Ruddigore

22 January 1887, Savoy Theatre, London

Arthur Sullivan · libretto by W. S. Gilbert

A Cornish baronetcy carries a witch's curse: every holder must commit a crime a day or die in agony. The heir has run away and lives disguised as a humble farmer, until his foster-brother betrays him and he inherits, whereupon his ancestors step down out of their picture frames to see that he keeps up the family standard. Subtitled "The Witch's Curse", it is Gilbert and Sullivan's send-up of Victorian melodrama, and its title had to be respelled within days of the opening.

How to spot them

▸The fishing village of Rederring, Cornwall, and a picture gallery in a castle
▸Professional bridesmaids permanently on duty from ten to four with nobody to marry
▸A village heroine who consults a book of etiquette before every decision
▸Ancestors who climb out of their portraits and torture their descendant
▸Subtitled 'The Witch's Curse'; the title was originally spelled with a 'y'

Arias & moments — listen

"When the night wind howls in the chimney cowls, and the bat in the moonlight flies" (1887)

Sir Roderic Murgatroyd's ghost song, often called the finest music Sullivan wrote for the Savoy

Recording: HMV/D'Oyly Carte Opera Company/Harry Norris · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons

"I shipped, d'ye see, in a Revenue sloop" — a sailor's hornpipe about declining to fight a Frenchman on the grounds of fair play (1887)

Richard Dauntless's song and dance; he always does what his heart tells him, which is usually self-interest

Recording: HMV/D'Oyly Carte Opera Company/Harry Norris · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons

"My eyes are fully open to my awful situation" — a patter trio at impossible speed ending 'this particularly rapid, unintelligible patter isn't generally heard, and if it is it doesn't matter' (1887)

The Act 2 'matter' trio, one of the hardest ensembles in the repertoire

Recording: HMV/D'Oyly Carte Opera Company/Harry Norris · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons

"Sir Rupert Murgatroyd, his leisure and his riches he ruthlessly employed in persecuting witches" (1887)

Dame Hannah's ballad setting out the curse laid by the burning witch on the whole line of baronets

Recording: HMV/D'Oyly Carte Opera Company/Harry Norris · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons

"I once was as meek as a new-born lamb" and a duet in which a reformed pair agree that when either grows excited the word 'Basingstoke' will restore calm (1887)

Sir Despard and Mad Margaret, now respectably engaged in district visiting

Recording: HMV/D'Oyly Carte Opera Company/Harry Norris · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons

A baronet argues that refusing to commit his daily crime is suicide, that suicide is itself a crime, and therefore that his ancestors died by mistake (1887)

The quibble that lifts the curse and brings the ghosts back to life for the finale

Quick-fire facts

•Opened at the Savoy Theatre on 22 January 1887, the successor to The Mikado, and ran for 288 performances.
•The title was originally spelled 'Ruddygore'; after complaints that it was too close to 'bloody gore' the 'y' was changed to an 'i' within the first fortnight.
•Asked whether the change made any difference, Gilbert is said to have replied that it did not — 'ruddy' and 'bloody' meaning the same thing — and to have joked that he might as well have called it 'Kensington Gore'.
•Every holder of the baronetcy must commit a crime every day or perish in inconceivable agony, a curse laid by a witch burned by the first Sir Rupert.
•Characters: Robin Oakapple (really Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd), Rose Maybud, Richard Dauntless, Sir Despard Murgatroyd, Mad Margaret, Dame Hannah, Old Adam Goodheart and the ghost of Sir Roderic.
•Mad Margaret parodies the mad scenes of Italian opera and of Shakespeare's Ophelia; 'Basingstoke' is the word that calms her.
•The picture-gallery scene, in which the portraits come to life, was the most technically ambitious staging the Savoy had attempted.
•Judged a comparative failure beside its predecessor at the time, it was dropped from the repertory for decades and only re-established after a heavily revised 1920 revival; it is now a standard piece.

Drill it — 9 cards

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Sources

The Gilbert and Sullivan Archive — Ruddigore — Introduction
Encyclopaedia Britannica — Ruddigore: operetta by Gilbert and Sullivan
Michael Ainger — Gilbert and Sullivan: A Dual Biography