Pauline Rita

Pauline Rita (c.1842 – 28 June 1920) was an English soprano and actress. During her early career, she was best known for her performances in operettas and comic operas at the Opera Comique and was associated with impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte. Later, she married flautist John Radcliff, and the two performed together for many years.

In 1872, Rita took part in a joint recital with Charles Santley at St James's Hall, London. In the same year she sang in Handel's oratorio Athalia in Glasgow, where the local critic was unimpressed: "Mdlle. Rita has a voice nearly always in tune, but of a shrill and unsympathetic quality, and she indulges from time to time in that fatal vibrato to which we have so often objected." In 1874, she performed in Richard D'Oyly Carte's light opera company at the Opera Comique, in The Broken Branch, an English version of Gaston Serpette's La branch cassée, in which she received better notices: "Madame Pauline Rita has achieved a triumph in her first appearance on the stage. She possesses a voice of singular flexibility, acts well, and looks attractive." In December 1874 she played the lead role of the Prince de Conti in Charles Lecocq's Les Prés St. Gervais at the Criterion Theatre. The following year, she starred in the title role, Clairette Angot, in a revival of Lecocq's La fille de Madame Angot at the Opera Comique, which replaced La Périchole on the bill with Trial by Jury. In October of that year she appeared as Barbara in Alfred Cellier's The Tower of London at the Prince's Theatre, Manchester.

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