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Princess Ida: or, Castle Adamant is an opera with book and lyrics by W.S. Gilbert (who also designed the costumes) and music by Arthur Sullivan, the eighth of their 14 operatic collaborations. It opened on January 5, 1884, at the Savoy Theatre in London, where it ran for 246 performances, a good run (outlasting five of their 13 other operas), but not up to the standards of their most successful works—notably its successor, The Mikado, which ran 672 performances.
Nonetheless Princess Ida—which is one of the most serious of the Savoy operas—remains a favorite with Gilbert & Sullivan aficionados, with its score in particular regarded as perhaps Sullivan’s greatest. The Light Opera Company first staged it in 1992, and returned to it in 2007, both productions being very successful.
The opera is set in Eastern Europe during the 14th or 15th centuries, and its story concerns the dynastic rivalry of two neighboring kings—notably King Gama of Hungary, whose daughter (the title character) has fled an arranged marriage and instead set up a college for women, where she teaches the then-unthinkable principles of women’s rights and equality for all, regardless of rank, wealth or class. In the end the story boils down to whether the opera’s young people are doomed to grow into their parents, repeating all their mistakes, or if they can escape the machinations of their parents, move beyond hatred and violence, and forge a new future for themselves.
In the Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company’s 2023 production of the opera, Kara Vertucci of Lindenhurst plays Princess Ida and Joseph Anthony Smith of Freeport plays Prince Hilarion, with Chris Jurak of Brightwaters as King Gama and Ben Salers of Northport as King Hildebrand. Lady Psyche is played by Patricia Gallagher of West Hempstead, and Lady Blanche by Terry Hochler of East Meadow; Jordan Breslow of Bellmore plays Florian and Richard Risi of Locust Valley plays Cyril. Ida’s brothers, the formidable Warriors Three, are played by Henry Horstmann of Lindenhurst (Arac), John Benvenuto of Floral Park (Guron) and Marc Eliot Stein of Brookyln (Scynthius). Tamara Shyngle of Brentwood plays Chloe, and Hanna Roth of Upper Brookville plays Ada. The director is Gayden Wren, and the music director is Leonard Lehrman.
Held in the Baldwin Room
Photos:1) Kara Vertucci stars as the rebellious Princess Ida in the Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island’s 2023 production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Princess Ida. (Photo by NanMagna. Copyright 2023 The Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island.)
2) Married to each other as infants, Prince Hilarion (Joseph Anthony Smith) and Princess Ida (Kara Vertucci) find themselves on opposite sides in a scene from the Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island’s 2023 production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Princess Ida. (Photo by NanMagna. Copyright 2023 The Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island.)
3) The rival kings Hildebrand (Ben Salers, left) and Gama (Chris Jurak) are, as
always, at odds in a scene from the Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company of
Long Island’s 2023 production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Princess Ida. (Photo by
NanMagna. Copyright 2023 The Gilbert & Sullivan Light Opera Company of
Long Island.)
