The Pirates of Penzance on the water in Wichita

Gilbert and Sullivan’s crowning comic masterpiece, The Pirates of Penzance, is an audience favorite. The Wichita Grand Opera (WGO) premieres its new production of the comic opera at Bradley Fair, putting the merry band of professional pirates in their natural element – right on the water. Opera and laughter come together under the Kansas stars, like no other venue in the region.

Performances at Bradley Fair will be May 20 and 21, at 8 p.m. with a third performance at the McPherson Opera House on May 22 at 6 p.m.

Here’s your chance to get carried away by Pirates! Join the band of swashbuckling buccaneers, bumbling British Bobbies, frolicsome Victorian maidens, and the delightfully dotty “model of a modern Major-General” for a rollicking romp over the rocky coast of Cornwall.

First performed in New York City in 1879, Gilbert’s wit (always incisive but never vicious) and Sullivan’s memorable score are among the most valuable treasures of musical theatre history. Patter songs are a Gilbert & Sullivan trademark, and Pirates features the most famous of them all, “I am the very model of a modern Major-General.”

The plot of Pirates centers on the dilemma of young Frederic who, as a child, was mistakenly apprenticed to the pirates until his twenty-first birthday. Since he was born in a leap year on February 29, he is honor bound to remain a pirate until the distant date of 1940, despite his moral objection to piracy. Helping Frederic to deal with this unusual predicament are the brash Pirate King, Ruth (the pirate maid-of-all-work), romantic Mabel, and the delightfully stuffy Major-General Stanley.

The Pirates Of Penzance – they’ll steal your heart away!

Seats for the May 20 and 22 performances at Bradley Fair are $20 through $85, with a VIP Dinner package available for $150, and may be purchased online at www.WichitaGrandOpera.org, by phone at (316) 262-8054, or in person at the Century II Concert Hall box office. Tickets for the McPherson Opera House performance May 22, are $37 to $85, by phone at (316) 262-8054.

The Gayly – May 14, 2016 @ 2:35 p.m.