Go-Bang is an English musical comedy

Edwardian Musical Comedy

Edwardian musical comedies were British musical theatre shows from the period between 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 World War I.Between...

 with words by Adrian Ross

Adrian Ross

For the NFL player see Adrian Ross Arthur Reed Ropes , better known under the pseudonym Adrian Ross, was a prolific writer of lyrics, contributing songs to more than sixty British musical comedies in the late 19th and early 20th centuries...

 and music by F. Osmond Carr.

The piece was produced by Fred Harris and opened at the Trafalgar Square Theatre on 10 March 1894. It ran for 159 performances. The show starred Harry Grattan

Harry Grattan

Harry Grattan was a British stage actor, singer, dancer and writer best known for his performances in musical comedies around 1900.- Life and career :...

, George Grossmith, Jr.

George Grossmith, Jr.

George Grossmith, Jr. was a British actor, theatre producer and manager, director, playwright and songwriter, best remembered for his work in and with Edwardian musical comedies...

, Arthur Playfair

Arthur Playfair

Arthur Wyndham Playfair was an English actor and singer. Beginning in Victorian burlesque and comic operas, Playfair became known for his roles in Edwardian musical comedy and, later, in musical revues.-Biography:...

, Jessie Bond

Jessie Bond

Jessie Bond was an English singer and actress best known for creating the mezzo-soprano soubrette roles in the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas. She spent twenty years on the stage, the bulk of them with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company.Musical from an early age, Bond began a concert singing...

, and dancer Letty Lind

Letty Lind

Letitia Elizabeth Rudge, better known as Letty Lind , was an English actress, dancer and acrobat, best known for her work in burlesque at the Gaiety Theatre, and in musical theatre at Daly's Theatre, in London....

. The American child prodigy "Baby Costello" danced in the interval between acts. Whereas Ross generally acted as lyricist only, in this case he created the book as well as the lyrics.

Go-Bang had a lot of competition in London in 1894, which saw the openings of The Chieftain

The Chieftain

The Chieftain is a two-act comic opera by Arthur Sullivan and F. C. Burnand based on their 1867 opera, The Contrabandista. It consists of substantially the same first act as the 1867 work with a completely new second act...

by Arthur Sullivan

Arthur Sullivan

Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...

 and F. C. Burnand, His Excellency

His Excellency (opera)

His Excellency is a two-act comic opera with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by F. Osmond Carr. The piece concerns a practical-joking governor whose pranks threaten to make everyone miserable, until the Prince Regent kindly foils the governor's plans...

by Carr and W. S. Gilbert

W. S. Gilbert

Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...

, The Lady Slavey by Gustave Kerker

Gustave Kerker

Gustave Adolph Kerker was a German composer and conductor who made a career in London and America. He became a musical director for Broadway theatre productions and wrote the music for a series of musicals.-Life and career:...

 and George Dance

George Dance (dramatist)

George Dance was an English lyricist and librettist in the 1890s and an important theatrical manager at the beginning of the 20th century....

, a revival of Little Jack Sheppard

Little Jack Sheppard

Little Jack Sheppard is a burlesque melodrama written by Henry Pottinger Stephens and William Yardley, with music by Meyer Lutz, with songs contributed by Florian Pascal, Corney Grain, Arthur Cecil, Michael Watson, Henry J. Leslie, Alfred Cellier and Hamilton Clarke...

by Meyer Lutz

Meyer Lutz

Wilhelm Meyer Lutz was a German-born English composer and conductor who is best known for light music, musical theatre and burlesques of well-known works....

 and H. P. Stephens at the Gaiety Theatre

Gaiety Theatre, London

The Gaiety Theatre, London was a West End theatre in London, located on Aldwych at the eastern end of the Strand. The theatre was established as the Strand Musick Hall , in 1864 on the former site of the Lyceum Theatre. It was rebuilt several times, but closed from the beginning of World War II...

, Mirette

Mirette (opera)

Mirette is an opéra comique in three acts composed by André Messager, first produced at the Savoy Theatre, London, on 3 July 1894.Mirette exists in two distinct versions. The first version of the libretto was written in French by Michel Carré but this was never performed. English lyrics were...

by André Messager

André Messager

André Charles Prosper Messager , was a French composer, organist, pianist, conductor and administrator. His stage compositions included ballets and 30 opéra comiques and operettas, among which Véronique, had lasting success, with Les p'tites Michu and Monsieur Beaucaire also enjoying international...

 and Ross, and The Shop Girl

The Shop Girl

The Shop Girl was a musical comedy in two acts written by H. J. W. Dam, with Lyrics by Dam and Adrian Ross and music by Ivan Caryll, and additional numbers by Lionel Monckton and Ross. It was first produced by George Edwardes at the Gaiety Theatre in London, opening on 24 November 1894...

, an extremely successful musical comedy by H. J. W. Dam, Ivan Caryll

Ivan Caryll

Félix Marie Henri Tilkin , better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language...

, Lionel Monckton

Lionel Monckton

Lionel John Alexander Monckton was an English writer and composer of musical theatre. He was Britain's most popular musical theatre composer of the early years of the 20th century.-Early life:...

 and Ross.

Synopsis

Dam Row, the Boojam-elect of the Asian country of Go-Bang, visits England to learn Western manners, escorted by Sir Reddan Tapeleigh. There, he finds that he is not Boojam after all. He falls in love with a dancer after seeing her performance, although he generally finds it difficult to grasp Western ways. He returns to Go-Bang as prime minister to the new chief, a humble greengrocer (previously Sir Reddan's footman), who is to be formally installed as Boojam at the palace in Go Bang. The parents of various girls scheme to marry their daughters to the Boojam. He must stand under the Golden Umbrella, where all decrees are announced, but finds himself married by mistake to three girls in as many minutes. Fortunately, the marriage decree is revoked. Sir Reddan's secretary loves Helen, Sir Reddan's daughter, and she helps him to find documents to prove that he is the rightful Boojam.

Roles and original cast

• Jenkins (A greengrocer) – Harry Grattan
  Harry Grattan
  Harry Grattan was a British stage actor, singer, dancer and writer best known for his performances in musical comedies around 1900.- Life and career :...
  
  
• Sir Reddan Tapeleigh, K.C.S.I. – Arthur Playfair
  Arthur Playfair
  Arthur Wyndham Playfair was an English actor and singer. Beginning in Victorian burlesque and comic operas, Playfair became known for his roles in Edwardian musical comedy and, later, in musical revues.-Biography:...
  
  
• Lieut. The Hon. Augustus Fitzpoop – George Grossmith, Jr.
  George Grossmith, Jr.
  George Grossmith, Jr. was a British actor, theatre producer and manager, director, playwright and songwriter, best remembered for his work in and with Edwardian musical comedies...
  
  
• Wang (Guardian of the Golden Canopy) – Fred Storey
• Narain (Secretary to the Boojam – Edgar Stevens
• Dam Row (Boojam elect of Go-Bang) – John L. Shine
• Helen Tapeleigh (Daughter of Sir Reddan) – Jessie Bond
  Jessie Bond
  Jessie Bond was an English singer and actress best known for creating the mezzo-soprano soubrette roles in the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas. She spent twenty years on the stage, the bulk of them with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company.Musical from an early age, Bond began a concert singing...
  
  
• Lady Fritterleigh (Widow of an Indian official) – Agnes Hewitt
• Sarah Anne (Housemaid to Sir Reddan) – Adelaide Astor
• Flo, Belle and Daisy Wedderburn (Sisters of Lady Fritterleigh) – Lydia Flopp, Maggie Roberts and Maud Lockett
• Di Dalrymple (Premiere danseuse of the Vanity Theatre) – Letty Lind
  Letty Lind
  Letitia Elizabeth Rudge, better known as Letty Lind , was an English actress, dancer and acrobat, best known for her work in burlesque at the Gaiety Theatre, and in musical theatre at Daly's Theatre, in London....
  
  
• Candidates, waiters, nobles and people of Go-Bang, soldiers, etc.

Reception

A review of the piece spoofed the loose plot (though praising it) in the following verse:

There is certainly not very much of a plot

In the musical farce of Go-Bang,

But, as someone remarks in the course of the larks,

Here the plot "doesn't matter a hang!"

For the music is light, and the dresses are bright,

And the ladies are shapely and tall;

There is dancing and song, and the skirts aren't too long,

And there's frequently no skirt at all.

The Times

The Times

The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

found the plot laboured and the satire heavy-handed, but praised the songs, Letty Lind's dancing, Grattan's and Grossmith's portrayals and Bond's singing. The most popular song was Lind's song "Di, Di, Di", and Lind earned the highest praise from The Observer.

External links

• Information about Morocco Bound and Go Bang at the c20th.com website
• Reviews of Go Bang with photos at the footlightnotes website
• BroadwayWorld production page for Go-Bang
• Archer, William. "Go-Bang–Chapter XII", The Theatrical "World", London: Walter Scott, Limited (1894-1898), pp. 80–85
• List of shows opening in London in 1894 at the NODA website