VERO BEACH — Think of it as summer camp for grown-ups – with “camp” being the operative word. As many as 35 actors – plus more in the crew – are putting on “The Pirates of Penzance,” the Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera.
The urge to act doesn’t disappear just because it’s hot outside, says Mark Wygonik, the guild president and director of the upcoming show, scheduled for mid-July.
The campy operetta that launched a thousand pirate clichés is a much larger show than a typical guild summer production.
The reason for the off-season effort: to raise money for a recently announced expansion of the community theater.
Not since a 1995 production by the Vero Beach Opera Guild has Vero seen “Penzance” on its stages; the Opera Guild’s more recent incarnation, the Vero Beach Opera, stages only operas.
The Victorian-era works of librettist W.S. Gilbert and composer Authur Sullivan were known in their day as “Savoy operas” or comic operas, to distinguish them from the risqué “operettas.”
They are considered the precursor of today’s musical theater.
This will be a “stripped down” production, Wygonik says.
Sets will be simple, musical accompaniment – a full orchestra in Gilbert and Sullivan’s day – will be limited to a lone piano or a recording. Costumes will be rented for only the lead roles, all in the hopes of keeping outlay low to maximize on the fund-raising.
“You have to have a couple of great costumes,” says Wygonik. “You have to one for Major-General Stanley, and you have to have a fabulous pirate king.”
The guild is looking to increase the square footage of its building, a converted church near the county administration building, by adding on a second or third story. Costs are estimated at up to $500,000.
Summers usually see the guild staging scaled-down reader’s theater or workshops, with winter residents back up north and a smaller audience to draw on.
“Our shows tend to be a little more experimental in summer. We do things like Chekhov or Shakespeare that we would never do in a main stage show in season,” Wygonik says.
He recalls the years when the guild staged not only a summer show but a “shoestring series” of 10 or 12 shows during the course of the year.
“We’re kicking around ideas for next year for doing both a musical and a straight play like reader’s theater or black box because there are a lot of people who aren’t singers who want to do something in the summer.”
“The Pirates of Penzance” will be using eight to 12 women and 15 to 25 men.
The operetta tells the story of Frederic, a young man accidentally apprenticed to a pirate as a child. He serves his time with the merry band, but as the group toasts his 21st birthday, the newly-liberated Frederic does a 180-degree moral turn, and declares himself devoted to the abolition of piracy.
Throw in some pretty girls and their loopy dad, the Major-General, and the contractual snafu that Frederic was born in a leap year, and the romp has plenty of fodder to fuel its happy ending.
Cliché or not, “The Pirates of Penzance” was good enough for Linda Ronstadt and Kevin Kline on Broadway, in a slightly tweaked version produced by Joseph Papp of “A Chorus Line.”
The operetta opened first in Central Park as part of the summertime Shakespeare in the Park series. It then moved to Broadway and ended up as a film in 1983. Ronstadt, in the role of Mabel, was nominated for both a Tony and a Golden Globe.
“I saw the set design for Joe Papp’s version and there were trampolines for the pirates to jump on. I thought, Holy Cow, we’re not doing this,” says Wygonik.
Papp’s version still requires royalties; the original version is free, well into no-cost public domain since it premiered in New York on New Year’s Eve 1879.
Wygonik has already sparked interest from a number of singers involved in church-based choral groups who finally have some evenings free and want the fun of performing on stage.
“We’re hoping all the best singers in town come out,” he says. “It’s unfortunate for us that people involved in church chorales during the normal course of the year cannot really schedule time to do a show with us.”
As for auditions, there’s one role that won’t require one, reserved for the winner of an auction item at the Dancing with the Vero Stars benefit for the Healthy Start Coalition.
“The money goes to the charity, but we benefit by getting someone new in our show,” Wygonik says.
Years ago, the winner of a walk-on role was the late Steve Myers.
“His wife won it for him and he did a walk-on in ‘Gypsy,’” recalls Wygonik. “He was bitten by the bug and went on to do all kinds of shows.”
