Adelaide's G&S Fest brings modern stories to old classics

Presented by State Opera South Australia, The G&S Fest will bring together some of the best bits of British humour and song in an action-packed program over 10 days in May.

Among the productions will be Pirates of Penzance, H.M.S. Pinafore and Trial by Jury, plus themed film screenings, talks, a quiz night, a long lunch with festival cast members and more.

Gilbert & Sullivan, or "G&S" as they are known, created British comedy-opera in the 19th century. The pair gave rise to a tradition of political satire and their work shaped the development of musical theatre, political discourse, literature, film and advertising.

Dramatic baritone Douglas McNicol will play The Major-General in Pirates of Penzance and Dick Deadeye in H.M.S. Pinafore, both of which will be performed at Her Majesty's Theatre.

The Adelaide resident has worked with all major opera companies and orchestras in Australia and New Zealand, with roles including the titular character in Figaro, Papageno in The Magic Flute and Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd.

While Douglas is used to having definite lines and songs to follow laid out months in advance, his G&S performances will need to be more dynamic.

"Often things in G&S are reworked for topical commentary," Douglas said.

Among the variables will be how fellow cast members interpret their lines, how conductors Hunt & Pratt take tempi, or director Stuart Maunder influences text to reflect current world events.

"I have a script and I have a few melodies. I'll memorise them, turn up at rehearsal and everything's got to be free to go wherever it goes."

Douglas did share this much about the role of Dick Deadeye.

"He's a despised figure. In the more serious operatic repertoire, several of my favourite roles, including Scarpia, Iago and Pizarro, are absolute villains. So perhaps even though this is in a comic bent, there could be something in that I shall relish."

G&S's productions have been a thread through Douglas' career; at an early age in Trial By Jury in which he has played both Usher and Counsel for the Plaintiff, as well as Pooh Bah in Mikado.

As for what makes G&S's material so popular?

"It takes the Mickey out of society's posturing and so forth from the Victorian era when it was written. And if it didn't continue to take the Mickey, (hence) the topical rewrites that may occur, then I think there would be something lacking.

"But musically, it's really good fun. I think in every Gilbert & Sullivan opera I can think of, there's a moment in the music where it just lifts off the page and takes you to heaven. All of a sudden the music is allowed to do something special, whereas the rest of the opera is driven by the text.

"It's a genre of comedy in the western canon that we can pretend never existed, or we can have a look and have a chuckle."

Douglas is no stranger to Her Majesty's Theatre; he worked in the bar when he was at teacher's college, recalling seeing Nigel Triffett's Wild Stars and Graham Bond's Boys Own McBeth. It was the venue where he worked in 1981 for State Opera South Australia for the first time, and in 1990 - when it was called The Opera Theatre - he sang his first major operatic role as Figaro. More recently he was in Sweeney Todd and The Barber of Seville (both in 2021).

He was also chuffed that year to be invited to autograph a brick on a back wall of the venue's stage - an old tradition for well-established and admired performers. Among the names are Barry Humphreys, plus other performers in G&S Fest, including Ben Mingay and Antoinette Halloran, who are respectively playing the Pirate King and Ruth in Pirates of Penzance.

While his own career has spanned more than four decades, Douglas has always been a student of lifelong learning - wanting to hone his craft and be the best he could. One of Douglas' mentors was the late American operatic dramatic bass baritone Joshua Hecht, whose international career included The Met in New York plus Germany, and was a guest teacher at Opera Australia. They crossed paths when Joshua's wife Donna sang the principal soprano and Douglas sang the major baritone in La Forza del Destino in Christchurch in the early 2000s.

From that time, Douglas would annually visit Joshua in Sydney to help him hone his technique, working the roles they had in common, in particular Scarpia in Tosca, Rigoletto, the four villains in Tales of Hoffman, Iago in Otello and Pizarro in Fidelio.

"Joshua said 'Look, this is the repertoire you should sing'... And I knew this was where I belonged because while it's heavier singing, at the end of the night, I felt like I could do it all again straight away, which meant that it was the right thing for this set of chords and body."

"I want to get this right and the amount of time that I spend preparing roles is what makes me a full-time performer. Even though my collegiate contact hours may amount to several months of the year, the rest of the year, I remain a full-time student."

G&S Fest is at multiple venues across Adelaide from May 11-21, 2023. Visit gandsfest.com for more information.