest roles on television and in roles in television films. In 1970, Martin portrayed Alexander Hamilton in the NBC television special "Swing Out, Sweet Land", hosted by John Wayne. He also appeared in a 1970 episode of "The Immortal" ("White Elephants Don't Grow on Trees"). The following year, Martin tried his hand at directing. He guest starred in the 1971 episode of "Columbo" entitled "Suitable For Framing", as Dale Kingston, a murderous art critic and also a 1971 episode of "Love, American Style", which he also directed. Martin directed another episode of the series in 1973. Later that same year, he appeared as the famed Asian detective Charlie Chan in "The Return of Charlie Chan". He made a guest appearance on "Barnaby Jones" in 1974, and also lent his voice to an episode of "Wait Till Your Father Gets Home" later that year.


title: Ross Martin

text: In 1976, Martin returned to the stage as John Adams in a touring production of the musical "1776". In 1978, he did more voice work for the animated series "Jana of the Jungle". He reprised the role of Artemus Gordon in two "Wild, Wild West" television movies: "The Wild Wild West Revisited" in 1979 and "More Wild Wild West" in 1980. He had a four-episode recurring role as kumu mobster Tony Alika on "Hawaii Five-O" from 1978–79. In 1980, Martin appeared in the third episode of "The Love Boat" as Tom Thorton. Martin's final role was in the 1983 television movie "I Married Wyatt Earp" in which he played the role of Jacob Speigler. The film aired two years after his death.


title: Ross Martin

text: Martin married his first wife, Muriel Weiss, in 1941. They had one child together, a daughter, Phyllis Rosenblatt (a New York artist). Weiss died from cancer in 1965. (Martin and Weiss were separated at the time of her death.)


title: Ross Martin

text: In 1967, Martin married Olavee Lucile Parsons (a successful model and documentary director) and adopted her two children, Rebecca (Martin) Schacht and George Martin. Martin and Parsons remained married until Martin's death in 1981. She died in 2002.


title: Ross Martin

text: On July 3, 1981, Martin suffered a fatal heart attack after a game of tennis at San Vincente Tennis Ranch, San Diego County Club of Ramona, California. He was rushed to the Pomerado Hospital in Poway, California, but was pronounced dead on arrival.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: H.M.S. Pinafore; or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It opened at the Opera Comique in London, on 25 May 1878 and ran for 571 performances, which was the second-longest run of any musical theatre piece up to that time. "H.M.S. Pinafore" was Gilbert and Sullivan's fourth operatic collaboration and their first international sensation.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The story takes place aboard the Royal Navy ship HMS "Pinafore". The captain's daughter, Josephine, is in love with a lower-class sailor, Ralph Rackstraw, although her father intends her to marry Sir Joseph Porter, the First Lord of the Admiralty. She abides by her father's wishes at first, but Sir Joseph's advocacy of the equality of humankind encourages Ralph and Josephine to overturn conventional social order. They declare their love for each other and eventually plan to elope. The Captain discovers this plan, but, as in many of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, a surprise disclosure changes things dramatically near the end of the story.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Drawing on several of his earlier "Bab Ballad" poems, Gilbert imbued this plot with mirth and silliness. The opera's humour focuses on love between members of different social classes and lampoons the British class system in general. "Pinafore" also pokes good-natured fun at patriotism, party politics, the Royal Navy, and the rise of unqualified people to positions of authority. The title of the piece comically applies the name of a garment for girls and women, a pinafore, to the fearsome symbol of a warship.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: "Pinafore"s extraordinary popularity in Britain, America and elsewhere was followed by the similar success of a series of Gilbert and Sullivan works, including "The Pirates of Penzance" and "The Mikado". Their works, later known as the Savoy operas, dominated the musical stage on both sides of the Atlantic for more than a decade and continue to be performed today. The structure and style of these operas, particularly "Pinafore", were much copied and contributed significantly to the development of modern musical theatre.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In 1875, Richard D'Oyly Carte, who was then managing the Royalty Theatre for Selina Dolaro, brought Gilbert and Sullivan together to write their second show, a one-act opera entitled "Trial by Jury". This proved a success, and in 1876 D'Oyly Carte assembled a group of financial backers to establish the Comedy Opera Company, which was devoted to the production and promotion of family-friendly English comic opera. With this theatre company, Carte finally had the financial resources, after many failed attempts, to produce a new full-length Gilbert and Sullivan opera. This next opera was "The Sorcerer", which opened in November 1877. It too was successful, running for 178 performances. Sheet music from the show sold well, and street musicians played the melodies.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Instead of writing a piece for production by a theatre proprietor, as was usual in Victorian theatres, Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte produced the show with their own financial support. They were therefore able to choose their own cast of performers, rather than being obliged to use the actors already engaged at the theatre. They chose talented actors, most of whom were not well-known stars and did not command high fees, and to whom they could teach a more naturalistic style of performance than was commonly used at the time. They then tailored their work to the particular abilities of these performers. The skill with which Gilbert and Sullivan used their performers had an effect on the audience; as critic Herman Klein wrote: "we secretly marvelled at the naturalness and ease with which [the Gilbertian quips and absurdities] were said and done. For until then no living soul had seen upon the stage such weird, eccentric, yet intensely human beings. ... [They] conjured into existence a hitherto unknown comic world of sheer delight."


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The success of "The Sorcerer" paved the way for another collaboration by Gilbert and Sullivan. Carte agreed on terms for a new opera with the Comedy Opera Company, and Gilbert began work on "H.M.S. Pinafore" before the end of 1877. Gilbert's father had been a naval surgeon, and the nautical theme of the opera appealed to him. He drew on several of his earlier "Bab Ballad" poems (many of which also have nautical themes), including "Captain Reece" (1868) and "General John" (1867). Some of the characters also have prototypes in the ballads: Dick Deadeye is based on a character in "Woman's Gratitude" (1869); an early version of Ralph Rackstraw can be seen in "Joe Go-Lightly" (1867), with its sailor madly in love with the daughter of someone who far outranks him; and Little Buttercup is taken almost wholesale from "The Bumboat Woman's Story" (1870). On 27 December 1877, while Sullivan was on holiday on the French Riviera, Gilbert sent him a plot sketch accompanied by the following note:


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Despite Gilbert's disclaimer, audiences, critics and even the Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli, identified Sir Joseph Porter with W. H. Smith, a politician who had recently been appointed First Lord of the Admiralty despite having neither military nor nautical experience. Sullivan was delighted with the sketch, and Gilbert read a first draft of the plot to Carte in mid-January.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Following the example of his mentor, T. W. Robertson, Gilbert strove to ensure that the costumes and sets were as realistic as possible. When preparing the sets for "H.M.S. Pinafore", Gilbert and Sullivan visited Portsmouth in April 1878 to inspect ships. Gilbert made sketches of H.M.S. "Victory" and H.M.S. "St Vincent" and created a model set for the carpenters to work from. This was far from standard procedure in Victorian drama, in which naturalism was still a relatively new concept, and in which most authors had very little influence on how their plays and libretti were staged. This attention to detail was typical of Gilbert's stage management and would be repeated in all of his Savoy operas. Gilbert's focus on visual accuracy provided a "right-side-up for topsy-turvydom", that is, a realistic point of reference that serves to heighten the whimsicality and absurdity of the situations. Sullivan was "in the full swing" of work on the piece by the middle of April 1878. The bright and cheerful music of "Pinafore" was composed during a time when Sullivan suffered from excruciating pain from a kidney stone. The cast began music rehearsals on 24 April, and at the beginning of May 1878, the two collaborators worked closely together at Sullivan's flat to finalise the piece.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In "Pinafore", Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte used several of the principal cast members whom they had assembled for "The Sorcerer". As Gilbert had suggested to Sullivan in December 1877, "Mrs. Cripps [Little Buttercup] will be a capital part for Everard ... Barrington will be a capital captain, and Grossmith a first-rate First Lord." However, Mrs Howard Paul, who had played Lady Sangazure in "The Sorcerer", was declining vocally. She was under contract to play the role of Cousin Hebe in "Pinafore". Gilbert made an effort to write an amusing part for her despite Sullivan's reluctance to use her, but by mid-May 1878, both Gilbert and Sullivan wanted her out of the cast; unhappy with the role, she left. With only a week to go before opening night, Carte hired a concert singer, Jessie Bond, to play Cousin Hebe. Since Bond had little experience as an actress, Gilbert and Sullivan cut the dialogue out of the role, except for a few lines in the last scene, which they turned into recitative. Other new cast members were Emma Howson and George Power in the romantic roles, who were improvements on the romantic soprano and tenor in "The Sorcerer".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Gilbert acted as stage director for his own plays and operas. He sought realism in acting, just as he strove for realistic visual elements. He deprecated self-conscious interaction with the audience and insisted on a style of portrayal in which the characters were never aware of their own absurdity but were coherent internal wholes. Sullivan conducted the music rehearsals. As was to be his usual practice in his later operas, Sullivan left the overture for the last moment, sketching it out and entrusting it to the company's music director, in this case Alfred Cellier, to complete. "Pinafore" opened on 25 May 1878 at the Opera Comique.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The British warship H.M.S. "Pinafore" is at anchor off Portsmouth. The sailors are on the quarterdeck, proudly "cleaning brasswork, splicing rope, etc."


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Little Buttercup, a Portsmouth "bumboat woman" (dockside vendor) – who is the rosiest, roundest, and "reddest beauty in all Spithead" – comes on board to sell her wares to the crew. She hints that she may be hiding a dark secret under her "gay and frivolous exterior". Ralph Rackstraw, "the smartest lad in all the fleet", enters, declaring his love for the Captain's daughter, Josephine. His fellow sailors (excepting Dick Deadeye, the grim and ugly realist of the crew) offer their sympathies, but they can give Ralph little hope that his love will ever be returned.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The gentlemanly and popular Captain Corcoran greets his "gallant crew" and compliments them on their politeness, saying that he returns the favour by never ("well, hardly ever") using bad language, such as "a big, big D". After the sailors leave, the Captain confesses to Little Buttercup that Josephine is reluctant to consider a marriage proposal from Sir Joseph Porter, the First Lord of the Admiralty. Buttercup says that she knows how it feels to love in vain. As she leaves, the Captain remarks that she is "a plump and pleasing person". Josephine enters and reveals to her father that she loves a humble sailor in his crew, but she assures him that she is a dutiful daughter and will never reveal her love to this sailor.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Sir Joseph comes on board, accompanied by his "admiring crowd of sisters, cousins and aunts". He recounts how he rose from humble beginnings to be "ruler of the Queen's Navee" through persistence, although he has no naval qualifications. He then delivers a humiliating lesson in etiquette, telling the Captain that he must always say "if you please" after giving an order; for "A British sailor is any man's equal" – excepting Sir Joseph's. Sir Joseph has composed a song to illustrate that point, and he gives a copy of it to Ralph. Shortly afterwards, elated by Sir Joseph's views on equality, Ralph decides that he will declare his love to Josephine. This delights his shipmates, except Dick Deadeye, who contends that "when people have to obey other people's orders, equality's out of the question". Shocked by his words, the other sailors force Dick to listen to Sir Joseph's song before they exit, leaving Ralph alone on deck. Josephine now enters, and Ralph confesses his love in terms surprisingly eloquent for a "common sailor". Josephine is touched, but although she has found Sir Joseph's attentions nauseating, she knows that it is her duty to marry Sir Joseph instead of Ralph. Disguising her true feelings, she "haughtily rejects" Ralph's "proffered love".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Ralph summons his shipmates (Sir Joseph's female relatives also arrive) and tells them that he is bent on suicide. The crew expresses sympathy, except for Dick, who provides a stark counterpoint of dissent. Ralph puts a pistol to his head, but as he is about to pull the trigger, Josephine enters, admitting that she loves him after all. Ralph and Josephine plan to sneak ashore to elope that night. Dick Deadeye warns them to "forbear, nor carry out the scheme", but the joyous ship's company ignores him.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Later that night, under a full moon, Captain Corcoran reviews his concerns: his "kindly crew rebels", his "daughter to a tar is partial", his friends seem to desert him, and Sir Joseph has threatened a court-martial. Little Buttercup offers sympathy. He tells her that, if it were not for the difference in their social standing, he would have returned her affection. She prophesies that things are not all as they seem and that "a change" is in store for him, but he does not understand her cryptic warning.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Sir Joseph enters and complains that Josephine has not yet agreed to marry him. The Captain speculates that she is probably dazzled by his "exalted rank" and that if Sir Joseph can persuade her that "love levels all ranks", she will accept his proposal. They withdraw, and Josephine enters, still feeling guilty about her planned elopement with Ralph and fearful of giving up a life of luxury. When Sir Joseph makes the argument that "love levels all ranks", a delighted Josephine says that she "will hesitate no longer". The Captain and Sir Joseph rejoice, but Josephine is now more determined than ever to marry Ralph.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Dick Deadeye intercepts the Captain and tells him of the lovers' plans to elope. The Captain confronts Ralph and Josephine as they try to leave the ship. The pair declare their love, justifying their actions because "He is an Englishman!" The furious Captain is unmoved and blurts out, "Why, damme, it's too bad!" Sir Joseph and his relatives, who have overheard this oath, are shocked to hear swearing on board a ship, and Sir Joseph orders the Captain confined to his cabin.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: When Sir Joseph asks what had provoked the usually polite officer's outburst, Ralph replies that it was his declaration of love for Josephine. Furious in his turn at this revelation, and ignoring Josephine's plea to spare Ralph, Sir Joseph has the sailor "loaded with chains" and taken to the ship's brig. Little Buttercup now comes forward to reveal her long-held secret. Many years ago, when she "practised baby-farming", she had cared for two babies, one "of low condition", the other "a regular patrician". She confesses that she "mixed those children up. ... The wellborn babe was Ralph; your Captain was the other."


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Sir Joseph now realises that Ralph should have been the Captain, and the Captain should have been Ralph. He summons both, and they emerge wearing each other's uniforms: Ralph as Captain, in command of the "Pinafore", and Corcoran as a common sailor. Sir Joseph's marriage with Josephine is now "out of the question" in his eyes: "love levels all ranks ... to a considerable extent, but it does not level them as much as that." He hands her to Captain Rackstraw. The former Captain's now-humble social rank leaves him free to marry Buttercup. Sir Joseph settles for his cousin Hebe, and all ends in general rejoicing.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: "Pinafore" opened on 25 May 1878 at the Opera Comique, before an enthusiastic audience, with Sullivan conducting. Soon, however, the piece suffered from weak ticket sales, generally ascribed to a heat wave that made the Opera Comique particularly uncomfortable. The historian Michael Ainger questions this explanation, at least in part, stating that the heat waves in the summer of 1878 were short and transient. By mid-August, Sullivan wrote to his mother that cooler weather had arrived, which was good for the show. In the meantime, the four partners of the Comedy Opera Company lost confidence in the opera's viability and posted closing notices. Carte publicised the piece by presenting a matinee concert performance on 6 July 1878 at the enormous Crystal Palace.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In late August 1878, Sullivan used some of the "Pinafore" music, arranged by his assistant Hamilton Clarke, during several successful promenade concerts at Covent Garden that generated interest and stimulated ticket sales. By September, "Pinafore" was playing to full houses at the Opera Comique. The piano score sold 10,000 copies, and Carte soon sent two additional companies out to tour in the provinces.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Carte, Gilbert and Sullivan now had the financial resources to produce shows themselves, without outside backers. Carte persuaded the author and composer that a business partnership among the three would be to their advantage, and they hatched a plan to separate themselves from the directors of the Comedy Opera Company. The contract between Gilbert and Sullivan and the Comedy Opera Company gave the latter the right to present "Pinafore" for the duration of the initial run. The Opera Comique was obliged to close for drain and sewer repairs, and it was renovated by E. W. Bradwell, from Christmas 1878 to the end of January 1879. Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte believed that this break ended the initial run, and, therefore, ended the company's rights. Carte put the matter beyond doubt by taking a six-month personal lease of the theatre beginning on 1 February 1879, the date of its re-opening, when "Pinafore" resumed. At the end of the six months, Carte planned to give notice to the Comedy Opera Company that its rights in the show and the theatre had ended.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Meanwhile, numerous versions of "Pinafore", unauthorised by its creators, began playing in America with great success, beginning with a production in Boston that opened on 25 November 1878. "Pinafore" became a source of popular quotations on both sides of the Atlantic, such as the exchange:


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In February 1879, "Pinafore" resumed operations at the Opera Comique. The opera also resumed touring in April, with two companies crisscrossing the British provinces by June, one starring Richard Mansfield as Sir Joseph, the other W. S. Penley in the role. Hoping to join in on the profits to be made in America from "Pinafore", Carte left in June for New York to make arrangements for an "authentic" production there to be rehearsed personally by the author and composer. He arranged to rent a theatre and auditioned chorus members for the American production of "Pinafore" and a new Gilbert and Sullivan opera to be premiered in New York, and for tours.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Sullivan, as had been arranged with Carte and Gilbert, gave notice to the partners of the Comedy Opera Company in early July 1879 that he, Gilbert and Carte would not be renewing the contract to produce "Pinafore" with them and that he would be withdrawing his music from the Comedy Opera Company on 31 July. In return, the Comedy Opera Company gave notice that they intended to play "Pinafore" at another theatre and brought a legal action against Carte and company. They offered the London and touring casts of "Pinafore" more money to play in their production, and although some choristers accepted their offer, only one principal player, Aeneas Joseph Dymott, accepted. They engaged the Imperial Theatre but had no scenery. On 31 July, they sent a group of thugs to seize the scenery and props during Act II of the evening performance at the Opera Comique. Gilbert was away, and Sullivan was recovering from an operation for kidney stones. Stagehands and cast members managed to ward off their backstage attackers and protect the scenery, although the stage manager, Richard Barker, and others, were injured. The cast went on with the show until someone shouted "Fire!" George Grossmith, playing Sir Joseph, went before the curtain to calm the panicked audience. The police arrived to restore order, and the show continued. Gilbert sued to stop the Comedy Opera Company from staging their rival production of "H.M.S. Pinafore". The court permitted the production to go on at the Imperial, beginning on 1 August 1879, and it transferred to the Olympic Theatre in September. Pauline Rita was one of a series of Josephines. The production received good notices and initially sold well but was withdrawn in October after 91 performances. The matter was eventually settled in court, where a judge ruled in Carte's favour about two years later.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: After his return to London, Carte formed a new partnership with Gilbert and Sullivan to divide profits equally after the expenses of each of their shows. Meanwhile, "Pinafore" continued to play strongly. On 20 February 1880, "Pinafore" completed its initial run of 571 performances. Only one other work of musical theatre in the world had ever run longer, Robert Planquette's operetta "Les cloches de Corneville".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Approximately 150 unauthorised productions of "Pinafore" sprang up in the United States in 1878 and 1879, and none of these paid royalties to the authors. Gilbert and Sullivan called them "pirated", although the creators did not have any international copyright protection. The first of these productions, opening at the Boston Museum on 25 November 1878, made such a splash that the piece was quickly produced in major cities and on tour by dozens of companies throughout the country. Boston alone saw at least a dozen productions, including a juvenile version described by Louisa May Alcott in her 1879 story, "Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore". In New York, different productions of the piece played simultaneously in eight theatres within five blocks of each other and in six theatres in Philadelphia.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: These unauthorised performances took many forms, including burlesques, productions with men playing women's roles and vice versa, spoofs, variety acts, Minstrel show versions, all-black and Catholic productions, German, Yiddish and other foreign-language versions, performances on boats or by church choirs, and productions starring casts of children. Few purported to play the opera as written. Sheet music arrangements were popular, there were "Pinafore"-themed dolls and household items, and references to the opera were common in advertising, news and other media. Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte brought lawsuits in the U.S. and tried for many years to control the American performance copyrights over their operas, or at least to claim some royalties, without success. They made a special effort to claim American rights for their next work after "Pinafore", "The Pirates of Penzance", by giving the official premiere in New York.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte met by 24 April 1879 to make plans for a production of "Pinafore" in America. Carte travelled to New York in the summer of 1879 and made arrangements with theatre manager John T. Ford to present, at the Fifth Avenue Theatre, the first authorised American production of "Pinafore". In November, Carte returned to America with Gilbert, Sullivan and a company of strong singers, including J. H. Ryley as Sir Joseph, Blanche Roosevelt as Josephine, Alice Barnett as Little Buttercup, Furneaux Cook as Dick Deadeye, Hugh Talbot as Ralph Rackstraw and Jessie Bond as Cousin Hebe. To these, he added some American singers, including Signor Brocolini as Captain Corcoran. Alfred Cellier came to assist Sullivan, while his brother François remained in London to conduct "Pinafore" there.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: "Pinafore" opened in New York on 1 December 1879 (with Gilbert onstage in the chorus) and ran for the rest of December. After a reasonably strong first week, audiences quickly fell off, since most New Yorkers had already seen local productions of "Pinafore". In the meantime, Gilbert and Sullivan raced to complete and rehearse their new opera, "The Pirates of Penzance", which premiered with much success on 31 December. Shortly thereafter, Carte sent three touring companies around the United States East Coast and Midwest, playing "Pinafore" alongside "Pirates".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The unauthorised juvenile productions of "Pinafore" were so popular that Carte mounted his own children's version, played at matinees at the Opera Comique beginning on 16 December 1879. François Cellier, who had taken over from his brother as Carte's music director in London, adapted the score for children's voices. Between its two Christmas seasons in London, the children's production went on a provincial tour from 2 August 1880 to 11 December 1880.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Carte's children's production earned enthusiastic reviews from the critic Clement Scott and the other London critics, as well as the audiences, including children. However, Captain Corcoran's curse "Damme!" was uncensored, shocking such prominent audience members as Lewis Carroll, who later wrote: "a bevy of sweet innocent-looking girls sing, with bright and happy looks, the chorus 'He said, Damn me! He said, Damn me!' I cannot find words to convey to the reader the pain I felt in seeing those dear children taught to utter such words to amuse ears grown callous to their ghastly meaning ... How Mr. Gilbert could have stooped to write, or Sir Arthur Sullivan could have prostituted his noble art to set to music, such vile trash, it passes my skill to understand".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: After the opera became successful in London, Richard D'Oyly Carte quickly sent touring companies into the British provinces. At least one D'Oyly Carte company, and sometimes as many as three, played "Pinafore" under Carte's aegis every year between 1878 and 1888, including its first London revival in 1887. The opera was then given a rest, returning to the touring repertory between 1894 and 1900 and again for most of the time between 1903 and 1940. Gilbert directed all the revivals during his lifetime, and after his death, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company had exclusive performing rights to the Savoy operas until 1962. It continued to hew closely to Gilbert's directions throughout that period, as recorded in Gilbert's prompt books, and it also required its licensees to follow them closely.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Until 1908, revivals of the opera were given in contemporary dress, with ladies' costumes executed by couture houses such as Redfern. After that, designers such as Percy Anderson, George Sheringham and Peter Goffin created Victorian costume designs. The 1887 set was designed by Hawes Craven. In the winter of 1940–41, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company's scenery and costumes for "Pinafore" and three other operas were destroyed by German bombs during World War II. The opera was revived in London in the summer of 1947. It was then included in the D'Oyly Carte repertory in every season from then on, until the company's closure in 1982. The D'Oyly Carte company performed "Pinafore" before Queen Elizabeth II and the royal family at Windsor Castle on 16 June 1977, during the queen's Silver Jubilee year, the first royal command performance of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera since 1891.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company did not allow any other professional company to present the Savoy operas in Britain and the Commonwealth until the copyrights expired at the end of 1961, although it licensed many amateur and school societies to do so, beginning in the 19th century. Other professional productions since the copyrights expired have included Tyrone Guthrie's 1960 production from Stratford, Ontario, seen on Broadway in 1960 and in London in 1962 and a New Sadler's Wells Opera Company production first seen on 4 June 1984 at Sadler's Wells Theatre, which was seen also in New York. Scottish Opera, Welsh National Opera and many of the other British opera companies have mounted productions, as did the reconstituted D'Oyly Carte Opera Company between 1990 and its closure in 2003. In recent decades, the Carl Rosa Opera Company has produced "Pinafore" several times, including in 2009, Opera della Luna has toured it repeatedly, English National Opera presented it in 2021, it is regularly given by the National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company, and other British companies continue to mount the piece.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The extraordinary initial success of "Pinafore" in America was seen first-hand by J. C. Williamson. He soon made arrangements with D'Oyly Carte to present the opera's first authorised production in Australia, opening on 15 November 1879 at the Theatre Royal, Sydney. Thereafter, his opera company played frequent seasons of the work (and the subsequent Savoy operas) until at least 1963. In the U.S., the piece never lost popularity. The Internet Broadway Database links to a non-exhaustive list of 29 productions on Broadway alone. Among the professional repertory companies continuing to present "Pinafore" regularly in the U.S. are Opera a la Carte, based in California, Ohio Light Opera and the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players, which tours the opera annually and often includes it in its New York seasons. "Pinafore" is still performed around the world by opera companies such as the Royal Theatre, Copenhagen; Australian Opera (and Essgee Entertainment and others in Australia); in Kassel, Germany; and even Samarkand, Uzbekistan.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The following table shows the history of the D'Oyly Carte productions (excluding tours) in Gilbert's lifetime:


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: "The Era" also lavishly praised Emma Howson as Josephine. "The Entr'acte and Limelight" commented that the opera was reminiscent of "Trial by Jury" and "Sorcerer" but found it diverting and called the music "very charming. To hear so-called grand opera imitated through the medium of the most trifling lyrics, is funny". The paper praised Grossmith as Sir Joseph, noting with amusement that he was made up to look like portraits of Horatio Nelson, "and his good introductory song seems levelled at" W. H. Smith. It opined, further, that "He Is an Englishman" is "an excellent satire on the proposition that a man must necessarily be virtuous to be English". It found the piece, as a whole, well presented and predicted that it would have a long run.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Similarly, "The Illustrated London News" concluded that the production was a success and that the plot, though slight, served as a good vehicle for Gilbert's "caustic humour and quaint satire". It found that there was "much to call forth hearty laughter in the occasional satirical hits. ... Dr. Sullivan's music is as lively as the text to which it is set, with here and there a touch of sentimental expression ... The piece is well performed throughout." The "Daily News", "The Globe", "The Times" (which particularly praised Grossmith, Barrington and Everard) and "The Standard" concurred, the last commenting favourably on the chorus acting, which, it said, "adds to the reality of the illusion". "The Times" also noted that the piece was an early attempt at the establishment of a "national musical stage" with a libretto free from risqué French "improprieties" and without the "aid" of Italian and German musical models.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: "The Daily Telegraph" and the "Athenaeum", however, greeted the opera with only mixed praise. "The Musical Times" complained that the ongoing collaboration between Gilbert and Sullivan was "detrimental to the art-progress of either" because, although it was popular with audiences, "something higher is demanded for what is understood as 'comic opera'". The paper commented that Sullivan had "the true elements of an artist, which would be successfully developed were a carefully framed libretto presented to him for composition". It concluded, however, by saying how much it enjoyed the opera: "Having thus conscientiously discharged our duties as art-critics, let us at once proceed to say that "H.M.S. Pinafore" is an amusing piece of extravagance, and that the music floats it on merrily to the end". "The Times" and several of the other papers agreed that, while the piece was entertaining, Sullivan was capable of higher art. Only "The Figaro" was actively hostile to the new piece. Upon the publication of the vocal score, a review by "The Academy" joined the chorus of regret that Sullivan had sunk so low as to compose music for "Pinafore" and hoped that he would turn to projects "more worthy of his great ability". This criticism would follow Sullivan throughout his career.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The many unauthorised American productions of 1878–79 were of widely varying quality, and many of them were adaptations of the opera. One of the more "authentic" ones was the production by the Boston Ideal Opera Company, which was first formed to produce "Pinafore". It engaged well-regarded concert singers and opened on 14 April 1879 at the 3,000-seat Boston Theatre. The critics agreed that the company fulfilled its goals of presenting an "ideal" production. The "Boston Journal" reported that the audience was "wrought up by the entertainment to a point of absolute approval". The paper observed that it is a mistake to consider "Pinafore" a burlesque, "for while irresistibly comical it is not "bouffe" and requires to be handled with great care lest its delicate proportions be marred and its subtle quality of humor be lost". The "Journal" described the opera as "classical" in method and wrote that its "most exquisite satire" lay in its "imitation of the absurdities" of grand opera. The company went on to become one of the most successful touring companies in America. The first children's version in Boston became a sensation with both children and adult audiences, extending its run through the summer of 1879. The "Boston Herald" wrote that "the large audience of children and their elders went fairly wild with delight ... shrieks of laughter were repeatedly heard".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: When "Pinafore" was first revived in London in 1887, it was already treated as a classic. "The Illustrated London News" observed that the opera had not been updated with new dialogue, jokes and songs, but concluded that this was for the best, as the public would have missed the "time-honoured jokes, such as 'Hardly Ever.' The Savoy has once more got a brilliant success." "The Theatre" concurred, stating that since the opera "has been heard in almost every part of this habitable globe and been enjoyed everywhere, there is not much occasion to descant". It called the revival a "most brilliant" success and predicted another long run.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Reviewing the 1899 revival, "The Athenaeum" managed to praise the piece while joining in the musical establishment's critique of Sullivan. On the one hand, "The "Pinafore" ... sounds fresher than ever. The musical world has become serious – very serious – and it is indeed refreshing to hear a merry, humorous piece, and music, unassuming in character ... it is delicately scored, and in many ways displays ability of a high order". On the other hand, it wrote that if Sullivan had pursued the path of composing more serious music, like his symphony, "he would have produced still higher results; in like manner "Pinafore" set us wondering what the composer would have accomplished with a libretto of somewhat similar kind, but one giving him larger scope for the exercise of his gifts".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In 1911, H. L. Mencken wrote: "No other comic opera ever written – no other stage play, indeed, of any sort – was ever so popular. ... "Pinafore" ... has been given, and with great success, wherever there are theaters – from Moscow to Buenos Aires, from Cape Town to Shanghai; in Madrid, Ottawa and Melbourne; even in Paris, Rome, Vienna and Berlin." After the deaths of Gilbert and Sullivan, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company retained exclusive rights to perform their operas in Great Britain until 1962, touring throughout Britain for most of the year and, beginning in 1919, often performing in London for a season of about four months. "The Times" gave the company's 1920 London production an enthusiastic review, saying that the audience was "enraptured", and regretting that "Pinafore" would be played for only two weeks. It praised the cast, singling out Leo Sheffield as the Captain, Henry Lytton as Sir Joseph, Elsie Griffin as Josephine, James Hay as Ralph, Bertha Lewis as Little Buttercup and the "splendid" choral tone. It concluded that the opera made a "rollicking climax to the season". Two years later, it gave an even more glowing report of that season's performances, calling Derek Oldham an "ideal hero" as Ralph, noting that Sydney Granville "fairly brought down the house" with his song, that Darrell Fancourt's Deadeye was "an admirably sustained piece of caricature" and that it was a "great pleasure" to hear the returning principals. A 1961 review of the company's "Pinafore" is much the same.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In 1879, J. C. Williamson acquired the exclusive performing rights to "Pinafore" in Australia and New Zealand. His first production earned public and critical acclaim. Williamson played Sir Joseph, and his wife, Maggie Moore played Josephine. Praising the production, Williamson, Moore and the other performers, the "Sydney Morning Herald" noted that the production, though "abounding in fun", was dignified and precise, especially compared with a previous "boisterous" unauthorized production, and that many numbers were encored and the laughter and applause from the "immense audience ... was liberally bestowed". Williamson's company continued to produce "Pinafore" in Australia, New Zealand and on tour into the 1960s with much success. Williamson said, "If you need money, then put on G&S". Meanwhile, "Pinafore" continued to garner praise outside Britain. The 1950s Danish version in Copenhagen, for example, was revived repeatedly, playing for well over 100 performances to "packed houses". Translations into German, Yiddish and many other languages, and professional productions in places as remote as Samarkand in Uzbekistan have been successful.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In the U.S., where Gilbert and Sullivan's performance copyright was never in force, "Pinafore" continued to be produced continuously by both professional and amateur companies. "The New York Times", in a 1914 review, called a large-scale production at the 6,000-seat New York Hippodrome a "royal entertainment [that] comes up smiling". The opera had been turned into a "mammoth spectacle" with a chorus of hundreds and the famous Hippodrome tank providing a realistic harbour. Buttercup made her entrance by rowing over to the three-masted "Pinafore", and Dick Deadeye was later thrown overboard with a real splash. The "Times" praised the hearty singing but noted that some subtlety is lost when the dialogue needs to be "shouted". The production took some liberties, including interpolated music from other Sullivan works. The paper concluded, "the mild satire of "Pinafore" is entertaining because it is universal". The same newspaper deemed Winthrop Ames' popular Broadway productions of "Pinafore" in the 1920s and 1930s "spectacular". Modern productions in America continue to be generally well received. "The New York Times" review of the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players' 2008 season at New York City Center commented, "Gilbert's themes of class inequality, overbearing nationalism and incompetent authorities remain relevant, however absurdly treated. But the lasting appeal of "Pinafore" and its ilk is more a matter of his unmatched linguistic genius and Sullivan's generous supply of addictive melodies."


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: With the expiry of the copyrights, companies around the world have been free to produce Gilbert and Sullivan works and to adapt them as they please for almost 50 years. Productions of "Pinafore", both amateur and professional, range from the traditional, in the D'Oyly Carte vein, to the broadly adapted, such as that of the very successful Essgee Entertainment (formed by Simon Gallaher) in Australia and Opera della Luna in Britain. Since its original production, "H.M.S. Pinafore" has remained one of Gilbert and Sullivan's most popular comic operas. Productions continue in large numbers around the world. In 2003 alone, The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company rented 224 sets of orchestra parts, mostly for productions of "Pinafore", "Pirates" and "Mikado". This does not take into account other rental companies and the theatre companies that borrow scores or have their own, or that use only one or two pianos instead of an orchestra. Hundreds of productions of "Pinafore" are presented every year worldwide.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Theatre historian John Bush Jones wrote that "Pinafore" has "everything a musical theatregoer could ask for. An engaging and even relatively suspenseful story is populated with varied and well-drawn characters who speak and sing witty, literate, and often outrageously funny dialogue and lyrics [and] has a score that ... has plenty of tunes for the audience to go away humming". George Power, the tenor who created the role of Ralph Rackstraw, opined in later life that the secret of the success of the Savoy operas is the way in which "Sullivan entered into the spirit of Gilbert's topsy-turvy humour, and was pompous when Gilbert was sprightly, or, when Gilbert's satire was keenest and most acid, consciously wallowed in sentiment." Another commentator has suggested that the opera's enduring success lies in its focus on "mirth and silliness". Even the title of the piece is silly, applying the name of a little girl's garment, a pinafore, to the fearsome symbol of a naval warship, which usually bore names like "Victory", "Goliath", "Audacious" and "Minotaur".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Gilbert's biographer Jane Stedman wrote that "Pinafore" is "satirically far more complex" than "The Sorcerer". She commented that Gilbert uses several ideas and themes from his Bab Ballads, including the idea of gentlemanly behaviour of a captain towards his crew from "Captain Reece" (1868) and the exchange of ranks due to exchange at birth from "General John" (1867). Dick Deadeye, based on a character in "Woman's Gratitude" (1869), represents another of Gilbert's favorite (and semi-autobiographical) satiric themes: the misshapen misanthrope whose forbidding "face and form" makes him unpopular although he represents the voice of reason and common sense. Gilbert also borrows from his 1870 opera, "The Gentleman in Black" which includes the device of baby-switching.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Historian H. M. Walbrook wrote in 1921 that "Pinafore" "satirizes the type of nautical drama of which Douglas Jerrold's "Black-Eyed Susan" is a typical instance, and the 'God's Englishman' sort of patriotism which consists in shouting a platitude, striking an attitude, and doing little or nothing to help one's country". G. K. Chesterton agreed that the satire is pointed at the selfishness of "being proud of yourself for being a citizen" of one's country, which requires no virtuous effort of will to resist the "temptations to belong to other nations" but is merely an excuse for pride. In 2005, Australian opera director Stuart Maunder noted the juxtaposition of satire and nationalism in the opera, saying, "they all sing 'He is an Englishman', and you know damn well they're sending it up, but the music is so military ... that you can't help but be swept up in that whole jingoism that is the British Empire." In addition, he argued that the song ties this theme into the main satire of class distinctions in the opera: ""H.M.S. Pinafore" is basically a satire on ... the British love of the class system. ... [O]f course [Ralph] can marry [the Captain's] daughter, because he's British, and therefore he's great'". Jacobs notes that Gilbert is lampooning the tradition of nautical melodrama in which the sailor's "patriotism guarantees his virtue".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: One of Gilbert's favourite comic themes is the elevation of an unqualified person to a position of high responsibility. In "The Happy Land" (1873), for example, Gilbert describes a world in which government offices are awarded to the person who has the least qualification to hold each position. In particular, the one who has never heard of a ship is appointed to the cabinet post of First Lord of the Admiralty. In "Pinafore", Gilbert revisits this theme in the character of Sir Joseph, who rises to the same position by "never go[ing] to sea". In later Gilbert and Sullivan operas, the characters Major-General Stanley in "Pirates", and Ko-Ko in "The Mikado", are similarly appointed to high office though lacking the necessary qualifications. Gilbert also pokes fun at party politics, implying that when Sir Joseph "always voted at [his] party's call", he sacrificed his personal integrity. The "commercial middle class" (which was Gilbert's main audience) is treated as satirically as are social climbers and the great unwashed. In addition, the apparent age difference between Ralph and the Captain, even though they were babies nursed together, satirises the variable age of Thaddeus in "The Bohemian Girl". "The Times" wrote, in reviewing the 1929 production, that "Pinafore" was quintessentially Gilbertian in that the absurdities of a "paternal" Captain and the "ethics ... of all romanticism" are accepted "unflinchingly" and taken to their logical conclusion: "It is the reference to actuality that is essential; without it, the absurdity will not stand starkly out".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: A theme that pervades the opera is the treatment of love across different social ranks. In the previous Gilbert and Sullivan opera, "The Sorcerer", a love potion causes trouble by inducing the villagers and wedding guests to fall in love with people of different social classes. In "Pinafore", the captain's daughter, Josephine, loves and is loved by a common sailor, but she dutifully tells him, "your proffered love I haughtily reject". He expresses his devotion to her in a poetic and moving speech that ends with "I am a British sailor, and I love you". It finally turns out that he is of a higher rank than she. This is a parody of the Victorian "equality" drama, such as Lord Lytton's "The Lady of Lyons" (1838), where the heroine rejects a virtuous peasant who makes a similarly moving speech, ending with "I am a peasant!" It then turns out that he has become her social superior. Furthermore, in "Pinafore", Sir Joseph assures Josephine that "love levels all ranks". In Tom Taylor's "The Serf", the heroine again loves a worthy peasant who turns out to be of high rank, and she declares happily at the end that "love levels all". In a satire of the libertarian traditions of nautical melodrama, Sir Joseph tells the crew of the Pinafore that they are "any man's equal" (excepting his), and he writes a song for them that glorifies the British sailor. Conversely, he brings the proud captain down a notch by making him "dance a hornpipe on the cabin table". Jones notes that the union between Ralph and Josephine "becomes acceptable only through the absurd second-act revelation of Buttercup's inadvertent switching of the infants" and concludes that Gilbert is a "conservative satirist [who] ultimately advocated preserving the status quo ... [and] set out to show [that] love definitely "does not" level all ranks".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: There is a divide among Gilbert and Sullivan scholars as to whether Gilbert is, as Jones argues, a supporter of the status quo whose focus is merely to entertain or, on the other hand, predominantly to satirise and protest "against the follies of his age". The Gilbert scholar Andrew Crowther posits that this disagreement arises from Gilbert's "techniques of inversion – with irony and topsyturvydom", which lead to "the surface meaning of his writings" being "the opposite of their underlying meaning". Crowther argues that Gilbert desires to "celebrate" society's norms while, at the same time, satirising these conventions. In "Pinafore", which established many patterns for the later Savoy operas, Gilbert found a way to express his own conflict that "also had tremendous appeal to the general public". He creates "a highly intelligent parody of nautical melodrama ... [though] controlled by the conventions it mocks". While nautical melodrama exalts the common sailor, in "Pinafore" Gilbert makes the proponent of equality, Sir Joseph, a pompous and misguided member of the ruling class who, hypocritically, cannot apply the idea of equality to himself. The hero, Ralph, is convinced of his equality by Sir Joseph's foolish pronouncements and declares his love for his Captain's daughter, throwing over the accepted "fabric of social order". At this point, Crowther suggests, the logic of Gilbert's satiric argument should result in Ralph's arrest. But to satisfy convention, Gilbert creates an obvious absurdity: the captain and Ralph were switched as babies. By an "accident of birth", Ralph is suddenly an appropriate husband for Josephine, and both the social order and the desire for a romantic happy ending are satisfied at once. Crowther concludes, "We have an opera which uses all the conventions of melodrama and ridicules them; but in the end it is difficult to see which has won out, the conventions or the ridicule." Thus, "Pinafore" found broadbased success by appealing to the intellectual theatregoer seeking satire, the middle-class theatre-goer looking for a comfortable confirmation of the "existing social order" and the working-class audience who saw a satisfying melodramatic victory for the common man.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: According to musicologist Arthur Jacobs, Gilbert's plot "admirably sparked off Sullivan's genius". Sullivan embraces the nautical setting; in "We Sail the Ocean Blue", for example, he "presents his twist on a traditional sea shanty". In the Captain's opening song, "I am the Captain of the Pinafore", he admits that his gentlemanliness "never ... well, hardly ever" gives way to swearing at his men, and although he has experience at sea, he "hardly ever" suffers from seasickness. Sullivan "unerringly found the right musical setting for the key phrase 'What never?' ... cunningly sharpened ... through the chromatic touch on the bassoon." Audrey Williamson argued that the music of "Pinafore" is quintessentially English and free of European influences throughout most of the score, from the "glee" for Ralph, the Boatswain and the Carpenter, to "For He Is an Englishman".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The best-known songs from the opera include "I'm called Little Buttercup", a waltz tune introducing the character, which Sullivan repeats in the entr'acte and in the Act II finale to imprint the melody on the mind of the audience; and "A British tar" (a glee for three men describing the ideal sailor), composed by Sir Joseph "to encourage independent thought and action in the lower branches of the service, and to teach the principle that a British sailor is any man's equal, excepting mine". Sullivan's voicing advances the satiric lyric, which mocks the "equality" plays while underlining the hypocrisy of Sir Joseph. Another popular number is Sir Joseph's song "When I was a Lad", recounting the meteoric rise of his career, which bears similarities to that of W. H. Smith, the civilian news entrepreneur who had risen to the position of First Lord of the Admiralty in 1877.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In "Pinafore", Sullivan exploits minor keys for comic effect, for instance in "Kind Captain, I've important information". Further, he achieves a musical surprise when he uses the subdominant minor in "Sorry her lot". The musicologist Gervase Hughes was impressed with the introduction to the opening chorus which includes "a rousing nautical tune ... in a key of no nonsense, C major ... a modulation to the mediant minor, where to our surprise a plaintive oboe gives us the first verse of "Sorry her lot" in 2/4 [time]. After this closes on the local dominant B major the violins (still in 2/4) introduce us to Little Buttercup ... meeting her under these conditions one would hardly expect her to blossom out later as a queen of the waltz." He continues, "the bassoon and basses ... assert vigorously who is the Captain of the Pinafore ... in the improbable key of A flat minor. ... Buttercup makes a last despairing attempt to make herself heard in D flat minor, but the others have never known that such an outlandish key existed. So in a flash they all go back to C major on a good old 6/4".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: According to Jacobs, "Ralph, Captain Corcoran, Sir Joseph and Josephine all live in their interactive music (particularly 'Never mind the why and wherefore'), and almost as much musical resource is lavished on two characters parodied from opera or melodrama, Little Buttercup with 'gypsy blood in her veins' and the heavy-treading Dick Deadeye." Jacobs also opined that the leading tone that begins "Never mind the why and wherefore" "serves to emphasize the phrase like a Johann Strauss-ian grace-note". The Sullivan scholar David Russell Hulme noted Sullivan's parody of operatic styles, "particularly the Handelian recitatives and the elopement scene (evocative of so many nocturnal operatic conspiracies), but best of all is the travesty of the patriotic tune in 'For he is an Englishman!'" Buttercup's Act II song, in which she reveals the dark secret of the baby-switching is preceded by a quote from Franz Schubert's "Erlkönig" and also parodies the opera "Il trovatore". Jacobs notes that Sullivan also adds his own humorous touches to the music by setting commonplace expressions in "Donizettian recitative". But on the serious side, he enhances the moments of true emotional climax, as in Josephine's Act II aria, and added musical interest to concerted numbers by "subtly shifting the rhythms and bar groupings."


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: During rehearsals for the original production, Gilbert added a ballad for Captain Corcoran in which he urged his daughter to forget the common sailor with whom she is in love, because "at every step, he would commit solecisms that society would never pardon." The ballad was meant to be sung between No. 5 and No. 6 of the current score, but it was cut before opening night. The words survive in the libretto that was deposited with the Lord Chamberlain for licensing. Before 1999, all that was known to survive of Sullivan's setting was a copy of the leader violin part.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In April 1999, Sullivan scholars Bruce I. Miller and Helga J. Perry announced that they had discovered a nearly complete orchestration – lacking only the second violin part – in a private collection of early band parts. These materials, with a conjectural reconstruction of the partially lost vocal lines and second violin part, were later published and professionally recorded. This piece has now been performed a number of times by amateur and professional companies, although it has not become a standard addition to the traditional scores or recordings.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In the licensing copy of the libretto, Sir Joseph's cousin Hebe had lines of dialogue in several scenes in Act II. In the scene that follows No. 14 ("Things are seldom what they seem"), she accompanied Sir Joseph onstage and echoed the First Lord's dissatisfaction with Josephine. After several interruptions, Sir Joseph urged her to be quiet, eliciting the response "Crushed again!" Gilbert would later re-use this passage for Lady Jane in "Patience". Hebe was also assigned several lines of dialogue after No. 18 ("Carefully on tiptoe stealing") and again after No. 19 ("Farewell, my own").


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Late in rehearsals for the original production, Jessie Bond assumed the role of Hebe, replacing Mrs Howard Paul. Bond, who at this point in her career was known primarily as a concert singer and had little experience as an actress, did not feel capable of performing dialogue, and these passages were revised to cut Hebe's dialogue. Hebe's cut dialogue is occasionally restored in modern performances.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The dialogue preceding the Act II finale, starting with "Here, take her sir, and mind you treat her kindly", was originally recitative. The music for this passage was printed in the first edition of the vocal score as No. 20a. Shortly after opening night, the recitative was dropped, and the lines thereafter were performed as spoken dialogue. In modern productions, the recitative is occasionally restored in place of the dialogue.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: There have been numerous recordings of "Pinafore" since 1907. Ian Bradley counted seventeen recordings of the opera available on CD in 2005.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The 1930 recording is notable for preserving the performances of the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company stars of the era. The 1960 D'Oyly Carte recording, which contains all the dialogue, has been repeatedly praised by reviewers. The 1994 Mackerras recording, featuring grand opera singers in the principal roles, is musically well regarded. The 2000 D'Oyly Carte recording also contains complete dialogue and the first recording of the "lost" ballad for Captain Corcoran, "Reflect, my child", as a bonus track. A 1957 Danish-language recording of the opera is one of the few foreign-language professional recordings of Gilbert and Sullivan.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: In 1939, "Pinafore" was chosen by NBC as one of the earliest operas ever broadcast on American television, but no recording is known to have been saved. The 1973 D'Oyly Carte video recording, directed by Michael Heyland, features the company's staging of the period, but some reviewers find it dull. It is, however, one of only three video or film recordings of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. In 1982, Brent Walker Productions produced "Pinafore" as part of its series of Gilbert and Sullivan television films. According to discographer Marc Shepherd, the "Pinafore" video "is widely considered one of the worst" in the series. More recent professional productions have been recorded on video by the International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: "H.M.S. Pinafore" has been adapted many times. W. S. Gilbert wrote a 1909 children's book called "The Pinafore Picture Book", illustrated by Alice Woodward, which retells the story of "Pinafore", giving considerable backstory details not found in the libretto. Many other children's books have since been written retelling the story of "Pinafore" or adapting characters or events from "Pinafore".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Many musical theatre adaptations have been produced since the original opera. Notable examples include a 1945 Broadway musical adapted by George S. Kaufman, called "Hollywood Pinafore", using Sullivan's music. This was revived several times, including in London in 1998. Another 1945 Broadway musical adaptation, "Memphis Bound", was written by Don Walker and starred Bill Robinson and an all-black cast. In 1940, the American Negro Light Opera Association produced the first of several productions set in the Caribbean Sea, "Tropical Pinafore". An early Yiddish adaptation of "Pinafore", called "Der Shirtz" (Yiddish for "apron") was written by Miriam Walowit in 1949 for a Brooklyn Hadassah group; they toured the adaptation, and they recorded 12 of the songs. In the 1970s, Al Grand was inspired by this recording and urged the Gilbert and Sullivan Long Island Light Opera Company to perform these songs. He later translated the missing songs and dialogue, with Bob Tartell, and the show has been toured widely under the name "Der Yiddisher Pinafore". The group have continued to produce this adaptation for over two decades, in which "He is an Englishman" becomes "Er Iz a Guter Yid" ("He is a good Jew").


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Essgee Entertainment produced an adapted version of "Pinafore" in 1997 in Australia and New Zealand that has been much revived. Another musical adaptation is "Pinafore! (A Saucy, Sexy, Ship-Shape New Musical)", adapted by Mark Savage. It was first performed at the Celebration Theater in Los Angeles on 7 September 2001, directed by Savage, where it ran with great success for nine months. It then played in Chicago and New York in 2003. In this adaptation, only one character is female, and all but one of the male characters are gay. An original cast recording was issued in 2002 by Belva Records. "Pinafore Swing" is a musical with music arranged by Sarah Travis. It premiered at the Watermill Theatre in England in 2004 in a production directed by John Doyle. The adaptation, set in 1944, changes the characters into members of a band entertaining the sailors on a World War II troop ship in the Atlantic. The reduced-size acting cast also serve as the orchestra for the singing roles, and the music is infused with swing rhythms. Numerous productions in recent decades have been set to parody "Star Trek" or "Star Wars".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Among its other influences on popular culture, "Pinafore" had perhaps its most profound influence on the development of musical theatre. According to theatre historian John Kenrick, "Pinafore" "became an international sensation, reshaping the commercial theater in both England and the United States." The music writer Andrew Lamb notes, "The success of "H.M.S. Pinafore" in 1879 established British comic opera alongside French opéra bouffe throughout the English-speaking world". The historian John Bush Jones opines that "Pinafore" and the other Savoy operas demonstrate that musical theatre "can address contemporary social and political issues without sacrificing entertainment value" and that "Pinafore" created the model for a new kind of musical theatre, the "integrated" musical, where "book, lyrics, and music combined to form an integral whole". He adds that its "unprecedented ... popularity fostered an American audience for musical theatre, while the show itself became a model for form, content, and even intention of ... musicals ever since, especially socially relevant musicals." Its popularity also led to the musical theatre adaptations of "Pinafore" described above, musicals in which the story line involves a production of "Pinafore" and other musicals that parody the opera or that use or adapt its music. The first such parody was a short-lived burlesque presented at the Opera Comique in 1882, called "The Wreck of the Pinafore" by William Horace Lingard and Luscombe Searelle; the opera's characters are shipwrecked on a desert island. It was described by "The Era" as "chiefly remarkable for its impudence".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The opera's popularity has led to the widespread parody and pastiche of its songs in comedy routines, literature and other media. Many comedians have used "Pinafore" songs for comic and satiric effect. For example, in his comedy album "My Son, the Celebrity", Allan Sherman parodies "When I Was a Lad" from the point of view of a young man who goes to an Ivy League school and then rises to prominence in business. At the end of the song, he "thanks old Yale", "thanks the Lord" and thanks his father, "who is chairman of the board". Literary references to "Pinafore" songs include Harris's attempt to sing "When I Was a Lad" in Jerome K. Jerome's "Three Men in a Boat". Another is found in the story "Runaround" from "I, Robot" by Isaac Asimov, where a robot sings part of "I'm Called Little Buttercup". "Pinafore" and its songs have been performed by rock musicians such as Todd Rundgren, Taj Mahal and Michele Gray Rundgren, who performed "Never Mind the Why and Wherefore" on "Night Music" ("Sunday Night") in 1989.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Political references include a 1996 satiric pastiche of "When I Was a Lad" aimed at Tony Blair by Virginia Bottomley, heritage secretary under John Major. Sporting references include a racehorse named "H.M.S. Pinafore". "Pinafore" songs and images have been used extensively in advertising. According to Jones, ""Pinafore" launched the first media blitz in the United States" beginning in 1879, and recent ads include a television campaign for Terry's Chocolate Orange featuring a pastiche of "When I Was a Lad". "Pinafore"-themed merchandise includes trading cards that were created in the 1880s.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Songs from "Pinafore" have been used to give period flavor to such films as the 1981 historical film "Chariots of Fire", in which the protagonist, Harold Abrahams, and others from Cambridge University, sing "He Is an Englishman". This song also features at the end of the 1983 BBC drama "An Englishman Abroad". In the 2003 movie "Peter Pan", the Darling family sings "When I Was a Lad". In "Wyatt Earp" (1994), the famed lawman meets his future wife when he sees her playing in an early production of "Pinafore". A 1953 biopic, "The Story of Gilbert and Sullivan", uses music from "Pinafore".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Characters also sing songs from "Pinafore" in such popular films as "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981) and "" (1998), where Captain Picard and Lt. Commander Worf sing part of "A British Tar" to distract a malfunctioning Lt. Commander Data. "The Good Shepherd" (2006) depicts an all-male version of "Pinafore" at Yale University in 1939; Matt Damons character plays Little Buttercup, singing in falsetto. Judy Garland sings "I Am the Monarch of the Sea" in the 1963 film, "I Could Go On Singing". The soundtrack of the 1992 thriller "The Hand that Rocks the Cradle" prominently features songs and music from "Pinafore", and the father and daughter characters sing "I Am the Captain of the Pinafore" together. An example of a film based on ideas from "Pinafore" is the 1976 animated film by Ronald Searle called "Dick Deadeye, or Duty Done" is based on the character and songs from "Pinafore". In the 1988 drama "Permanent Record", a high school class performs "Pinafore".


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: Television series that include substantial "Pinafore" references include "The West Wing", for example in the 2000 episode "And It's Surely to Their Credit", where "He Is an Englishman" is used throughout and quoted (or paraphrased) in the episode's title. Among other notable examples of the use of songs from "Pinafore" on television are several popular animated shows. In the "Cape Feare" episode of "The Simpsons", Bart stalls his would-be killer Sideshow Bob with a "final request" that Bob sing him the entire score of "Pinafore". Similarly, the 1993 "HMS Yakko" episode of "Animaniacs" consists of pastiches of songs from "H.M.S. Pinafore" and "The Pirates of Penzance". In a "Family Guy" episode, "The Thin White Line" (2001), Stewie sings a pastiche of "My Gallant Crew". Stewie also sings "I Am the Monarch of the Sea" (including the ladies' part, in falsetto) in "". A 1986 "Mr. Belvedere" episode, "The Play", concerns a production of "H.M.S. Pinafore", and several of the songs are performed. In 1955, NBC broadcast a variety special including a 20-minute compressed jazz version, "H.M.S. Pinafore in Jazz", produced and directed by Max Liebman, starring Perry Como, Buddy Hackett, Kitty Kallen, Bill Hayes, Pat Carroll and Herb Shriner.


title: H.M.S. Pinafore

text: The following tables show the most prominent cast members of significant D'Oyly Carte Opera Company productions and tours at various times through to the company's 1982 closure:


title: Tiger Memon

text: Ibrahim Mushtaq Abdul Razzaq Memon (born 24 November 1960), better known by the nickname Tiger Memon, is a gangster and terrorist, reputed to be one of the masterminds behind the 1993 Mumbai bombings. He is wanted by Interpol and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). He is a former member of D-Company, a gang led by Dawood Ibrahim. He got the nickname "Tiger" after helping a petty drugs and weapons smuggler to evade the crime branch of Mumbai Police by driving his car recklessly over 100 km/h on one-way roads.


title: Tiger Memon

text: He has been sanctioned under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act in the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List by the United States Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control.


title: Tiger Memon

text: Memon's role as the prime accused in the blasts was confirmed by a Special Court set up under the terms of the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act after the conviction of the others accused in the case.


title: Tiger Memon

text: On 15 September 2014, the special TADA court, hearing the long-drawn-out case around the 1993 Bombay bombings, convicted four members of the Memon family: Yakub, Essa, Rubina and Yusuf. Three other members of the family—Suleiman, Hanifa and Rahil—were acquitted because the judge gave them benefit of doubt. The four convicted Memons have been held guilty on charges of conspiring and abetting acts of terror. They face jail terms ranging from a minimum of five years to life imprisonment. Yakub Memon, the younger brother of prime accused Tiger Memon, had been charged for possession of unauthorised arms and was executed by hanging on 30 July 2015 in Nagpur jail.


title: Tiger Memon

text: On 26 June 2020, his other brother Yusuf Memon died while imprisoned at the Nashik Central Jail. , Memon is still at large; one of his addresses is listed in Karachi by the US Treasury, where Dawood Ibrahim is also based.


title: Tiger Memon

text: The activities of Tiger Memon were a major part of Anurag Kashyap's film "Black Friday" (2004), which is based on the book of Hussain Zaidi named "" about the 1993 Bombay Bombings. Memon was played by Bollywood actor Pavan Malhotra.


title: Alan Cox (actor)

text: Alan Douglas Cox (born 6 August 1970) is an English actor. He is perhaps most widely known for portraying a teenage Dr. Watson in Barry Levinson's production "Young Sherlock Holmes" (1985).


title: Alan Cox (actor)

text: Cox was born in Westminster, London, and is the son of Scottish Emmy Award-winning actor Brian Cox and his first wife, actress Caroline Burt. Cox was educated at St Paul's School in London. He has a sister, Margaret, and two half brothers Orson Jonathan Cox and Torin Kamran Cox.


title: Alan Cox (actor)

text: Cox portrayed the young John Mortimer the 1982 TV adaptation of his play "A Voyage Round My Father", starring opposite Laurence Olivier. He is probably most widely known for his role in "Young Sherlock Holmes" (1985), where he played a teenage version of Dr. Watson. Other films include "An Awfully Big Adventure" (1995), "Mrs. Dalloway" (1997), and "The Auteur Theory" (1999). In 2011, Cox also co-starred as a nudist named Cory Beck in the independent comedy "Act Naturally".


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: Dirofilaria immitis, also known as heartworm or dog heartworm, is a parasitic roundworm that is a type of filarial worm, a small thread-like worm, that causes dirofilariasis. It is spread from host to host through the bites of mosquitoes. There are four genera of mosquitoes that transmit dirofilariasis, "Aedes", "Culex", "Anopheles", and "Mansonia". The definitive host is the dog, but it can also infect cats, wolves, coyotes, jackals, foxes, ferrets, bears, seals, sea lions and, under rare circumstances, humans.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: Adult heartworms often reside in the pulmonary arterial system (lung arteries) as well as the heart, and a major health effect in the infected animal host is a manifestation of damage to its lung vessels and tissues. In cases involving advanced worm infestation, adult heartworms may migrate to the right heart and the pulmonary artery. Heartworm infection may result in serious complications for the infected host if left untreated, eventually leading to death, most often as a result of secondary congestive heart failure.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: Although at one time confined to the southern United States, heartworm has now spread to nearly all locations where its mosquito vector is found. In the southeast region of the United States, veterinary clinics saw an average of more than 100 cases of heartworm each in 2016. Transmission of the parasite occurs in all of the United States (cases have even been reported in Alaska), and the warmer regions of Canada. The highest infection rates are found within 150 miles of the coast from Texas to New Jersey, and along the Mississippi River and its major tributaries. It has also been found in South America, southern Europe, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Australia, Korea, and Japan.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: Heartworms go through several life stages before they become adults infecting the pulmonary artery of the host animal. The worms require the mosquito as an intermediate host to complete their lifecycles. The rate of development in the mosquito is temperature-dependent, requiring about two weeks of temperature at or above 27 °C (80 °F). Below a threshold temperature of 14 °C (57 °F), development cannot occur, and the cycle is halted. As a result, transmission is limited to warm weather, and duration of the transmission season varies geographically. The period between the initial infection when the dog is bitten by a mosquito and the maturation of the worms into adults living in the pulmonary arteries takes six to seven months in dogs and is known as the "prepatent period".


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: The first larval stage (L) and second larval stage (L) of heartworm development occurs within the body of a mosquito. Once the larvae develop into the infective third larval stage (L), the mosquito locates and bites a host, depositing the larvae under the skin at the site of the bite. After a week or two of further growth, they molt into the fourth larval stage (L) . Then, they migrate to the muscles of the chest and abdomen, and 45 to 60 days after infection, molt to the fifth stage (L, immature adult). Between 75 and 120 days after infection, these immature heartworms then enter the bloodstream and are carried through the heart to reside in the pulmonary artery. Over the next three to four months, they increase greatly in size. The female adult worm is about 30 cm in length, and the male is about 23 cm, with a coiled tail. By seven months after infection, the adult worms have mated and the females begin giving birth to live young, called microfilariae. Heartworms can live for 5 to 7 years in a dog.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: The microfilariae circulate in the bloodstream for as long as two years, and are ingested by bloodsucking mosquitos, where development occurs and the cycle repeats.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: Dogs show no indication of heartworm infection during the six-month prepatent period prior to the worms' maturation, and current diagnostic tests for the presence of microfilariae or antigens cannot detect prepatent infections. Rarely, migrating heartworm larvae get "lost" and end up in aberrant sites, such as the eye, brain, or an artery in the leg, which results in unusual symptoms such as blindness, seizures, and lameness, but normally, until the larvae mature and congregate inside the heart, they produce no symptoms or signs of illness.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: Many dogs show little or no sign of infection even after the worms become adults. These animals usually have only a light infection and live a fairly sedentary lifestyle. However, active dogs and those with heavier infections may show the classic signs of heartworm disease. Early signs include a cough, especially during or after exercise, and exercise intolerance. In the most advanced cases where many adult worms have built up in the heart without treatment, signs progress to severe weight loss, fainting, coughing up blood, and finally, congestive heart failure.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: "Wolbachia pipientis" is an intracellular bacterium that is an endosymbiont of "D. immitis". All heartworms are thought to be infected with "Wolbachia" to some degree. The inflammation occurring at the die-off of adult heartworms or larvae is in part due to the release of "Wolbachia" bacteria or protein into the tissues. This may be particularly significant in cats, in which the disease seems to be more related to larval death than living adult heartworms. Treating heartworm-positive animals with an antibiotic such as doxycycline to remove "Wolbachia" may prove to be beneficial, but further studies are necessary.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: A blood sample is collected and viewed under the microscope. The direct smear technique allows examination of larval motion, confirming the presence of microfilaria. It also helps in the distinction of "D. immitis" from "Acanthocheilonema reconditum". This distinction is important because the presence of the latter parasite does not pose a health risk to the host. "D. immitis" usually has stationary body movement, while "A. reconditum" has progressive movement. However, this method often misses light infections because only a small amount of blood sample is used.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: This method uses a microhematocrit (or capillary tube) filled with a blood sample that has been centrifuged, separating the plasma from the red blood cells. These layers are divided by the buffy coat. The buffy coat consists of the leukocytes and platelets that are in the sample. The tube is snapped at the buffy coat and added to a slide for microscopic examination. Adding methylene blue stain to the sample may allow greater visibility of any microfilariae. However, the hematocrit tube method will not allow for species differentiation.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: The modified Knott's test is more sensitive because it concentrates microfilariae, improving the chance of diagnosis. A blood sample is mixed with 2% formalin and centrifuged in a tube. The supernatant is removed and methylene blue stain is added to the pellet remaining in the tube for microscopic examination. It allows microfilariae species differentiation based on morphology. Microfilariae can be differentiated between "D. immitis" and "Acanthocheilonema reconditum" because of small differences in morphology. The Modified Knott's test is the best method of visual examination when determining presence of microfilaria because it preserves their morphology and size. It is easy to perform, quick, and inexpensive.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: The potential for a microfilaremic infection is 5 – 67%. The number of circulating microfilariae does not correlate with the number of adult heartworms, so is not an indicator of disease severity.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: In most practices, antigen testing has supplanted or supplemented microfilarial detection. Combining the microfilaria and adult antigen test is most useful in dogs receiving diethylcarbamazine or no preventive (macrolides like ivermectin or moxidectin typically render the dog amicrofilaremic). Up to 1% of infected dogs are microfilaria-positive and antigen-negative. Immunodiagnostics (ELISA, lateral flow immunoassay, rapid immunomigration techniques) to detect heartworm antigen in the host's blood are now regularly used. They can detect occult infections, or infections without the presence of circulating microfilariae. However, these tests are limited in that they only detect the antigens released from the sexually mature female worm's reproductive tract. Therefore, false-negative results may occur during the first five to eight months of infection when the worms are not yet sexually mature. The specificity of these tests is close to 100%, and the sensitivity is more than 80%. A recent study demonstrated a sensitivity of only 64% for infections of only one female worm, but improved with increasing female worm burden (85%, 88%, and 89% for two, three, and four female worms, respectively). Specificity in this study was 97%. False-negative test results can be due to low worm counts, immature infections, and all-male infections.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: X-rays are used to evaluate the severity of the heartworm infection and develop a prognosis for the animal. Typically, the changes observed are enlargement of the main pulmonary artery, the right side of the heart, and the pulmonary arteries in the lobes of the lung. Inflammation of the lung tissue is also often observed.


title: Dirofilaria immitis

text: If an animal is diagnosed with heartworms, treatment may be indicated. Before the worms can be treated, however, the dog's heart, liver, and kidney function must be evaluated to determine the risks of treatment. Usually, the adult worms are killed with an arsenic-based compound. The currently approved drug in the US, melarsomine, is marketed under the brand name Immiticide. It has a greater efficacy and fewer side effects than the previously used drug thiacetarsamide, sold as Caparsolate, which makes it a safer alternative for dogs with late-stage infections.