Pirates of Penzance

Continuing with my time in Musical Theatre. I told you how it all began when the school where I was teaching put on Pirates of Penzance and I took the role of a pirate (seen on the left of photo behind the Pirate King - a student) in the first act. Then I was a policeman in the 2nd Act (on the right with truncheon at head below)

One of the other teachers had great difficulty keeping in time with the choreographed steps. We would practise with him interminably while off-stage but then, because he was out of step, he brought the house down. It was very difficult to maintain composure when you can see the School office ladies stuffing handkerchiefs in their mouths and tears of laughter running down their faces in front of you. The school theatre was very small.

Then having been in the Gondoliers and South Pacific in my local society, I was surprised when the next year (1987) they decided to stage the Pirates. As I said at the time, at least I knew the words. I was able to use the same costume as a pirate.


and then you can see me being admired by the ladies in their night dresses below. The painted on moustache is not very convincing.

I have searched and found a recent production of the University of Iowa singing the pirate king song in Act 1 and When a felon's not engaged in his employment sung by the police in Act 2. I chose these as not being as professional as some of the others available where the on stage antics were far beyond my athletic ability.