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Richard D’Oyly Carte. By Paul Seeley

2020; Oxford University Press; Volume: 101; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1093/ml/gcaa066

1477-4631

James Brooks Kuykendall,

Theatre and Performance Studies

That this biography, coming well more than a century after its subject’s death, is the first substantial treatment of a figure as significant as Richard D’Oyly Carte is a good reminder of the research remaining to be done, even in the comparatively well-trodden territory of the Savoy operas. A surprising percentage of Paul Seeley’s source material is published, but before Seeley no one had gone through it with an eye to Carte’s role; this, Seeley shows, has been under our noses the whole time. Indeed, the designation ‘Savoy’ itself is a reminder that W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan were not a collaborative duo, but rather part of a triumvirate with Carte; further, Carte’s vision, initiative, patience, and ability to negotiate allowed his Savoy Theatre to find its way into Victorian consciousness as a jewel of respectable entertainment. Collaboration with Gilbert–Sullivan was actually only one of the pies in which...