G&S 'Pirates' Combines Physical, Verbal Derring-Do

Any production of Gilbert and Sullivan has, perhaps, fewer grades of success than other forms of performance. It works or it fails to, and if it fails, the degree to which it does doesn't really matter: however much, we're annoyed, or just bored. Within this genre, a successful show is immediately apparent, and within this model, "The Pirates of Penzance"--as produced by the Harvard-Radcliffe Gilbert & Sullivan players--is a triumphant success. The audience is entertained before it has a chance to be anything else: the orchestra is in tune, the actors are loud, clear and funny, the colors are as motley as a fruit market.

The production's success begins, as one would expect, with Catherine Ingman's stage direction. A constant, careful and oftentimes outrageous choreography of cast members supplements the humor of the script. Sir William Schwenck Gilbert's wit is very much couched in wordplay and innuendo, and Ingman creates--in effeminate prancing, mock-stealthy stalking and slapstick combat--a physical counterpart to the clever turns of phrases. While such physical comedy can compromise itself with too much zeal or too little precision, this seldom happens. The actors seem to understand the appropriate bounds for their movements and the script is never upstaged.

The perennial ill of campus musicals, a singing voice too weak or too sour to carry, doesn't show its face here at all. Andrew Burlinson as Frederic, the Pirate Apprentice, projects with a sweet clarity, and Sarah Cullins as Mabel, his romantic counterpart and the General's daughter, banters back with coy and subtle bravura of her own. And if Adam Smith as the Major-General Stanley is outshined a little vocally, he more than compensates with his bizarre--but somehow nonetheless appropriate--Major-General gyrations.

All the secondary players can sing; there are very few flat notes on little side solos, and the moments of all-cast a cappella are worthy of--dare we say it--Memorial Church. All this is atop an orchestra which, despite an occasionally over-zealous snare, disappears from consciousness after the overture as the best pit orchestras know to do.

The sets, designed by Peter Miller of Hasty Pudding fame, create an illusion of more depth than the petite Agassiz has to offer and match the performers' intensity with one of color, as do the vivid costumes by Carrie Benes and Sara Smith. Even the lighting plays an active role in the scenes--sometimes overactive, such that the first act, which takes place in less than a day, seems to see more than one sunrise.

This production marks the 40th anniversary of the Harvard-Radcliffe Gilbert & Sullivan players, and perhaps it is the collective club excitement that the polish of the show exudes. Down to the details of a sharp poster and a clever program which imitates the style of the operetta's 1879 debut, "The Pirates of Penzance" demonstrates a real love on the part of the participants. It's musical theater that does what it's supposed to: entertainment which immediately, and without cessation, entertains.