An Introduction to The Zoo

Sir Arthur Sullivan is one-half of the legendary British operatic opera duo, Gilbert & Sullivan. Together they collaborated for over 25 years and created a total of fourteen operas together including HMS Pinafore, Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado.

The Zoo predates their partnership and shows Sullivan’s music before he teamed up with Gilbert.

Sullivan’s early musical promise led to his being a chorister at the Chapel Royal, and he studied at the Royal Academy of Music. Among his earliest compositions was his incidental music to Shakespeare’s The Tempest, which brought him to national attention in 1862.

The opera follows two pairs of lovers at a London Zoo.

A nobleman who is disguised as a commoner woos a young woman running a refreshment stall. While a young pharmacist panics after thinking he may have poisoned his girlfriend as he might have mixed up her father’s medication with some peppermint for her.

ENO’s 2027 production will be a brand-new staging directed by Gilbert & Sullivan expert John Savournin. Savournin has carved out a career as one of opera’s most versatile performers. For ENO, he’s performed in HMS Pinafore, Iolanthe and Pirates of Penzance and elsewhere in roles in contemporary repertoire such as Peter Quince in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Peter Maxwell Davies’ Eight Songs for a Mad King.

He’s also an established director, most recently directing The Merry Widow for Scottish Opera, in a co-production with Opera Holland Park and D’Oyly Carte Opera, The Yeomen of the Guard for Opera Holland Park, and a children’s opera for the Royal Ballet and Opera. He was recently appointed Artistic Director of Waterperry Opera Festival.