Following four-star rave reviews for their recent production of Orpheus in the Underworld, Opera della Luna make their first visit to Wilton’s with two hilarious one-act comedies by the French master of comic opera: Croquefer and L’ile De Tulipatan by Jacques Offenbach, sung in English in new versions by Jeff Clarke.
Croquefer or
The Last of the Paladins
Croquefer has imprisoned the daughter of his arch-rival: Mousse-a-Mort, with whom he has been at war for 23 years. Despite having lost most of his body parts, including his tongue, at the Crusades, Mousse-a-Mort is determined to fight one last battle to save his daughter. Their bloody final fight-to-the-death is only prevented by the deft interference of Croquefer’s housekeeper, who cunningly poisons the water, thereby inflicting on all the residents of the castle a devastating and debilitating dose of the squits.
L’Ile de Tulipatan
On the island of Tulipatan, King Cacatois XXII is unaware that his only son and heir, Alexis, is in fact biologically, his daughter. Knowing how desperate he was for a son, the doctors concealed the child’s true sex from the king, who has now grown increasingly despairing of his son’s gentle disposition.
Coincidentally, in order to avoid her child being conscripted into the army, the wife of the King’s Field Marshall has also lied to her husband about their daughter, who is in fact, a boy. How extraordinary it would be if these two bizarrely brought-up children were to meet and somehow fall in love...
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