As we set sail into spring semester, President Kathleen C. Zhou welcomes our patrons to join us for our 60th Anniversary performance of H.M.S. Pinafore; or, the Lass that Loved a Sailor, March 25-April 3
Letter and order form available on our patrons page!
Written by Trevor Mullin
As we depart from our 1920s style Ruddigore, gears are in motion here at HRG&SP in preparation for H.M.S. Pinafore and our 60th anniversary this spring! As we welcome Peryn E. A. Reeves-Darby and Michaela J. Kane on Board, we are very excited for what next semester brings. With experience as both an actor and our most recent stage manager, Peryn has continually been a valuable member of our community. Likewise, Michaela’s previous technical experience and dedication to the organization provides a rewarding addition to our Board. We look forward to working with them more in the future!
As Pinafore is quickly approaching, we have also selected our director and music director for the upcoming semester. With the directorial prowess of Olivia Munk and musical expertise of Jacob Moscona-Skolnik, everyone is in for a high quality theatrical experience!
With our highly-talented designers and technicians, we are very excited to once again transform the Agassiz stage into a nautical wonder! We hope everyone else is stoked for this upcoming project and keep an eye out for additional updates in the coming months!
Again, if any alums are interested in being involved in Pinafore for our 60th anniversary, please reach out to the producers at pinaforeprods-2016@googlegroups.com. We would love to hear from you!
Apologies for missing last week’s blog post! This week’s post is brought to you by Allegra C. Caldera ’17, one of the producers for next semester’s production of H.M.S. Pinafore! Thank you all so much for coming to see Ruddigore! We are so excited to start working on Pinafore. See you soon!
Written by Allegra Caldera
What a great weekend! Thank you so much to everyone who attended our production of Ruddigore; or, The Witch’s Curse, and congratulations to the cast, staff and orchestra on a successful run. Closing weekend was long, but rewarding.
We had a lively Milk and Cookies Matinee Saturday afternoon. During the backstage tour Raymond W.S. Ng ’17, one Ruddigore’s producers, explained some of the secrets of our life-sized, hand-painted ‘ghost portraits.’ If you, too, want to know how our amazing paint team captured the actors so well, or just how dark it is inside a ‘ghost box’ – well, you’ll just have to come to a backstage tour to find out!
Later on Saturday evening, we hosted a reunion-filled Alumni Night – capped off with the traditional trip to the Kong, for Chinese food and cross-generational conversation. I was lucky enough to sit with several recent alumni, who had inspiring (and cautionary) tales of life and theatre post-Harvard.
As we hurtle towards opening night next Friday, Tech Week is well underway. The Agassiz stage is morphing into the world of 1920s New Orleans under the vision of our set designers Elizabeth Pattyn and Rahul Kulka and the technical expertise of Trevor A. Mullin ’17.
The cast, staff, and board are all working together to ramp up the show process this week. After load-in on Sunday, most of the drops were up and the team began to figure out how to engineer the set change. Ruddigore is one of the more challenging technical shows in the G&S canon with the transition from the street scene of Act I to the Ruddigore mansion in Act II. Those of you who joined us for The Gondoliers last fall will recall the change of scene from the piazzas of Venice to the palace of Barataria, and we hope to enchant you again with two distinct settings! Our talented lighting designer Kat C. Zhou ’17 has been up in the scaffolding all week as the build crew works hard in the set shop downstairs. Our costumes team is in the process of sewing dresses for the gaggle of bridesmaids and clothing the ghosts of Murgatroyds past in spooky garb that will certainly be Halloween appropriate.
Tech week is definitely my favorite part of the show process—the astounding amount of time and energy our talented technicians put into their work is incredible, and we can’t wait for you all to see it soon!
Tickets for Ruddigore can be purchased through the Harvard Box Office or at the door (cash only). The show runs October 30-November 1 and November 5-8, click here for more information about showtimes and receptions.
Written by Emma Adler
Ruddigore; or, The Witch’s Curse, was the tenth penned of Gilbert and Sullivan’s fourteen comic operas. Like all of Gilbert and Sullivan’s works from Trial by Jury onward, Ruddigore debuted at the Savoy Theater, under the auspices of the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company. Premiering in 1887, Ruddigore followed fast on the heels of The Mikado; this would prove to have a detrimental effect on the opera’s critical reception, causing many to dismiss the ghostly comic opera as not on a par with its predecessor. The New York Times review noted: “When the curtain fell there was a hissing – the first ever heard in the Savoy Theatre.”
Written by Laura Peterson
This past Sunday, the cast and orchestra of Ruddigore joined together for the time-
honored tradition of Sitzprobe! With our conductor, Sean Rodan, at the helm, the orchestra played through the entire show while the cast sang along. It is amazing to see how many people return to our productions semester after semester. We as the producers and the Board of Directors were extremely pleased with the progress made by all of the musicians throughout the rehearsal process this far, and we cannot wait to see the strides they continue to make between now and opening night on Friday, October 30.
Written by Raymond Ng
Behind-the-scenes of Ruddigore are the painters, costumers, designers, builders, and many other staff who work tirelessly to turn a group of college students on an empty stage into the ghosts and townspeople of Rederring. As one of the producers, I’ve had the immense pleasure of working with the staff, meeting many times to ensure that Opening Night will be spectacular. I look forward to sharing what we’ve created!
Here are our dedicated and talented staff:
Written by Alex Raun
The first Ruddigorechestra rehearsal took place this week! The musicians, from college freshmen to Cambridge community members, met each other and played through most of the show under the direction of Sean Rodan, our music director. They sounded incredible, and with vocal rehearsals underway, we can’t wait for the Sitzprobe, which will take place in a couple weeks! Stay tuned. (Pun intended)
Written by Kat Zhou
Welcome to a new semester of blog posts! We are so excited to share the show process with you. This week, we held our first rehearsals and now have a set design plan. Elizabeth Pattyn and Rahul Kulka have done an amazing job with their design, and I’m so very excited to see it get built and painted.
I would also love to share with you our poster for this year:
We look forward to seeing you at our shows! Click below to see the cast and staff list!
Hello friends! I hope you’ve had a wonderful summer. I’ve finally put up the production photos from our spring production of Iolanthe. They are available here.
We hope to see to see you this year during our 60th season! We are so very excited for such a big year, starting with Ruddigore this fall and culminating in H.M.S. Pinafore this spring.
As always, please be in touch if you have any questions or concerns!
Harvard-Radcliffe Gilbert and Sullivan Players 