Iolanthe 1998
July 11, 12, 1998
This performance was the first in which the entire cast was composed entirely of members of the Gilbert & Sullivan Very Light Opera Company. Vern Sutton and his colleagues had elected not to continue doing Gilbert and Sullivan operetta concerts with the Minneapolis Pops Orchestra and, therefore, there was no concert in the summer of 1997. Jere Lantz and the Company, however, discussed and agreed to an arrangement by which the Company would provide the entire cast, including both principals and chorus, for the production. Since then, all subsequent concerts have been done only with casts from the the GSVLOC.
While the cast was composed entirely of members of the Company, we don’t seem to recall everyone who was in that cast! Perhaps, someday, one of us will find an old program from the concert, and we’ll be able to fill in the blanks.
The cast for this concert production of Iolanthe included:
| The Lord Chancellor | |
| Lord Mountararat | Waldyn Benbenek |
| Lord Tolloler | Joe Andrews |
| Strephon | Don Barbee |
| The Fairy Queen | Lynne Hicks |
| Phyllis | |
| Iolanthe | |
| Leila | |
| Celia |