The Nautch Girl

The Nautch Girl, or, The Rajah of Chutneypore is a comic opera in two acts, with a book by George Dance, lyrics by Dance and Frank Desprez and music by Edward Solomon. It opened on 30 June 1891 at the Savoy Theatre managed by Richard D'Oyly Carte and ran until 16 January 1892, for a respectable 200 performances, and then toured the British provinces and colonies.

The cast included several players familiar to the Savoy's audiences: Courtice Pounds (Indru), Frank Thornton (Pyjama), W. H. Denny (Bumbo), Frank Wyatt (Baboo Currie) and Rutland Barrington (Punka, replaced by W. S. Penley, when Barrington left the company for several months to tour in a series of "musical duologues" with Jessie Bond). The part of Chinna Loofa was the last role that Jessie Bond created at the Savoy. She wrote in her memoirs that it was one of her favourites. The title role was played by Lenore Snyder, the last of a number of actresses who had played Gianetta in The Gondoliers.

The opera was absent from the professional stage throughout the twentieth century but has been revived occasionally by amateur companies. The opera received its only known North American performances on 7 and 8 August 2004, by the Royal English Opera Company of Rockford, Illinois.

When the Gilbert and Sullivan partnership disbanded after the production of The Gondoliers in 1889, impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte was forced to find new works to present at the Savoy Theatre. This was the first non-Gilbert and Sullivan "Savoy Opera", but it was designed to resemble its G&S predecessors, in particular The Mikado, with its exotic oriental setting.The Times review of 1 July 1891 noted:

...
Wikipedia