Music: Arthur Sullivan
Words: William Schwenck Gilbert
Director: Jo Davies, revived James Hurley
Conductor: Anthony Kraus
Given the task of reviving one of Opera North’s great recent successes, James Hurley takes up the challenge with imaginative gusto, not merely echoing Jo Davies’ moves. The result is a wildly entertaining show, unburdened by any hint of D’Oyly Cartery, played at a frantic pace when required, Anthony Kraus performing miracles in keeping stage and pit together.
Ruddigore, of course, is the one where melodrama is hung out to dry. Rose Maybud is an innocent village girl, living her life by a book of etiquette, and devoted to young Robin Oakapple, tongue-tied suitor. Also in the village are Dame Hannah and Mad Margaret, one committed to lifelong spinsterhood, the other homicidally lunatic, both for the loss of the last two baronets of Ruddigore. Along comes Robin’s foster-brother Richard Dauntless who, in the best tradition of Gilbertian seafarers, likes nothing better than to dance a hornpipe and impress the ladies. Still Rose prefers Robin (his spacious farm making the difference) before Richard seizes the opportunity of betraying his foster-brother’s secret: he is Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, Bad Baronet of Ruddigore.
It’s at this point that the previously nonsensical story lurches into crazy comic melodrama. The baronets of Ruddigore operate under a curse: they must commit at least one crime a day. Sir Despard, Sir Ruthven’s younger brother, abandons his moustache-twirling bad baronetcy to become a thoroughly decent person and Robin/Sir Ruthven takes his place. In the second act, played in a much fuller version than in later D’Oyly Carte years, the famous pictures-coming-to-life scene sees Sir Ruthven enduring indescribable pains at the hands of Sir Roderic and his cronies, all old romances returned to and a final inspiration: if a baronet refuses to do his dirty deed, that is tantamount to suicide and suicide is (or was in 1887) a crime, so all the baronets are still alive!
Jo Davies set the opera in the 1920s, a good time for melodrama – we even have a silent film during the overture. Hurley’s attention to detail is incredible, from the intricate synchronised moves to the individual characters of the bad baronets past emerging from their picture frames. Equally his taste for the grotesque emerges in such things as the absurd dances for Sir Despard and Margaret, in their new roles ruling a national school. Above all the cumulative energy of the production sweeps the audience along.
Dominic Sedgwick is a blandly innocent Robin: part of the appeal of Ruddigore is the way Gilbert subverts conventional norms, the innocence of Robin hiding his dark secret as a bad baronet, just as the innocence of Rose Maybud hides her willingness to do the best marriage deal she can. When forced to become Sir Ruthven, Sedgwick twirls his cape with comic ineptitude, adds a verse about Liz Truss and Keir Starmer to his list of crimes to be done, cowers before his ancestors and (just) negotiates the terrors of the ultimate patter song, My Eyes are Fully Open (with Sir Despard and Rose).
John Savournin radiates confidence as Sir Despard, both as bad baronet and reformed giver of penny readings and adopts every kind of posture in his blameless dances and also in his front-cloth routine with Xavier Hetherington’s irrepressible Dick Dauntless, interspersing Gilbert’s version of Navy slang with the odd hornpipe or two. Sir Despard’s Act 2 partner is the gloriously over the top Mad Margaret of Helen Evora, only controlled by the repetition of “Basingstoke”.
Amy Freston’s line in deadpan humour as Rose is as impressive as her witty and graceful movement and Claire Pascoe comes into her own as Dame Hannah in Act 2 with her big number, There Grew a Little Flower, plus some unsuspected powers to terrify. Sullivan reputedly went against Gilbert’s intentions in setting When the Night Wind Howls and the attendant music for the ghosts in solemn style – and here it is given with all the trappings of real melodrama, with Steven Page’s Sir Roderic, for all the world looking like Field Marshal Haig, oozing authority.
At last Dick Dauntless, thwarted of Rose, settles on chief bridesmaid Zorah (Gillene Butterfield), leaving old Adam Goodheart, Robin/Sir Ruthven’s valet de cham (Henry Waddington as luxury casting) to have the final solitary laugh.
This is a production which reveals Ruddigore as Gilbert and Sullivan at their best – and probably the only Savoy opera where the female chorus (a manically singing and dancing group of professional bridesmaids) can have as much fun as the male!
Runs until 2nd November 2024 before touring.
