Talk:Savoy opera

message: The prior edit defined "Savoy Opera" as:
:The Savoy Operas are a series of comic operas or operettas written by Gilbert and Sullivan. Strictly speaking, the term refers only to those whose first run or part thereof occurred at the Savoy Theatre in London (those from Patience onwards); in practice, the term is used more generally to refer to all the operas written by librettist W. S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan, and produced by Richard D'Oyly Carte.
I don't think there's any historical basis for the rather pedantic idea that, "strictly speaking," Savoy Opera includes only those operas whose first run was entirely, or in part, at the Savoy. Moreover, at the time they were being written, "Savoy Opera" referred to a style, of which G&S were the pre-eminent, but not exclusive, practitioners. The contemporary press, of course, could not have guessed that all of those other works would pass into near-oblivion, leaving the G&S pieces to stand alone for a genre that originally included far more.
The revised definition, I hope, captures the idea more accurately. Marc Shepherd 16:27, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Revised definition

message: Through my recent research, the last opera to play at the Savoy was not Two Merry Monarchs, but a very brief production of Orpheus and Eurydice by Gluck. After that, the house was pretty empty until the December 1919 season. Should this be added to the list? It wasn't written for the Savoy, so maybe not. What do you think? Slfarrell (talk) 13:52, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It's pretty tough to argue that Orpheus and Eurydice is a Savoy opera. It was written 200 years earlier in a completely different style. I think what we're trying to list here is "Savoy operas," not "operas that played at the Savoy." Marc Shepherd (talk) 14:05, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That's what I was thinking, and precisely why I didn't just put it in. From J.P. Wearing's "The London Stage, 1910-1919: A Calendar of Players and Plays", it opened April 12 1910 (while Two Merry Monarchs transferred to the Strand Theatre) and played for 23 performances until June 17. It was very intermittent, with none of the Savoy stars, just Marie Brema and Viola Tree in the title roles. Workman managed it, there was obviously a chorus but no male characters, and that was it. The Savoy shut down and no G&S in London during the 1910s. Is this significant enough? Slfarrell (talk) 00:07, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

text: It's Volume 1, page 24. Wearing says nothing about anything. Baily says that no G&S was played in the West End during the decade, probably owing to the Great War and no one to run the company until Rupert was ready. Slfarrell (talk) 14:30, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

text: It might have played other pieces. I'm not about to go through the book (which is quite long) to search for something that isn't there. On page 432 of Baily's book, he says the Rupert was renting the Prince's Theatre in the West End for the upcoming revivals of the 1920s. This probably isn't the Savoy - wouldn't it be called the Savoy if that were the case? - but it says nothing about what the Savoy house is doing during the war years. Slfarrell (talk) 14:22, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

text: In my research, I discovered that the Savoy *was* occupied between 1911-1919. Hayden Coffin was Feste in a production of Twelfth Night and it opened at the Savoy in November 1912. But that's the only one I found. I didn't look for others. Slfarrell (talk) 14:54, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

text: I have. It's in Coffin's biography, in the appendix, pg. 274. He gives facsimilies of programmes, so all his roles are credited. No G&S, I'm afraid, though he did audition for the Savoy. Slfarrell (talk) 19:48, 29 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  The last Savoy productions