First produced by Robert Courtneidge, the musical opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London, on 29 April 1909, and ran for 809 performances. This was the third longest run for any musical theatre piece up to that time. The production starred Phyllis Dare, Dan Rolyat and Florence Smithson. A Broadway production opened in 1910 and ran for 193 performances. The piece was toured extensively, revived professionally in Britain, and a silent film version was made in 1927. It was popular with amateur theatre groups, particularly in Britain, throughout the 20th century. Recordings of some of its numbers were made in 1909 and 1915 by original members of the London cast, and more substantial excerpts and one complete performance have been released on compact disc.
The work is regarded by theatre historians as the finest example of its genre, with Monckton's melodic talent supported by Talbot's technical skill. The score contains elements characteristic of the Savoy Operas of the previous generation as well as broader numbers reminiscent of the music hall.
Background
Arcadia, a legendary land of rural perfection peopled by beautiful virtuous innocents, first described by the Ancient Greeks, was a popular setting for writers of the 19th century, notably W. S. Gilbert (in Happy Arcadia and Iolanthe). The development of aviation and flying in the early years of the 20th century captivated the public's attention. Writers fantasised about the strange adventures that might befall those who ventured to travel by the new-fangled aeroplane. A forced landing, perhaps, in some long-forgotten land where time has stood still. These stories laid the basis for The Arcadians.[1]
Historically, musically and dramatically, The Arcadians and the other Edwardian musical comedies sit between the fading world of British comic opera, like the Gilbert and Sullivan works, and the later styles of musical comedy and music hall. The Arcadians particularly illustrates this, with the innocent Arcadians representing the older style, and the brash Londoners embodying the new. This contrast between simplicity and cynicism drive the plot and its humour, a contrast personified in the character of Smith, who is magically transformed during the piece.[4] In 1999, Raymond McCall observed that theatre historians have variously referred to the work as an operetta or a musical comedy, commenting:
The score itself contributes to the discrepancy in labeling. The music for the Arcadian scenes in Act I has harmonies and rhythms that suggest the styles of Arthur Sullivan and Edward German; the quick step, however, dominates the London scenes. Simplicitas, like Bunthorne [in Patience] saunters down Piccadilly, but the tune is definitely not pre-Raphaelite"[5]
Production history
The piece was commissioned and staged by the impresario Robert Courtneidge, at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London. The production opened on 29 April 1909 and ran for 809 performances.[6] Only two musical shows had previously had longer runs: Dorothy (1886) and A Chinese Honeymoon (1901), which ran for 931 and 1,075 performances respectively.[7] The show starred Phyllis Dare as Eileen, Dan Rolyat as Smith, Harry Welchman as Jack, and Florence Smithson as Sombra.[8]Cicely Courtneidge, the producer's daughter, later took over the role of Eileen.[9] The musical director was Arthur Wood.[10] The costumes were by Wilhelm, who 27 years earlier had designed the Arcadian costumes for Iolanthe.[n 1]
Climax of Act II, with Simplicitas riding "The Deuce"
A Broadway production opened at the Liberty Theatre in 1910, and ran for 193 performances, starring Frank Moulan, Connie Ediss and Julia Sanderson.[12] Courtneidge assembled a touring company, which played the piece in the British provinces for ten years.[13] He revived the show in 1915 in London, with success. The cast included Welchman, Alfred Lester and H. C. Pearce from the original production; other members were Cicely Courtneidge, Jack Hulbert, Hope Charteris and Dan Agar.[14]
The piece was popular with amateur theatre groups throughout the 20th century, particularly in Britain, where it received more than 225 productions.[15] In modern productions it has become customary to amend some of Ambient and Thompson's dialogue, which is full of topical references and old fashioned puns, but the gentle satire of the pretensions and follies of high society has not dated.[16]
Synopsis
Act I
Sombra, one of the beautiful but naïve Arcadians, is troubled by reports of a place beyond the sea where "monsters" live in cages of brick and stone and never tell the truth – a place called London. The Arcadians beg Father Time to bring them a Londoner. He reluctantly agrees and causes the amateur aviator James Smith, an ageing London restaurateur with passions for aeroplanes and philandering, to crash land in Arcadia, where no one tells lies or grows older, where money is unknown, and employment is unnecessary. The Arcadians and Smith exchange stories, and Smith introduces the Arcadians to some new concepts: ugliness, jealousy and lying. He attempts to seduce Sombra by telling a lie. Far from impressed, the Arcadians immerse him in the Well of Truth, from which he emerges transformed into a young man, wearing the scanty costume of Arcadia, with a luxuriant head of hair but minus his mutton-chop whiskers. They christen him "Simplicitas", and he will remain young until he tells a lie. His hosts dispatch him with missionary zeal, and two agelessly beautiful Arcadian nymphs, Sombra and her sister, Chrysea, to wicked London to "set up the truth in England for ever more, and banish the lie."
Act II
The luckless jockey Peter Doody
They begin their crusade at Askwood races, where it is Cup Day. They cause considerable curiosity, being still clothed in the costumes of Arcady (everyone else is dressed up formally in this scene, anticipating the similar scene in My Fair Lady 50 years later).[n 2] But instead of improving the Londoners, the Arcadians adopt some of their wicked ways, including betting on the races. Here Simplicitas meets his wife Mrs. Smith, who, not recognising her husband, proceeds to fall in love with the young stranger. Simplicitas flirts with her and agrees to help her open up an Arcadian restaurant in London. Then comes an opportunity for Simplicitas to distinguish himself. Jack Meadows, who was to have ridden his temperamental horse "The Deuce" has been thrown by the animal, and Peter Doody, the hapless replacement jockey, has also been injured by "The Deuce". Sombra arranges that Simplicitas shall take his mount, as the Arcadians have the gift of speech with animals, and the brute becomes as gentle as a lamb. Simplicitas (while sound asleep), upon "The Deuce," wins the race, to the great satisfaction of its owner. Romantic complications ensue between Meadows and Eileen Cavanagh, a young Irish woman.
Act III
Simplicitas/Smith's Arcadian restaurant has become the rage of London, as the menu is that of the simple life. Simplicitas, however, is not living and spreading the simple life as his Arcadian friends had hoped, but rather is having "the time of his life." Mrs. Smith becomes suspicious of Simplicitas, and in endeavouring to explain the reason for an all-night absence, he tells another lie. He falls into the ornamental well in the restaurant and emerges as his former self, with his bald head and shaggy whiskers, to the astonishment and somewhat to the confusion of his wife. Sombra and Chrysea, realising that their mission to make all London tell the truth has failed, return to Arcadia – but they leave two happy couples behind.
The score was substantially revised during the original run, with new numbers interpolated. The numbers listed in the table are from a 1909 vocal score.[19]
Words by
Music by
Act I
1.
Introduction and opening chorus – "Arcadians are we"
Wimperis
Talbot
2.
"I quite forgot Arcadia" – Father Time and Chorus
Wimperis
Monckton
3.
"The Joy of Life" – Sombra, Chrysæa, Strephon and Astrophel
Wimperis
Talbot
4.
"Look what hovers there above us" – Chorus
Wimperis
Talbot
5.
"The Pipes of Pan are calling" – Sombra
Wimperis
Monckton
6.
"All a lie!" – Chorus
Wimperis
Talbot
7.
"Sweet Simplicitas" – Simplicitas and Chorus
Wimperis
Talbot
8.
Finale: "To all and each" – Sombra, Chrysæa, Strephon, Astrophel and Chorus
Wimperis
Talbot
Act II
9.
"That's all over, bar the shouting" – Chorus
Wimperis
Monckton
10.
"Back your fancy" – Bobbie and Chorus
Wimperis
Monckton
11.
"The Girl with a Brogue" – Eileen and Chorus
Wimperis
Monckton
12.
Shower chorus – "This is really altogether too provoking"
Wimperis
Talbot
13.
"Arcady is ever young" – Sombra
Monckton and Wimperis
Monckton
14.
"Somewhere" – Simplicitas
Wimperis
Monckton
15.
"Fickle Fortune" – Jack and Chorus
Wimperis
Monckton
16.
"Charming Weather" – Eileen and Jack
Monckton and Wimperis
Monckton
17.
Finale – "The horses are out"
Wimperis
Talbot
Act III
18.
"Plant your posies" – Chorus
Wimperis
Talbot
19.
"I like London" – Chrysæa
Wimperis
Talbot
20.
"My Motter" – Doody
Wimperis
Talbot
21.
Chorus of Belgravians – "Cheer for Simplicitas!" – Chorus
Wimperis
Monckton
22.
"Bring me a rose – Eileen
Monckton and Wimperis
Monckton
23.
"Truth is so beautiful" – Jack, Bobbie and Simplicitas
Numbers 15, 19, 22 and 25 were later cut, the last replaced by a waltz song for Sombra, "Here amid the city's clamour".[20] Another edition of the vocal score, also dated 1909 but evidently printed later than that cited here, includes four new numbers: "I'm a case of complete reformation" (Simplicitas and Chorus, Act I, music by Talbot), which was later cut;[20][21] "The only girl alive" (Jack, Act III) and "Come back to Arcady" (Sombra, Act III), both with music by Talbot; and most notably one of the show's big hit songs, "All down Piccadilly" (Simplicitas and Chorus, Act II), with music by Monckton who also co-wrote the words with Wimperis.[22] Other numbers added during the run were "People often tell us luck and love are jealous" (Jack and Chorus) and "Little George Washington, once on a day, took out his hatchet and, so people say" (Simplicitas, Jack and Bobbie).[20]
Critical opinion
The show received favourable reviews. The Observer, though noting that an Arcadian theme was bound to provoke comparisons with Gilbert, found that the new piece "stands out among other plays of its class" with "moments to be remembered with joy".[8]The Manchester Guardian, commenting that the piece would be "welcomed by patrons of musical comedy who had had their full dose of the Merry Widow", praised the originality of the writing, and called the score "simple and unpretentious, but melodious and pleasing".[23]The Times said that Monckton and Talbot had surpassed themselves in their music, and that Courtneidge's production "showed ingenuity, care and to some extent originality, so that familiar elements took on an unfamiliar look and that new things had their full effect."[24]The Daily Express observed, "surely it is a long time since an audience enjoyed a first night as much as this … [Courtneidge] has achieved the seemingly impossible. He has produced a 'new' musical comedy which really is new." The paper singled out for praise the songs, "The pipes of Pan", "Light is my heart", "The Girl with a Brogue", "Sweet Simplicitas", and "My motter".[25]
The Arcadians is widely regarded as the finest Edwardian musical comedy.[4] The historian Richard Traubner calls it "indisputably the greatest operetta (or musical comedy, if you will) of the Edwardian age".[26] In 2006, Oxford University Press's Encyclopedia of Popular Music commented, "The show had a truly memorable score, and was full of engaging songs such as 'The Pipes Of Pan', 'The Joy Of Life' and 'Arcadia Is Ever Young', all sung by Florence Smithson; 'The Girl With The Brogue' (Phyllis Dare), 'Charming Weather' and 'Half Past Two' (Dare and Harry Welchman), 'Somewhere' (Dan Rolyat), and 'My Motter', which is sung in typically gloomy fashion by Alfred Lister. Another important song, 'All Down Piccadilly', was added at a later date, and became an accepted part of the score.[27] The critic Andrew Lamb writes that The Arcadians is the best known of the works in which Talbot's greater technical expertise complemented the melodic talent of his collaborators such as Monckton. Lamb observes that Talbot was particularly skilled at writing ensembles and finales and that such numbers as the opening chorus, 'I like London', 'My Motter' and 'Half-past Two' "testify to Talbot's inventiveness and craftsmanship."[28]
Recordings and film
Members of the original cast recorded the following numbers from the show: "The pipes of Pan", "The girl with a brogue", "Arcady is ever young", "My motter", "Bring me a rose", "Come back to Arcady" and "Light is my heart". These recordings, made in 1909 and 1915, have been reissued on CD by EMI.[29] In 1913 the Edison Light Opera Company made wax cylinder recordings of "Arcadians are we", "The girl with a brogue", "Arcady is ever young", "Charming weather", "Bring me a rose" and "Truth is so beautiful."[30]
↑ Wilhelm designed all the costumes for the 1882 production of Iolanthe but was not credited in the programme.[11]
↑ Traubner comments that it is difficult to believe that Cecil Beaton had not seen the black and white photographs of the original West End or Broadway productions when he was designing the Ascot scene in My Fair Lady a half century later, "though it is possible he did not".[17]
↑ Welchman was ill and did not appear during the first three weeks of the run; H. E. Pearce covered for him in addition to retaining his own role of Astrophel in Act I.[18]
↑ The numbers omitted are: "I quite forgot Arcadia", "Look what hovers there above us", "All a lie!", "Sweet Simplicitas", "That’s all over, bar the shouting", "The horses are out", "Plant your posies", "Cheer for Simplicitas" and "My heart flies homing".[29]
↑ "The Arcadians", The Times, 24 April 1909, p. 14; "The Arcadians", The Observer, 2 May 1909, p. 9; and "Theatres", The Times, 6 May 1909, p. 10, and 15 May 1909, p. 10
↑ Larkin, Colin (ed). "Arcadians, The", Encyclopedia of Popular Music, 4th edition, Oxford Music Online, Oxford University Press, retrieved 5 June 2014 (subscription required)
↑ Lamb, Andrew. "Talbot, Howard", Grove Music Online, Oxford Music Online, Oxford University Press, retrieved 5 June 2014 (subscription required)
This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1909.
Dame Esmerelda Cicely Courtneidge, was an Australian-born British actress, comedian and singer. The daughter of the producer and playwright Robert Courtneidge, she was appearing in his productions in the West End by the age of 16, and was quickly promoted from minor to major roles in his Edwardian musical comedies.
Lionel John Alexander Monckton was an English composer of musical theatre. He became Britain's most popular composer of Edwardian musical comedy in the early years of the 20th century.
Félix Marie Henri Tilkin, better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian-born composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language, who made his career in London and later New York. He composed some forty musical comedies and operettas.
George Joseph Edwardes was an English theatre manager and producer of Irish ancestry who brought a new era in musical theatre to the British stage and beyond.
Tom Jones is a comic opera in three acts by Edward German founded upon Henry Fielding's 1749 novel, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, with a libretto by Robert Courtneidge and Alexander M. Thompson and lyrics by Charles H. Taylor.
Howard Munkittrick, better known as Howard Talbot, was an American-born, English-raised conductor and composer of Irish descent. He was best known for writing the music to several hit Edwardian musical comedies, including A Chinese Honeymoon, The Arcadians and The Boy, as well as a number of other successful British musicals during the first two decades of the 20th century.
Robert Courtneidge was a British theatrical manager-producer and playwright. He is best remembered as the co-author of the light opera Tom Jones (1907) and the producer of The Arcadians (1909). He was the father of the actress Cicely Courtneidge, who played in many of his early 20th century productions.
Edwardian musical comedy was a form of British musical theatre that extended beyond the reign of King Edward VII in both directions, beginning in the early 1890s, when the Gilbert and Sullivan operas' dominance had ended, until the rise of the American musicals by Jerome Kern, Rodgers and Hart, George Gershwin and Cole Porter following the First World War.
Arthur Harold Wimperis was an English playwright, lyricist and screenwriter, who contributed lyrics and libretti to popular Edwardian musical comedies written for the stage. But, with the advent of talking films, he switched to screenwriting, finding even greater success in this medium.
The Blue Moon is an Edwardian musical comedy with music composed by Howard Talbot and Paul Rubens, lyrics by Percy Greenbank and Rubens and a book by Harold Ellis and by Alexander M. Thompson. It is set in India during the days of the British Raj, and concerns the love of a singing girl for a young British army officer.
The Arcadians is a 1927 British comedy film directed by Victor Saville, and starring Ben Blue, Jeanne De Casalis and Vesta Sylva. It is a silent adaptation of the musical The Arcadians. It is on the BFI 75 Most Wanted list of missing films, but the British Film Institute has reported that an "incomplete and deteriorating nitrate print ... was apparently viewed prior to July 2008". It was made at the Lime Grove Studios in Shepherd's Bush.
Harry Welchman was an English star of musical theatre. He made several appearances in non-musical plays, but was remembered as, in the words of The Times, "perhaps the most popular musical comedy hero on the London stage in the years between the wars."
Princess Caprice is a musical theatre work described as a "comedy with music", in three acts, with music by Leo Fall. The book was adapted by Alexander M. Thompson from Fall's operetta Der liebe Augustin by Rudolf Bernauer and Ernst Welisch. The lyrics were by A. Scott-Craven, Harry Beswick and Percy Greenbank. Much of the music was from Der liebe Augustin, but Fall composed four new numbers, with lyrics by Scott-Craven, for the new piece. The story involves mistaken identities and farcical financial dealings at a European palace, following which the proper romantic partners are paired happily.
Florence Smithson was an actress and singer celebrated in Edwardian musical comedy. In her early career she was an opera singer. She was spotted by the impresario Robert Courtneidge and recruited for his productions in the West End of London and on tour, most notably the hit musical The Arcadians. She was known for the purity of her soprano singing voice.
Alfred Lester, real name Alfred Edwin Leslie, was an English actor and comedian. Born into a theatrical family, he learnt his craft touring in melodramas, as a young man, but made his reputation as a comedian in musical comedy, music hall and, later, revue.
Dan Rolyat, born Herbert Taylor, was an English actor and singer. After an apprenticeship with a touring company he was engaged by the impresarios George Edwardes and Robert Courtneidge to play comic roles in musical comedy. He also played in variety shows and, later in his career, in farce.
Harold Harley, known by his pen name Mark Ambient, was an English actor and dramatist. He is particularly noted as a writer of the musical comedy The Arcadians, first produced in 1909.
This is a summary of 1909 in music in the United Kingdom.
Daly's Theatre was a Broadway theatre at 1221 Broadway and 30th Street. It was built in 1867 and opened that year as Banvard's Museum but changed its name the following year to Wood's Museum and Metropolitan. In 1876 it became the Broadway Theatre, and finally was named Daly's Theatre in 1879 when it was acquired by Augustin Daly. After 1899, it was operated by the Shubert family. The building was demolished in 1920, after serving as a burlesque theatre and cinema.
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