Ross Snyder will make his directing debut with the Schenectady Light Opera Company during performances of Pirates of Penzance Oct. 21-24, but he’s no stranger to the SLOC stage. In fact, he portrayed one of the comedic opera’s lead characters in a different version of the production, years ago.
`This was a delightful experience, primarily because we had a wonderful cast that got along great, and I’ve actually performed in the show as Major General Stanley, so I knew the show really well and am a real fan of Gilbert and Sullivan,` said Snyder.
Part of the reason Snyder jumped at the chance to rest his acting chops and take a turn directing, was because he was eager to bring back the tradition of presenting light opera. `Pirates of Penzance,` he said, seemed like the perfect show to do just that.
`SLOC has been in business for 83 years and started out as strictly a light opera company, but they tend to get away from doing those anymore so I was very happy to bring one back,` said Snyder. `This is the last show in our existing theater so I thought it appropriate to close that theater with a light opera.`
Light opera was the transition between grand opera and the modern musical. Grand opera is told by three tenors and sung in Italian. Modern musicals that audiences are accustomed to today feature more dialogue with songs to accent the plot. Light opera is somewhere in between, heavy on the singing but with a plot that is advanced by the songs themselves.
Amy Shake graduated from SUNY Fredonia in May and found herself cast as the character Mabel for her first post-college acting gig. She said this light opera is exactly the type of theater she hopes to expose more people to.
`I think this show has been a great learning experience and is one of my first fully staged roles in a while,` said Shake. `I look forward to performing and hope that this will spur the audience’s interest in opera and classical music. It’s light opera, so it’s funny, interesting, a little kitschy. My ongoing goal is always to get people interested because it seems like this is not very well recognized.`
Shake’s character is around 17, the youngest of several sisters, a daddy’s girl, strong-willed and always gets what she wants. She’s the love interest of Frederic, the main character, and Shake said twists and turns commence before they can end up together, happily ever after. Getting into the character of Mabel, said Shake, was her biggest challenge.
It was difficult to get into character, especially in the beginning because Mabel is a flighty, typical 19th century maiden, very proper. Sometimes it can be hard to relate to that because I tend not to be, or try not to be, the sort of ditzy, flighty, dependent type of woman that these girls are,` said Shake. `It was difficult trying to find that and make it realistic for people.`
Richard Mazzaferro plays the Pirate King, a character he said is actually a nobleman masquerading as a pirate. Trying to find the balance between these two dynamics was the trick to making a successful transformation.
`I thought about my own childhood, watching movies with my grandfather and then I’d run out in the backyard with my cousins and play pirates, but it wasn’t as if I wanted to make people walk the plank or anything; and then I was happy to go home and put on my baseball uniform and go to Little League,` said Mazzaferro. `So it was keeping in mind the idea that what the Pirate King really sees are all the romantic notions of being a pirate, like the wind in your hair, steward at your side, even the outfit is outlandish.`
Mazzaferro has performed with SLOC before, starring as the lead role in last year’s production of `Kiss Me Kate.` He said this show’s cast was one of the most impressive he’s performed with.
`I’ve been blessed with a wonderful cast, fantastic singers, excellent comic timing. Even though it’s technically community theater, I’ve worked on a professional stage and there are definitely people in this cast that could easily stand up to any one of those people,` said Mazzaferro.
Snyder said he used the 1980 version of the Broadway hit as inspiration and that audiences can expect a very `silly` show, with plenty of tongue-in-cheek humor and `wonderful music.`
`Pirates of Penzance` will run Thursday, Oct. 21, to Sunday, Oct. 24. Thursday, Friday and Saturday performances are at 8 p.m. and Sunday performances are at 2 p.m. Tickets are $18, $22 and $28 and can be purchased online at sloctheater.org or by calling 1-877-350-7378.“
