Pirates! The Penzance Musical Broadway Reviews

Despite such mismatches between the original and the remake, “Pirates!” is still a feather in the tricorn of the Roundabout Theater Company, which produced and nurtured it. Operettas don’t last 146 years just because they’re good. (I love Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Ruddigore” too, but have never seen it except at camp.) Longevity like that requires faith not only in the past but also in the future.

The modern world is full of stress, so go and have a party, brah, And shake it like a necklace made of gaudy beads at Mardi Gras. Enjoy this Broadway hybrid that is tuneful and poetical: A most delightful model of a modern operettical.

Borrowing “We’re All From Someplace Else” from Gilbert & Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore for the finale, Pirates! ends its tale with a generous plea for tolerance – swashbucklers are people too, after all – and having built up enough good well over the previous couple of hours the underlying earnestness at show’s end seems absolutely deserved.

Providing just around two hours of silly joy, Pirates! The Penzance Musical would make Gilbert and Sullivan proud. They might object to some of the changes, but they would surely approve of the pleasure it’s providing to modern-day audiences.

Sporting mutton-chop whiskers in his dual role as Gilbert playing Major-General Stanley, David Hyde Pierce rattles through several patter numbers with perfect assurance and depicts the retired soldier with a befuddled dignity droll to behold. Robust and roguish as the Pirate King, Ramin Karimloo shows off his magnificent baritone and the gleaming chest from which it comes. Genial as Sullivan, Preston Truman Boyd amiably appears as the Sergeant of Police whose midnight gambols with the Stanley daughters and his tap-happy flatfoot platoon are highlights of the second act. Nicholas Barasch makes a perfectly ingenuous Frederic and sings the role handsomely opposite Samantha Williams’ flirtatious Mabel. Jinkx Monsoon ably cuts her good-natured Ruth along the mildly goofy lines of Andrea Martin, but gets stuck with one of Katisha’s arias from The Mikado reworked as a not so hot torch song; better had they simply given Ruth a new costume for act two. The members of the ensemble perform with fresh voices and considerable vitality. Finally, any child who witnesses David Hyde Pierce reel off “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General,” backed by the ensemble cheerily waving blue and white flags during the choruses, will either wake up screaming some night or will recall this sequence for the rest of their lives. Family audiences: Be warned.

“Pirates!,” which opens tonight on Broadway, is billed as a reimagining of Gilbert and Sullivan’s 146-year-old comic operetta. But luckily there is plenty it shares with the twenty-six previous Broadway productions of “The Pirates of Penzance, or The Slave of Duty.” The creative team’s noodling doesn’t get in the way of some exciting performances, such as David Hyde Pierce’s, mastering “I Am The Very Model of a Modern Major-General,” the granddaddy of all patter songs, and Ramin Karimloo’s, swashbuckling his way through “I Am The Pirate King,” leaping from the ship’s deck, sword at the ready.

Still, it is easy enough to put aside almost all quibbles about genre tensions or adaptation choices because the production is so joyous and well-executed. Director Scott Ellis keeps things light, bouncy, and maximizes the hilarity. Lindo Cho’s colorful costumes play with period details, and David Rockwell’s sets even include a massive pirate ship. The choreography by Warren Carlyle is sensational, energetic, and whimsical, making inventive use of props including pirouetting parasols, spectacular sabres, and fierce flagging. Many of the big numbers are so enjoyable it makes you immediately want to see the production again. (Thankfully, the show treats us to a few brief encores.)

But my patience for being toyed with ran out at the top of Act 2 when Hyde Pierce sings “The Nightmare Song” from “Iolanthe.” I had no idea what was going on until the musical skidded into familiar turf with “A Paradox,” which is clearly from “Pirates.” It helps that Karimloo, Monsoon and Barasch sing the classic song with great panache. The show ends with “He Is an Englishman” from “HMS Pinafore,” which has been retitled “We’re All From Someplace Else” to make it an ode to immigrants. Good will does not always translate into good entertainment.

Director Scott Ellis’ boisterous romp is not groundbreaking in the way the Joseph Papp-produced 1980 revival was, but it has the same irreverent spirit — and perpetually ridiculous tale.

The show’s energy flags a bit in the second act, as the plot gets more convoluted and the 13-person orchestra switches between New Orleans-style and more traditional orchestrations almost at random. And yet, by the final number — a modified version of “He Is an Englishman” from HMS Pinafore with very of-this-21st-century-moment lyrics — we’re right back in that joyful space that fans of Pirates have cherished for over a century. (This is the 27th Broadway revival, though the first since Papp’s in the early ’80s.) Pirates! offers only modest concessions to modern times in look and sound, and instead embraces the old-fashionedness of the material in a way that still holds mass appeal. It’s a pirate’s booty-ful treat. ★★★★☆

Still, if you allow yourself to get carried away, you’ll have a delightful time with “Pirates! The Penzance Musical.” And if you bring your own beignets, please eat them after the show.

Pirates! The Penzance Musical comes with a stacked cast and a nearly 150-year history of Broadway adaptations. With such an iconic piece of theatre, any change is bound to stir the pot. But perhaps what makes this version such a smash is that at its core, it’s exactly what Gilbert and Sullivan created the original to be: a fun, silly, nonsensical laugh with the lightest plot and a great big happy ending to wrap it all up.