"H.M.S. Pinafore"
Gilbert & Sullivan
Umpqua Actors Community Theatre, 1989
"Pinafore" was my first Gilbert and Sullivan show. I was originally brought into the project as part of the orchestra, to play timpani but, as happened with "Annie" my other talents turned out to be more useful to the show, and I joined the Sailors Chorus.
This show was my introduction to Marianne and David Jones, who had only recently moved from Bend, where they had been doing similar community theater projects, and the leads, Richard Ewer who played Captain Corcoran, and his wife Cassandra who was Josephine. They would play the corresponding baritone and soprano character roles in "Pirates" the following year, and I got to know them further in 1989-90 when I joined the Vintage Singers chamber choir under the direction of the late Steve Biethan.
Dick Deadeye was played with marvelous gusto by Peter Graff, a planner who also sang in Vintage. Many years later in Portland, I would attend a 2006 Shakespeare-in-the-Parks production of "The Merry Wives of Windsor" in which a wonderfully comic slender was played by a towering young man named Jesse Graff -- and yes, he turned out to be Peter's son. I have yet to work with Jesse on a show, but I've seen him in other productions and there's a good chance someday we will be in a play together.