Genesis of the opera

Gilbert's original sketch of Trial by Jury, published in Fun in 1868

The genesis of Trial by Jury was in 1868, when Gilbert wrote a single-page illustrated comic piece for the magazine Fun entitled Trial by Jury: An Operetta. Drawing on Gilbert's training and brief practice as a barrister, it detailed a "breach of promise" trial going awry, in the process spoofing the law, lawyers and the legal system. (In the Victorian era, a man could be required to pay compensation should he fail to marry a woman to whom he was engaged.)^[6] The outline of this story was followed in the later opera, and two of its numbers appeared in nearly their final form in Fun. The skit, however, ended abruptly: the moment the attractive plaintiff stepped into the witness box, the judge leapt into her arms and vowed to marry her, whereas in the opera, the case is allowed to proceed further before this conclusion is reached.^[7][8]

In 1873, the opera manager and composer Carl Rosa asked Gilbert for a piece to use as part of a season of English opera that Rosa planned to present at the Drury Lane Theatre; Rosa was to write or commission the music. Gilbert expanded Trial into a one-act libretto. Rosa's wife, Euphrosyne Parepa-Rosa, a childhood friend of Gilbert's, died after an illness in 1874, and Rosa dropped the project.^[9][10] Later in the same year, Gilbert offered the libretto to the impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte, but Carte knew of no composer available to set it to music.^[11]

Meanwhile, Sullivan may have been considering a return to light opera: Cox and Box, his first comic opera, had received a London revival (co-starring his brother, Fred Sullivan) in September 1874. In November, Sullivan travelled to Paris and contacted Albert Millaud, one of the librettists for Jacques Offenbach's operettas. However, he returned to London empty-handed and worked on incidental music for the Gaiety Theatre's production of The Merry Wives of Windsor.^[12] By early 1875, Carte was managing Selina Dolaro's Royalty Theatre, and he needed a short opera to be played as an afterpiece to Offenbach's La Périchole, which was to open on 30 January (with Fred Sullivan in the cast), in which Dolaro starred. Carte had asked Sullivan to compose something for the theatre and advertised in The Times in late January: "In Preparation, a New Comic Opera composed expressly for this theatre by Mr. Arthur Sullivan in which Madame Dolaro and Nellie Bromley will appear."^{[13][lower-alpha 1]} But around the same time, Carte also remembered Gilbert's Trial by Jury and knew that Gilbert had worked with Sullivan to create Thespis. He suggested to Gilbert that Sullivan was the man to write the music for Trial.^[13]

Gilbert finally called on Sullivan and read the libretto to him on 20 February 1875. Sullivan was enthusiastic, later recalling, "[Gilbert] read it through ... in the manner of a man considerably disappointed with what he had written. As soon as he had come to the last word, he closed up the manuscript violently, apparently unconscious of the fact that he had achieved his purpose so far as I was concerned, inasmuch as I was screaming with laughter the whole time."^[16] Trial by Jury, described as "A Novel and Original Dramatic Cantata" in the original promotional material,^{[lower-alpha 2]} was composed and rehearsed in a matter of weeks.^[16][19]

Production and aftermath

The result of Gilbert and Sullivan's collaboration was a witty, tuneful and very "English" piece, in contrast to the bawdy burlesques and adaptations of French operettas that dominated the London musical stage at that time.^[1]

April 1875 programme for La Périchole and Trial by Jury. Sullivan and Gilbert are the cherubs.

Initially, Trial by Jury, which runs only 30 minutes or so, was played last on a triple bill, on which the main attraction, La Périchole (starring Dolaro as the title character, Fred Sullivan as Don Andres and Walter H. Fisher as Piquillo), was preceded by the one-act farce Cryptoconchoidsyphonostomata.^[16] The latter was immediately replaced by a series of other curtain raisers.^{[20][lower-alpha 3]} The composer conducted the first night's performance, and the theatre's music director, B. Simmons, conducted thereafter.^[22] The composer's brother, Fred Sullivan, starred as the Learned Judge, with Nellie Bromley as the Plaintiff. One of the choristers in Trial by Jury, W. S. Penley, was promoted in November 1875^[23] to the small part of the Foreman of the Jury and made a strong impact on audiences with his amusing facial expressions and gestures.^[24] In March 1876, he temporarily replaced Fred Sullivan as the Judge, when Fred's health declined from tuberculosis.^[25] With this start, Penley went on to a successful career as comic actor, culminating with the lead role in the record-breaking original production of Charley's Aunt.^[24] Fred Sullivan died in January 1877.^[26]

Jacques Offenbach's works were then at the height of their popularity in Britain, but Trial by Jury proved even more popular than La Périchole,^[27] becoming an unexpected hit.^[1] Trial by Jury drew crowds and continued to run after La Périchole closed.^[28] While the Royalty Theatre closed for the summer in 1875, Dolaro immediately took Trial on tour in England and Ireland.^[29] The piece resumed at the Royalty later in 1875 and was revived for additional London seasons in 1876 at the Opera Comique and in 1877 at the Strand Theatre.^[30]

Trial by Jury soon became the most desirable supporting piece for any London production, and, outside London, the major British theatrical touring companies had added it to their repertoire by about 1877.^[31] The original production was given a world tour by the Opera Comique's assistant manager Emily Soldene, which travelled as far as Australia.^[31] Unauthorised "pirate" productions quickly sprang up in America, taking advantage of the fact that American courts did not enforce foreign copyrights.^[22][23] It also became popular as part of the Victorian tradition of "benefit concerts", where the theatrical community came together to raise money for actors and actresses down on their luck or retiring. The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company continued to play the work for a century, licensing the piece to amateur and foreign professional companies, such as the J. C. Williamson Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company.^[32] Since the copyrights to Gilbert and Sullivan works ran out in 1961,^[33] the piece has been available to theatre companies around the world free of royalties. The work's enduring popularity since 1875 makes it, according to theatrical scholar Kurt Gänzl, "probably the most successful British one-act operetta of all time".^[2]

The success of Trial by Jury spurred several attempts to reunite Gilbert and Sullivan, but difficulties arose. Plans for a collaboration for Carl Rosa in 1875 fell through because Gilbert was too busy with other projects,^[34][35] and an attempted Christmas 1875 revival of Thespis by Richard D'Oyly Carte failed when the financiers backed out.^[34][36] Gilbert and Sullivan continued their separate careers, though both continued writing light opera, among other projects: Sullivan's next light opera, The Zoo, opened while Trial by Jury was still playing, in June 1875; and Gilbert's Eyes and No Eyes premiered a month later,^[37] followed by Princess Toto in 1876.^[38]

Gilbert and Sullivan were not reunited until The Sorcerer in 1877.^[20] It was announced that Fred Sullivan would be involved with the next Gilbert and Sullivan opera the following season, but he became ill and died soon afterwards.^[39]

Impact

As the first Savoy opera, Trial by Jury marked an important moment in the history of the Gilbert and Sullivan collaboration, as well as in the careers of each of the two men and in Victorian drama in general. The historian Reginald Allen sums up the historical import of the opera:

Most scholars of the Victorian theatre date the birth of Gilbert & Sullivan opera with the first performance of Trial by Jury.... Some will maintain that there is no single date of comparable importance in the history of the modern lyric theatre than this occasion which first brought together the triumvirate of W. S. Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, and their catalyst business genius, Richard D'Oyly Carte. The next twenty-five years witnessed the spectacular, worldwide success of this collaboration: the Gilbert & Sullivan operas, initiated by Trial by Jury. Without this spark, who can say that any of the instantaneous hits of G[ilbert] & S[ullivan] that followed would ever have been written?^[58]

Sidney Dark and Rowland Grey also give a high value to the importance of Trial by Jury and the operas that followed: "There is not a little historical interest in the genesis of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, the one English contribution of any value to dramatic literature for many generations."^[59] In addition, references to the opera continue today in the popular media^{[lower-alpha 8]} and even in law cases.^{[lower-alpha 9]}

Pattern for later Savoy operas

Trial by Jury is the only Gilbert and Sullivan opera played in one act and the only theatrical work by W. S. Gilbert without spoken dialogue.^[61] However, later Gilbert and Sullivan operas retained a number of patterns seen in Trial. For example, all except The Yeomen of the Guard begin with a chorus number.^[62] Also, like Trial by Jury, the later operas generally end with a relatively short finale consisting of a chorus number interspersed with short solos by the principal characters. "Comes the broken flower" (part of No. 3) was the first in a string of meditative "Horatian" lyrics, "mingling happiness and sadness, an acceptance and a smiling resignation".^[63] These would, from this point forward, allow the characters, in each of the Savoy operas, an introspective scene where they stop and consider life, in contrast to the foolishness of the surrounding scenes.^[64] Like both of the tenor's arias in Trial by Jury, tenor arias in later Savoy operas were set in ⁶
₈ time so frequently that Anna Russell, in her 1953 parody, "How to Write Your Own Gilbert and Sullivan Opera",^[65] exclaimed, "the tenor ... according to tradition, must sing an aria in ⁶
₈ time, usually accompanying himself on a stringed instrument".^[66] In Trial by Jury hypocrisy is revealed as the characters' motivations are held up to satire, and Gilbert mocks the underlying absurdity of the judicial procedures. As Gilbert scholar Andrew Crowther explains, Gilbert combines his criticisms with comic entertainment, which renders them more palatable, while at the same time underlining their truth: "By laughing at a joke you show that you accept its premise."^[67] This too would become characteristic of Gilbert's work.^[68]

Fred Sullivan as The Learned Judge

The judge's song, "When I, good friends, was called to the Bar" was followed by a string of similar patter songs that would come to epitomise Gilbert and Sullivan's collaboration.^[69] In these, often, a "dignified personage [would, just like the Judge,] supply a humorous biography of himself."^[70] Just as in Gilbert's earlier play, The Palace of Truth, in these songs, the characters "naïvely reveal their innermost thoughts, unconscious of their egotism, vanity, baseness, or cruelty".^[71] Crowther points out that such revelations work particularly well in Trial by Jury, because people commonly expect "characters singing in opera/operetta will communicate at a deeper level of truth than they would in mere speech."^[61] In "When I, good friends", the judge outlines the path of corruption that led to his becoming a judge, and this, too, would set the pattern for many of the patter songs in Gilbert and Sullivan operas to follow.^[61]

One of Gilbert's most notable innovations, first found in Thespis and repeated in Trial by Jury and all of the later Savoy operas, is the use of the chorus as an essential part of the action. In most earlier operas, burlesques, and comedies, the chorus had very little impact on the plot and served mainly as "noise or ornament".^[72] In the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, however, the chorus is essential, taking part in the action and often acting as an important character in its own right.^[72] Sullivan recalled, "Until Gilbert took the matter in hand choruses were dummy concerns, and were practically nothing more than a part of the stage setting. It was in 'Thespis' that Gilbert began to carry out his expressed determination to get the chorus to play its proper part in the performance. At this moment it seems difficult to realise that the idea of the chorus being anything more than a sort of stage audience was, at that time, a tremendous novelty."^[73] Another Gilbert innovation, following the example of his mentor, T. W. Robertson, was that the costumes and sets were made as realistic as possible:^[74] Gilbert based the scenery for the production on the Clerkenwell Sessions House, where he had practised law in the 1860s.^[75] The costumes were contemporary, and Angelina and her bridesmaids were dressed in real wedding attire.^[74] This attention to detail and careful creation of realistic sets and scenes were typical of Gilbert's stage management and would be repeated in all of Gilbert's work.^[76] For instance, when preparing the sets for H.M.S. Pinafore (1878), Gilbert and Sullivan visited Portsmouth to inspect ships. Gilbert made sketches of H.M.S. Victory and H.M.S. St Vincent and created a model set for the carpenters to work from.^[77] This was far from standard procedure in Victorian drama, where naturalism was still a relatively new concept, and where most authors had very little influence on how their plays and libretti were staged.^[78]

Analysis

Andrew Crowther places Trial by Jury at the centre of Gilbert's development as a librettist. He notes that in some of Gilbert's early libretti, such as Topsyturveydom (1874), the songs simply emphasise the dialogue. In others, such as Thespis (1871), some songs are relatively disconnected from both the story and characterisation, such as "I once knew a chap" or "Little maid of Arcadee", which simply convey a moral lesson.^[79] In Trial by Jury, however, each song carries the plot forward and adds depth to the characters. In addition, unlike some of Gilbert's more fantastical early plots, "Aside from the ending, nothing essentially improbable happens."^[61] Gänzl agrees, writing that "Gilbert's libretto was superior to any of his previous efforts. It was concise, modern and satirical without being impossibly whimsical. Having no spoken dialogue it was perforce tightly constructed and allowed of no interpolation or alteration."^[80] Sullivan's development as a comic opera writer, too, would mature with Trial by Jury. Except for incidental music for productions of Shakespeare, he had not written any music for the stage since Thespis. Gänzl wrote that Trial by Jury "brought Sullivan firmly and finally into the world of the musical" stage^[81] and confirmed, after his previous success with Cox and Box and Thespis, that "Sullivan was a composer of light lyric and comic music who could rival Offenbach, Lecocq and any English musician alive."^[81]

Part of the vocal score of "A nice dilemma"

Sullivan used the opportunities suggested by Gilbert's satire of the pomp and ceremony of the law to provide a variety of musical jokes.^[44] "From the first chords ... Sullivan's music sets the scene of mock-seriousness.... His ... humorous use of the orchestra runs throughout".^[57] For example, counterpointing the plaintiff's calculated swooning in "That she is reeling is plain to see!" (No. 9) with a reeling, minor-key theme in the string accompaniment, heading up and down the octaves.^[20] The instruments are also used to comically set the scene; for instance, he underlines the Counsel's misstatement in the line "To marry two at once is burglaree" with a comic bassoon "sting" in octaves^[20] and has the Defendant tune his guitar on stage (simulated by a violin in the orchestra) in the opening to his song.^[82]

The score also contains two parodies or pastiches of other composers: No. 3, "All hail great Judge" is an elaborate parody of Handel's fugues,^[83] and No. 12, "A nice dilemma", parodies "dilemma" ensembles of Italian opera in the Bel canto era; in particular "D'un pensiero" from Act I of Bellini's La sonnambula.^[84] "A nice dilemma" uses the dominant rhythm and key of "D'un pensiero" and divides up some of the choral lines between the basses and higher voices to create an oom-pa-pa effect common in Italian opera choruses.^[85]

Production history

The following table summarises the main London productions of Trial by Jury up to the time of Sullivan's death in 1900:

The exclusive performing rights to Trial by Jury and the other Gilbert and Sullivan operas were held by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company until their expiration in 1961, 50 years after Gilbert's death, and no other professional company was authorised to present the Savoy operas in Britain from 1877 until that date.^[33] The following tables show the casts of the principal original D'Oyly Carte productions and touring companies at approximately 10-year intervals through to the 1975 centenary season.^{[105][lower-alpha 11]}

Notes

References

Sources

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• Allen, Reginald (1958). The First Night Gilbert and Sullivan. London: Chappell. OCLC 3156011.
• Allen, Reginald (1975a). The First Night Gilbert and Sullivan [Centennial Edition]. London: Chappell. OCLC 550681465.
• Allen, Reginald (1975b). Sir Arthur Sullivan: Composer and Personage. New York: The Pierpont Morgan Library. ISBN 978-0-87598-049-2.
• Archer, William (1882). "Mr. W. S. Gilbert". English Dramatists of To-Day. London: Low, Marston, Searle and Rivington. OCLC 963632829.
• Bradley, Ian (1996). The Complete Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-816503-3.
• Browne, Edith A. (1907). Stars of the Stage: W. S. Gilbert. London: John Lane, The Bodley Head. OCLC 5866733.
• Burgess, A. J. (1997). The Notary and other Lawyers in Gilbert & Sullivan. Hadleigh, Suffolk: Jardine Press. ISBN 978-0-9525594-1-2.
• Crowther, Andrew (2000). Contradiction Contradicted – The Plays of W. S. Gilbert. London: Associated University Presses. ISBN 978-0-8386-3839-2.
• Davis, Richard Harding (ed. Charles Belmont Davis) (1995). Adventures and Letters of Richard Harding Davis. Project Gutenberg. ISBN 978-0-8386-3839-2. Retrieved 1 June 2008.
• Dark, Sidney and Rowland Grey (1923). W. S. Gilbert: His Life and Letters. Ayer Publishing. ISBN 978-0-405-08430-0.
• Fitzgerald, Percy Hetherington (1899). The Savoy Opera and the Savoyards. London: Chatto & Windus. OCLC 4635323. Trial by Jury Fisher Sullivan Bromley Pepper.
• Gänzl, Kurt (1986). The British Musical Theatre—Volume I, 1865–1914. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-333-39839-5.
• Gänzl, Kurt (2021). Gilbert and Sullivan: The Players and the Plays. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press. ISBN 978-1-4384-8545-4.
• Gilbert, W. S. & Sullivan, Arthur (1912). Trial by Jury (Vocal Score). London: Chappell. OCLC 48594935.
• Goldberg, Isaac (1929). The Story of Gilbert and Sullivan, or The 'Compleat' Savoyard. London: John Murray. OCLC 758343552.
• Jacobs, Arthur (1986). Arthur Sullivan: A Victorian Musician. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-282033-4.
• Lawrence, Arthur (1899). Sir Arthur Sullivan, Life Story, Letters and Reminiscences (1907 ed.). London: Duffield. OCLC 1303888.
• McElroy, George C. (1984). "Whose Zoo; or, When Did The Trial Begin?". Nineteenth Century Theatre Research. 12: 39–54.
• MacQueen-Pope, W. J. (1947). Carriages at Eleven. London: Hutchinson. OCLC 155797891.
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• Stedman, Jane W. (1996). W. S. Gilbert, A Classic Victorian & His Theatre. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-816174-3.
• Walbrook, H. M. (1922). Gilbert & Sullivan Opera: A History and A Comment. London: F. V. White. OCLC 3303311.
• Wilson, Robin; Frederic Lloyd (1984). Gilbert & Sullivan – The Official D'Oyly Carte Picture History. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-394-54113-6.
• Young, Percy M. (1971). Sir Arthur Sullivan. London: J. M. Dent. ISBN 0-460-03934-2.