*GILBERT WITHOUT SULLIVAN TOM COBB EARLY 1880s PROGRAM*
Specifications
| Return Shipping Will Be Paid By | Buyer |
| All Returns Accepted | Returns Accepted |
| Item Must Be Returned Within | 14 Days |
| Refund Will Be Given As | Money Back |
| Industry | Theater |
| Year | Pre-1940 |
| Object Type | Playbill |
| Original/Reproduction | Original |
| Country/Region Of Manufacture | United Kingdom |
A rare original early 1880s program for W. S. Gilbert's farce comedy Tom Cobb, advertised as by the author of "Patience," "Pinafore," and "Pygmalion and Galatea." Four pages. Dimensions eight by five inches. Edgewear at top otherwise good. See the story of Gilbert and Sullivan and W. S. Gilbert's Tom Cobb below. Shipping discounts for multiple purchases. Inquiries always welcome. Please visit my other eBay items for more early Gilbert and Sullivan items, theatre, opera, film and historical autographs, photographs and programs, and great actor and actress cabinet photos and CDV's. Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900) and to the works they jointly created. The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado are among the best known.[1]Gilbert, who wrote the libretti for these operas, created fanciful "topsy-turvy" worlds where each absurdity is taken to its logical conclusion—fairies rub elbows with British lords, flirting is a capital offence, gondoliers ascend to the monarchy, and pirates emerge as noblemen who have gone astray.[2] Sullivan, six years Gilbert's junior, composed the music, contributing memorable melodies[n 1] that could convey both humour and pathos.[n 2]Their operas have enjoyed broad and enduring international success and are still performed frequently throughout the English-speaking world.[5][6] Gilbert and Sullivan introduced innovations in content and form that directly influenced the development of musical theatre through the 20th century.[7] The operas have also influenced political discourse, literature, film and television and have been widely parodied and pastiched by humorists. The producer Richard D'Oyly Carte brought Gilbert and Sullivan together and nurtured their collaboration. He built the Savoy Theatre in 1881 to present their joint works (which came to be known as the Savoy Operas) and founded the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, which performed and promoted Gilbert and Sullivan's works for over a century.Tom Cobb or, Fortune's Toy is a farce in three-acts (styled "An Entirely Original Farcical Comedy") by W. S. Gilbert. The story concerns Tom, a young debtor who pretends to be a recently deceased man to avoid his debts. A family claims to inherit the dead man's fortune and pays Tom a pound a week to continue to live under an assumed name and keep quiet. He is claimed in marriage by the well-born Caroline Effingham who was jilted by the man whose name he has assumed. After further complications, Tom turns out, in actuality, to be the heir of the deceased and wealthy miser and happily marries Caroline.The play opened at the St. James's Theatre on 24 April 1875. Although it was praised by the critics, the original production of the play ran for only 53 performances.[1] Arthur Sullivan's The Zoo played as an afterpiece to Tom Cobb.BackgroundGilbert and Sullivan had already produced their hit one-act comic opera Trial by Jury by the time Tom Cobb was written, but both Gilbert and Sullivan were still producing a considerable amount of work separately.Several plot elements from Tom Cobb reappear in Gilbert and Sullivan's last opera, The Grand Duke (1896). This full-length romantic farce was a departure by Gilbert from his earlier farces, which had generally been short works in one act.[2]Gilbert claimed, in a 1903 story article called "My Last Client", that the idea for the play came to him when he attended the funeral of T. W. Robertson in 1871 and a man in the crowd reminded him of Robertson.[3] However, Gilbert based Tom Cobb on a short story that he had written in 1871 called "Tom Poulton's Joke", in which the title character attends his own "funeral", as in the story told by Gilbert in "My Last Client".[4] In Tom Cobb there is no such incident.[5] Arthur Sullivan and F. C. Burnand had earlier written Cox and Box, in which a man describes how he "killed himself" yet remains alive.