The Story of Gilbert and Sullivan
Encyclopedia
The Story of Gilbert and Sullivan is a 1953 British technicolor
film that dramatises the story of the collaboration between W. S. Gilbert
and Arthur Sullivan
. Gilbert and Sullivan
authored 14 comic opera
s, later referred to as the Savoy Operas, which became the most popular series of musical entertainments of the Victorian era
and are still popular today. The film was written by Leslie Baily, Sidney Gilliat
and Vincent Korda, based on Baily's The Gilbert and Sullivan Book. It was directed by Sidney Gilliat, with cinematography by Christopher Challis
and production design by Hein Heckroth
. It was produced by Gilliat and Frank Launder
for Alexander Korda
, head of London Film Productions and was produced in time to mark the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.
, the movie also depicts many of the people who performed in the original runs of the operas and includes extensive musical excerpts from the works, staged with the assistance of Martyn Green
, who advised on the performance practices of the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company
. The film is similar in style to other popular biopics of the era, such as The Great Caruso
and takes considerable dramatic licence with factual details and moves events in time. For example, the opening night of Iolanthe
is depicted as being the opening of the Savoy Theatre
, whereas the Savoy Theatre actually opened earlier, during the run of Patience
. The music in the film is played by the London Symphony Orchestra
, conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent.
The film starred Robert Morley
as W. S. Gilbert, Maurice Evans
as Arthur Sullivan, Peter Finch
as Richard D'Oyly Carte, Eileen Herlie
as Helen Carte and Martyn Green as George Grossmith
. Appearances were also made by Dinah Sheridan
as Grace Marston, Wilfrid Hyde-White
as Mr. Marston, Leonard Sachs
as Smythe, Owen Brannigan
as the company's principal heavy baritone
, Thomas Round
as the company's principal tenor
, Isabel Dean as Mrs. Gilbert, Arthur Howard
as the Usher in Trial by Jury
, and Michael Ripper
as Louis.
The Prodigal Son
, but he is pleased by the acclaim that he receives for the music to the short comic opera
Trial by Jury
, a collaboration with dramatist W. S. Gilbert. Grace leaves him, telling him that he is wasting his musical gifts on triviality, foreshadowing criticism from the musical establishment that will follow Sullivan for the rest of his career.
Still wrestling with this dilemma, Sullivan joins Gilbert and the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte
in a partnership to create more light operas. Their subsequent operas, The Sorcerer
and, especially, H.M.S. Pinafore
, become so popular that they are pirated extensively in America. The entire company goes on tour there so that the partnership can profit from their fame in the new world. The Pirates of Penzance
premieres in New York to much acclaim, and Carte soon builds a new theatre in London to present the partnership's operas. Everyone is delighted.
The Savoy Theatre opens with the opening night of Iolanthe
. Sullivan revels in the atmosphere of the premiere, while Gilbert, as usual, is nervous and apprehensive. At the opening, Carte demonstrates the safety of the theatre's innovative electric lighting. Sullivan conducts the performance, but Gilbert escapes the theatre to walk the streets, returning just in time to take a triumphant curtain call before the enthusiastic crowd. Nevertheless, Sullivan is unhappy writing comic opera.
When Gilbert proposes a new piece involving the device of a magic lozenge, Sullivan objects that he wants to devote himself to serious music. Sullivan's friend, critic Joseph Bennett
, writes a libretto for a cantata based on Longfellow
's The Golden Legend. Meanwhile, Gilbert, inspired by the sight of a Japanese sword hanging in his study, proposes a new plot, and Sullivan begins work. When Bennett goes to see Sullivan, he finds that The Mikado
is being rehearsed instead of his cantata. He informs Sullivan that, if he would get around to finishing The Golden Legend, Queen Victoria will attend the premiere. Likewise, when Gilbert calls on Sullivan, he sees him rehearsing The Golden Legend, as Bennett stands watch. When Bennett dozes off, Sullivan turns back to The Mikado. After both works debut, Sullivan is knighted. The Queen inquires if he will write a grand opera
.
Just before the premiere of their next opera, Ruddigore
, Sullivan asks Gilbert to write the libretto for his first grand opera. Gilbert declines, stating that in such a work the words play second fiddle to the music, and Sullivan is angered saying that he has always had to hold the music back so that the words could predominate, and that he no longer takes pleasure in writing comic operas. Ruddigore receives negative reviews and some negative audience response. Although the piece is eventually a financial success, author and composer remain at odds. Mrs. Helen Carte travels to Monte Carlo
to see Sullivan on holiday. She gives him the news that her husband will build another theatre to present grand opera, and wants Sullivan to compose an opera for the theatre. Sullivan happily agrees, but at the same time, Gilbert has written a libretto for another comic opera. Sullivan also accepts this libretto, and The Gondoliers
is another hit.
Gilbert, suffering from gout, and in a particularly foul temper, examines the financial accounts of the partnership, seeing a large item for the purchase of a new carpet at the Savoy Theatre. He confronts Carte, at the new theatre, over lavish expenses. He also quarrels with Sullivan, and Gilbert announces that he will write no more Savoy operas. Sullivan's grand opera Ivanhoe
debuts, and he presents a bound volume to the Queen. She commands a private performance at Windsor Castle
but astonishes Sullivan by choosing to hear The Gondoliers. Apart from Gilbert, Sullivan comes to realise that his true gifts lie with light music.
Richard and Helen Carte toast the arrival of the twentieth century, hoping for a revival of the Gilbert and Sullivan partnership. Stopping by at a rehearsal for a revival of The Yeomen of the Guard
, Gilbert runs into Sullivan, after having been apart for years. Sullivan is ill and using a wheelchair. The two men make up and propose taking a curtain call together with Carte, all three of them in wheelchairs. During the performance, however, news arrives of Sullivan's death. Some years later, Gilbert is finally knighted.
The following additional singing voices were heard on the soundtrack: Elsie Morison
, Marjorie Thomas
, Owen Brannigan
, Harold Williams
, Muriel Brunskill
and Jennifer Vyvyan
.
Technicolor
Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
film that dramatises the story of the collaboration between W. S. Gilbert
W. S. Gilbert
Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
and Arthur Sullivan
Arthur Sullivan
Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
. Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the librettist W. S. Gilbert and the composer Arthur Sullivan . The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S...
authored 14 comic opera
Comic opera
Comic opera denotes a sung dramatic work of a light or comic nature, usually with a happy ending.Forms of comic opera first developed in late 17th-century Italy. By the 1730s, a new operatic genre, opera buffa, emerged as an alternative to opera seria...
s, later referred to as the Savoy Operas, which became the most popular series of musical entertainments of the Victorian era
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
and are still popular today. The film was written by Leslie Baily, Sidney Gilliat
Sidney Gilliat
Sidney Gilliat was an English film director, producer and writer.He was born in the district of Edgeley in Stockport, Cheshire. In the 1930s he worked as a scriptwriter, most notably with Frank Launder on The Lady Vanishes for Alfred Hitchcock, and its sequel Night Train to Munich , directed by...
and Vincent Korda, based on Baily's The Gilbert and Sullivan Book. It was directed by Sidney Gilliat, with cinematography by Christopher Challis
Christopher Challis
Christopher Challis BSC, FRPS is a British cinematographer who has worked on more than 70 feature films since starting in the industry in the 1940s....
and production design by Hein Heckroth
Hein Heckroth
German art director Hein Heckroth began his career working with the German national ballet...
. It was produced by Gilliat and Frank Launder
Frank Launder
Frank Launder was an English writer, director and producer, who made more than 40 films, many of them in collaboration with Sidney Gilliat....
for Alexander Korda
Alexander Korda
Sir Alexander Korda was a Hungarian-born British producer and film director. He was a leading figure in the British film industry, the founder of London Films and the owner of British Lion Films, a film distributing company.-Life and career:The elder brother of filmmakers Zoltán Korda and Vincent...
, head of London Film Productions and was produced in time to mark the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.
Description
In addition to describing the ups and downs of the partnership between Gilbert and Sullivan, and their relationships with their producer, Richard D'Oyly CarteRichard D'Oyly Carte
Richard D'Oyly Carte was an English talent agent, theatrical impresario, composer and hotelier during the latter half of the Victorian era...
, the movie also depicts many of the people who performed in the original runs of the operas and includes extensive musical excerpts from the works, staged with the assistance of Martyn Green
Martyn Green
William Martyn-Green , better known as Martyn Green, was an English actor and singer. He is best known for his work as principal comedian in the Gilbert & Sullivan comic operas, which he performed and recorded with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and other troupes.After army service in World War I,...
, who advised on the performance practices of the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company
D'Oyly Carte Opera Company
The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company was a professional light opera company that staged Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy operas. The company performed nearly year-round in the UK and sometimes toured in Europe, North America and elsewhere, from the 1870s until it closed in 1982. It was revived in 1988 and...
. The film is similar in style to other popular biopics of the era, such as The Great Caruso
The Great Caruso
The Great Caruso is a 1951 biographical film made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Joe Pasternak with Jesse L. Lasky as associate producer from a screenplay by Sonya Levien and William Ludwig. The original music was by Johnny Green and the cinematography by...
and takes considerable dramatic licence with factual details and moves events in time. For example, the opening night of Iolanthe
Iolanthe
Iolanthe; or, The Peer and the Peri is a comic opera with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It is one of the Savoy operas and is the seventh collaboration of the fourteen between Gilbert and Sullivan....
is depicted as being the opening of the Savoy Theatre
Savoy Theatre
The Savoy Theatre is a West End theatre located in the Strand in the City of Westminster, London, England. The theatre opened on 10 October 1881 and was built by Richard D'Oyly Carte on the site of the old Savoy Palace as a showcase for the popular series of comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan,...
, whereas the Savoy Theatre actually opened earlier, during the run of Patience
Patience (opera)
Patience; or, Bunthorne's Bride, is a comic opera in two acts with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. First performed at the Opera Comique, London, on 23 April 1881, it moved to the 1,292-seat Savoy Theatre on 10 October 1881, where it was the first theatrical production in the...
. The music in the film is played by the London Symphony Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra
The London Symphony Orchestra is a major orchestra of the United Kingdom, as well as one of the best-known orchestras in the world. Since 1982, the LSO has been based in London's Barbican Centre.-History:...
, conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent.
The film starred Robert Morley
Robert Morley
Robert Adolph Wilton Morley, CBE was an English actor who, often in supporting roles, was usually cast as a pompous English gentleman representing the Establishment...
as W. S. Gilbert, Maurice Evans
Maurice Evans (actor)
Maurice Herbert Evans was an English actor noted for his interpretations of Shakespearean characters. In terms of his screen roles, he is probably best known as Dr...
as Arthur Sullivan, Peter Finch
Peter Finch
Peter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...
as Richard D'Oyly Carte, Eileen Herlie
Eileen Herlie
Eileen Herlie was a Scottish-American actress.-Life and career:Eileen Herlie was born Eileen Isobel Herlihy to a Catholic father and a Protestant mother in Glasgow, Scotland, and was one of five children. Herlie was trained as a theatre actress. Among her West End London theatre successes were The...
as Helen Carte and Martyn Green as George Grossmith
George Grossmith
George Grossmith was an English comedian, writer, composer, actor, and singer. His performing career spanned more than four decades...
. Appearances were also made by Dinah Sheridan
Dinah Sheridan
Dinah Sheridan is an English actress who appeared in the films 29 Acacia Avenue and Genevieve .She made her film debut in 1937, and has frequently appeared on television...
as Grace Marston, Wilfrid Hyde-White
Wilfrid Hyde-White
Wilfrid Hyde-White was an English character actor.-Early life and career:Wilfrid Hyde White was born at the rectory in Bourton-on-the-Water in Gloucestershire, the son of William Edward White, canon of Gloucester Cathedral, and his wife, Ethel Adelaide Drought...
as Mr. Marston, Leonard Sachs
Leonard Sachs
Leonard Sachs was a British actor.-Early life and career:Sachs was born in South Africa in the town of Roodepoort, Transvaal...
as Smythe, Owen Brannigan
Owen Brannigan
Owen Brannigan OBE was an English bass, known in opera for buffo roles and in concert for a wide range of solo parts in music ranging from Henry Purcell to Michael Tippett...
as the company's principal heavy baritone
Baritone
Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...
, Thomas Round
Thomas Round
Thomas Round is a retired English opera singer and actor, best known for his performances in the tenor roles of the Savoy Operas and in grand opera....
as the company's principal tenor
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
, Isabel Dean as Mrs. Gilbert, Arthur Howard
Arthur Howard
For other people with this name, see Arthur Howard Arthur Howard was an English film and television actor.-Life and career:...
as the Usher in Trial by Jury
Trial by Jury
Trial by Jury is a comic opera in one act, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It was first produced on 25 March 1875, at London's Royalty Theatre, where it initially ran for 131 performances and was considered a hit, receiving critical praise and outrunning its...
, and Michael Ripper
Michael Ripper
Michael Ripper was an English character actor born in Portsmouth.He began his film career in quota quickies in the 1930s and until the late 1950s was virtually unknown; he was seldom credited. He played one of the two murderers in Richard III. Ripper became a mainstay in Hammer Film Productions...
as Louis.
Plot
The young composer Arthur Sullivan is encouraged by his friends and fiancée, Grace, to pursue the creation of "serious" works, such as his cantataCantata
A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....
The Prodigal Son
The Prodigal Son (Sullivan)
The Prodigal Son is an oratorio by Arthur Sullivan with text taken from the parable of the same name in the Gospel of Luke. It features chorus with Soprano, Contralto, Tenor and Bass solos...
, but he is pleased by the acclaim that he receives for the music to the short comic opera
Comic opera
Comic opera denotes a sung dramatic work of a light or comic nature, usually with a happy ending.Forms of comic opera first developed in late 17th-century Italy. By the 1730s, a new operatic genre, opera buffa, emerged as an alternative to opera seria...
Trial by Jury
Trial by Jury
Trial by Jury is a comic opera in one act, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It was first produced on 25 March 1875, at London's Royalty Theatre, where it initially ran for 131 performances and was considered a hit, receiving critical praise and outrunning its...
, a collaboration with dramatist W. S. Gilbert. Grace leaves him, telling him that he is wasting his musical gifts on triviality, foreshadowing criticism from the musical establishment that will follow Sullivan for the rest of his career.
Still wrestling with this dilemma, Sullivan joins Gilbert and the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte
Richard D'Oyly Carte
Richard D'Oyly Carte was an English talent agent, theatrical impresario, composer and hotelier during the latter half of the Victorian era...
in a partnership to create more light operas. Their subsequent operas, The Sorcerer
The Sorcerer
The Sorcerer is a two-act comic opera, with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Arthur Sullivan. It was the British duo's third operatic collaboration. The plot of The Sorcerer is based on a Christmas story, An Elixir of Love, that Gilbert wrote for The Graphic magazine in 1876...
and, especially, H.M.S. Pinafore
H.M.S. Pinafore
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, England, on 25 May 1878 and ran for 571 performances, which was the second-longest run of any musical...
, become so popular that they are pirated extensively in America. The entire company goes on tour there so that the partnership can profit from their fame in the new world. The Pirates of Penzance
The Pirates of Penzance
The Pirates of Penzance; or, The Slave of Duty is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. The opera's official premiere was at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City on 31 December 1879, where the show was well received by both audiences...
premieres in New York to much acclaim, and Carte soon builds a new theatre in London to present the partnership's operas. Everyone is delighted.
The Savoy Theatre opens with the opening night of Iolanthe
Iolanthe
Iolanthe; or, The Peer and the Peri is a comic opera with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It is one of the Savoy operas and is the seventh collaboration of the fourteen between Gilbert and Sullivan....
. Sullivan revels in the atmosphere of the premiere, while Gilbert, as usual, is nervous and apprehensive. At the opening, Carte demonstrates the safety of the theatre's innovative electric lighting. Sullivan conducts the performance, but Gilbert escapes the theatre to walk the streets, returning just in time to take a triumphant curtain call before the enthusiastic crowd. Nevertheless, Sullivan is unhappy writing comic opera.
When Gilbert proposes a new piece involving the device of a magic lozenge, Sullivan objects that he wants to devote himself to serious music. Sullivan's friend, critic Joseph Bennett
Joseph Bennett
Joseph Bennett may refer to:*Joseph Bennett , soccer player*Joseph A. Bennett , English actor*Joseph B. Bennett , U.S. congressman*Joseph Bennett , English merchant and Liberal Party politician...
, writes a libretto for a cantata based on Longfellow
Longfellow
Longfellow may refer to:* Longfellow, Minneapolis, United States** Longfellow , Minneapolis, United States* Longfellow, Oakland, California, United States* Longfellow , one of America's first great thoroughbred racehorses...
's The Golden Legend. Meanwhile, Gilbert, inspired by the sight of a Japanese sword hanging in his study, proposes a new plot, and Sullivan begins work. When Bennett goes to see Sullivan, he finds that The Mikado
The Mikado
The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert, their ninth of fourteen operatic collaborations...
is being rehearsed instead of his cantata. He informs Sullivan that, if he would get around to finishing The Golden Legend, Queen Victoria will attend the premiere. Likewise, when Gilbert calls on Sullivan, he sees him rehearsing The Golden Legend, as Bennett stands watch. When Bennett dozes off, Sullivan turns back to The Mikado. After both works debut, Sullivan is knighted. The Queen inquires if he will write a grand opera
Grand Opera
Grand opera is a genre of 19th-century opera generally in four or five acts, characterised by large-scale casts and orchestras, and lavish and spectacular design and stage effects, normally with plots based on or around dramatic historic events...
.
Just before the premiere of their next opera, Ruddigore
Ruddigore
Ruddigore; or, The Witch's Curse, originally called Ruddygore, is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It is one of the Savoy Operas and the tenth of fourteen comic operas written together by Gilbert and Sullivan...
, Sullivan asks Gilbert to write the libretto for his first grand opera. Gilbert declines, stating that in such a work the words play second fiddle to the music, and Sullivan is angered saying that he has always had to hold the music back so that the words could predominate, and that he no longer takes pleasure in writing comic operas. Ruddigore receives negative reviews and some negative audience response. Although the piece is eventually a financial success, author and composer remain at odds. Mrs. Helen Carte travels to Monte Carlo
Monte Carlo
Monte Carlo is an administrative area of the Principality of Monaco....
to see Sullivan on holiday. She gives him the news that her husband will build another theatre to present grand opera, and wants Sullivan to compose an opera for the theatre. Sullivan happily agrees, but at the same time, Gilbert has written a libretto for another comic opera. Sullivan also accepts this libretto, and The Gondoliers
The Gondoliers
The Gondoliers; or, The King of Barataria is a Savoy Opera, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It premiered at the Savoy Theatre on 7 December 1889 and ran for a very successful 554 performances , closing on 30 June 1891...
is another hit.
Gilbert, suffering from gout, and in a particularly foul temper, examines the financial accounts of the partnership, seeing a large item for the purchase of a new carpet at the Savoy Theatre. He confronts Carte, at the new theatre, over lavish expenses. He also quarrels with Sullivan, and Gilbert announces that he will write no more Savoy operas. Sullivan's grand opera Ivanhoe
Ivanhoe (opera)
Ivanhoe is a romantic opera in three acts based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott, with music by Sir Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by Julian Sturgis. It premiered at the Royal English Opera House on 31 January 1891 for a consecutive run of 155 performances, unheard of for a grand opera...
debuts, and he presents a bound volume to the Queen. She commands a private performance at Windsor Castle
Windsor Castle
Windsor Castle is a medieval castle and royal residence in Windsor in the English county of Berkshire, notable for its long association with the British royal family and its architecture. The original castle was built after the Norman invasion by William the Conqueror. Since the time of Henry I it...
but astonishes Sullivan by choosing to hear The Gondoliers. Apart from Gilbert, Sullivan comes to realise that his true gifts lie with light music.
Richard and Helen Carte toast the arrival of the twentieth century, hoping for a revival of the Gilbert and Sullivan partnership. Stopping by at a rehearsal for a revival of The Yeomen of the Guard
The Yeomen of the Guard
The Yeomen of the Guard; or, The Merryman and His Maid, is a Savoy Opera, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It premiered at the Savoy Theatre on 3 October 1888, and ran for 423 performances...
, Gilbert runs into Sullivan, after having been apart for years. Sullivan is ill and using a wheelchair. The two men make up and propose taking a curtain call together with Carte, all three of them in wheelchairs. During the performance, however, news arrives of Sullivan's death. Some years later, Gilbert is finally knighted.
Cast
- Robert MorleyRobert MorleyRobert Adolph Wilton Morley, CBE was an English actor who, often in supporting roles, was usually cast as a pompous English gentleman representing the Establishment...
as W. S. GilbertW. S. GilbertSir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S... - Maurice EvansMaurice Evans (actor)Maurice Herbert Evans was an English actor noted for his interpretations of Shakespearean characters. In terms of his screen roles, he is probably best known as Dr...
as Arthur SullivanArthur SullivanSir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado... - Eileen HerlieEileen HerlieEileen Herlie was a Scottish-American actress.-Life and career:Eileen Herlie was born Eileen Isobel Herlihy to a Catholic father and a Protestant mother in Glasgow, Scotland, and was one of five children. Herlie was trained as a theatre actress. Among her West End London theatre successes were The...
as Helen D'Oyly Carte - Martyn GreenMartyn GreenWilliam Martyn-Green , better known as Martyn Green, was an English actor and singer. He is best known for his work as principal comedian in the Gilbert & Sullivan comic operas, which he performed and recorded with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and other troupes.After army service in World War I,...
as George GrossmithGeorge GrossmithGeorge Grossmith was an English comedian, writer, composer, actor, and singer. His performing career spanned more than four decades... - Peter FinchPeter FinchPeter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...
as Richard D'Oyly CarteRichard D'Oyly CarteRichard D'Oyly Carte was an English talent agent, theatrical impresario, composer and hotelier during the latter half of the Victorian era... - Dinah SheridanDinah SheridanDinah Sheridan is an English actress who appeared in the films 29 Acacia Avenue and Genevieve .She made her film debut in 1937, and has frequently appeared on television...
as Grace Marston - Isabel DeanIsabel DeanIsabel Dean was an English film and television actress.Born as Isabel Hodgkinson on 29 May 1918 in Aldridge, Staffordshire. She studied painting at the Birmingham Art School and from 1937 joined the Cheltenham Repertory Company as a scenic artist...
as Mrs. Gilbert - Wilfrid Hyde-WhiteWilfrid Hyde-WhiteWilfrid Hyde-White was an English character actor.-Early life and career:Wilfrid Hyde White was born at the rectory in Bourton-on-the-Water in Gloucestershire, the son of William Edward White, canon of Gloucester Cathedral, and his wife, Ethel Adelaide Drought...
as Mr. Marston - Muriel AkedMuriel AkedMuriel Aked was a British film actress. She was a student at Liverpool Repertory Theatre for six months but left to do war work. She made her screen debut in 1920 in A Sister to Assist 'Er...
as Queen VictoriaVictoria of the United KingdomVictoria was the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she used the additional title of Empress of India.... - Michael RipperMichael RipperMichael Ripper was an English character actor born in Portsmouth.He began his film career in quota quickies in the 1930s and until the late 1950s was virtually unknown; he was seldom credited. He played one of the two murderers in Richard III. Ripper became a mainstay in Hammer Film Productions...
as Louis - Bernadette O'FarrellBernadette O'FarrellBernadette O'Farrell was an Irish actress.She is best known for playing Maid Marian in the 1950s TV version of The Adventures of Robin Hood...
as Jessie BondJessie BondJessie Bond was an English singer and actress best known for creating the mezzo-soprano soubrette roles in the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas. She spent twenty years on the stage, the bulk of them with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company.Musical from an early age, Bond began a concert singing... - Ann Hanslip as Principal sopranoSopranoA soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
- Eric BerryEric Berry (actor)- Biography :Eric Berry was born in London on 9 January 1913 to parents Frederick William Berry and Anna Lovisa Danielson. He attended the City of London School and trained for the stage at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Berry was briefly married to actress Constance Carpenter...
as Rutland BarringtonRutland BarringtonRutland Barrington was an English singer, actor, comedian, and Edwardian musical comedy star. Best remembered for originating the lyric baritone roles in the Gilbert and Sullivan operas from 1877 to 1896, his performing career spanned more than four decades... - Lloyd LambleLloyd LambleLloyd Nelson Lamble was an Australian actor who worked in theatre, television, radio and film. He lived and worked two-thirds of his life in the United Kingdom .- Personal life :...
as Joseph BennettJoseph BennettJoseph Bennett may refer to:*Joseph Bennett , soccer player*Joseph A. Bennett , English actor*Joseph B. Bennett , U.S. congressman*Joseph Bennett , English merchant and Liberal Party politician... - Richard Warner as Alfred CellierAlfred CellierAlfred Cellier was an English composer, orchestrator and conductor.In addition to conducting and music directing the original productions of several of the most famous Gilbert and Sullivan works and writing the overtures to some of them, Cellier conducted at many theatres in London, New York and...
- Muriel BrunskillMuriel BrunskillMuriel Brunskill was an English contralto of the mid-twentieth century. Her career included concert, operatic and recital performance from the early 1920s until the 1950s...
as Principal contraltoContraltoContralto is the deepest female classical singing voice, with the lowest tessitura, falling between tenor and mezzo-soprano. It typically ranges between the F below middle C to the second G above middle C , although at the extremes some voices can reach the E below middle C or the second B above... - Owen BranniganOwen BranniganOwen Brannigan OBE was an English bass, known in opera for buffo roles and in concert for a wide range of solo parts in music ranging from Henry Purcell to Michael Tippett...
as Principal bass - Harold WilliamsHarold Williams (baritone)Harold John Williams MBE was a leading Australian baritone and music teacher. Born in Sydney, he enjoyed a long and successful career in England and his native country, performing in opera, oratorio and concerts and giving radio broadcasts.-Early years:Williams was born on 3 September 1893 at...
as Judge (Trial by Jury) - Thomas RoundThomas RoundThomas Round is a retired English opera singer and actor, best known for his performances in the tenor roles of the Savoy Operas and in grand opera....
as Defendant in Trial by Jury and Nanki Poo in The Mikado - Yvonne Marsh as Bride in Trial by Jury
The following additional singing voices were heard on the soundtrack: Elsie Morison
Elsie Morison
Elsie Jean Morison is an Australian soprano.Morison was born in Ballarat, Victoria, and studied at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music from 1943-45...
, Marjorie Thomas
Marjorie Thomas
Marjorie Gwendolen Thomas was an English opera and oratorio singer for almost three decades.Thomas sang at the Royal Opera House and was a regular performer at the Promenade Concerts and the Three Choirs Festivals and, for many years, a professor of singing at London's Royal Academy of Music...
, Owen Brannigan
Owen Brannigan
Owen Brannigan OBE was an English bass, known in opera for buffo roles and in concert for a wide range of solo parts in music ranging from Henry Purcell to Michael Tippett...
, Harold Williams
Harold Williams (baritone)
Harold John Williams MBE was a leading Australian baritone and music teacher. Born in Sydney, he enjoyed a long and successful career in England and his native country, performing in opera, oratorio and concerts and giving radio broadcasts.-Early years:Williams was born on 3 September 1893 at...
, Muriel Brunskill
Muriel Brunskill
Muriel Brunskill was an English contralto of the mid-twentieth century. Her career included concert, operatic and recital performance from the early 1920s until the 1950s...
and Jennifer Vyvyan
Jennifer Vyvyan
Jennifer Vyvyan was a British classical soprano who had an active international career in operas, concerts, and recitals from 1948 up until her death in 1974. She possessed a beautifully clear, steady voice with considerable flexibility in florid music...
.
External links
- The Story of Gilbert and Sullivan on the Internet Movie DatabaseInternet Movie DatabaseInternet Movie Database is an online database of information related to movies, television shows, actors, production crew personnel, video games and fictional characters featured in visual entertainment media. It is one of the most popular online entertainment destinations, with over 100 million...
- The Story of Gilbert and Sullivan at The Gilbert and Sullivan Archive
- Posters (lobby cards) from the film
- Many photos from the production
- Martyn Green's reminiscences about making the film
- Photo of the Gilberts from the film
- Review and lists of cast and crew
- Exclusive source for copies of this film