Presented by Opera della Luna
Music: Oscar Straus
New English book and lyrics: Jeff Clarke, based on George Bernard Shaw’s Arms and the Man
Opera della Luna is renowned for its innovative and high-class staging of comic opera and operetta. Following last year’s sell-out The Mikado at Wilton’s, the company returns with a new production of an operetta classic.
Oscar Straus’s 1908 opéra bouffe is closely based on George Bernard Shaw’s classic anti-war play Arms and the Man. Shaw did not approve of his play being turned into an operetta and forbade any of his dialogue or his characters’ names being used. It was a very bad business decision on his part as The Chocolate Soldier, a worldwide success, subsequently earned a vast amount more for its writers than Shaw’s celebrated play ever did. Now that Shaw’s work is out of copyright, Opera della Luna have created a new version of the show, restoring much of Shaw’s witty dialogue, and re-instating his original characters. It was given in a rehearsed reading two years ago at Wilton’s and Opera magazine reported that it was brilliantly judged and executed. Timing and tone were spot on, and the musical numbers – in a new orchestral arrangements by James Widden, nattily conducted by James Ham – were confident and classy, the conversational idiom suave.
A new fully staged production; the first in the UK since 1940, when its run at the Shaftesbury Theatre was cut short when the theatre was bombed.
“there are comic twists and turns with every scene…. And the singing is glorious.”
“Every Opera della Luna show is a labour of love: every Opera della Luna show has youth, freshness and fun. Long may it flourish.”
Rupert Christiansen
