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Before W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan became the famed theatrical duo in 1874, Gilbert wrote poems, comic rants, theater critiques and short stories. In one of his creations, “The Bumboat Woman’s Story,” a character named Poll Pineapple falls for the captain of the H.M.S. Hot Cross Bun. To be close to the captain, she and other women — who also have a crush on him — disguise themselves as sailors and secretly board his ship. He doesn’t notice that members of his “crew” are smaller than before, among other things.
In 1951, conductor Sir Charles Mackerras and choreographer John Cranko set Sullivan’s music to a ballet based on Gilbert’s story and called it “Pineapple Poll.”
Popular in its day, the ballet isn’t performed much now, but it was the perfect opener for the Madison Savoyards’ summer production at Madison College’s Mitby Theater, Aug. 17-18. The ballet’s Midwest premiere was paired with “Trial by Jury,” Gilbert and Sullivan’s first blockbuster. J. Adam Shelton directed the production.
It was delightful to see the Central Midwest Ballet Academy’s performers dance with such joy and precision. The Academy’s artistic director Marguerite Luksik and faculty member Michael Knight designed choreography that highlighted the dancers’ personalities. Lillian Thompson and Erik Stewart as Pineapple Poll and Jasper, her admirer, were fine actors as well as dancers, and Benjamin Brown stole the show as the lovably clueless Captain Belaye. Everything was performed in front of a backdrop of lovely blues.
The audience was having such fun that we misread as comedy a moment of gravitas when Jasper finds Pineapple’s clothes by the ship and thinks she has drowned. Gilbert and Sullivan are full of surprises, and sometimes drop a dark moment into a pool of comedy.
The pit orchestra, with conductor Sergei Pavlov, had unstoppable energy and kept a good rapport with the stage.
Gilbert, the dramatist who began his career as a barrister, stretched his satirical muscles in “Trial by Jury,” an operetta about a courtroom battle between Angelina, a jilted bride seeking money damages, and Edwin, who argues that he’d make a lousy husband.
Despite the perukes (wigs) and somber black robes, the courtroom was chaotic, and Jim Chiolino, the usher, tried admirably to keep it in order. Thore Dosdall and Keith Christianson, as Edwin and the judge, captured Gilbert’s biting critique of legal higher-ups. And Angelina (Megan McCarthy), wailed her anguish beautifully. But happiness was restored when the judge married her himself.
