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An Enjoyable Evening
Opera North's 'Ruddigore',
reviewed by MIKE WHEELER
As something of a Gilbert and Sullivan sceptic I was looking forward to seeing how Opera North was going to handle the partnership's spoof melodrama Ruddigore (Theatre Royal, Nottingham, 10 March 2010).
Updated to the 1920s, Jo Davies' inventive staging is bright, energetic, and full of delightful touches, from the silent film that plays during the overture, filling us in on the story so far, to the dancing skeletons of Act 2.
The cast is uniformly strong. Amy Freston's Rose Maybud gives just enough hint of the flirt beneath the prim surface. Grant Doyle, nervy and uncertain as Robin Oakapple in Act 1, makes his Act 2 persona, wicked baronet Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, endearingly ineffectual...
Copyright © 15 March 2010
Mike Wheeler,
Derby UK
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