Rutland Barrington

British opera singer and actor, born 1853

Rutland Barrington (15 January 1853 – 31 May 1922) was an English singer, actor, comedian and Edwardian musical comedy star. Best remembered for originating the lyric baritone roles in the Gilbert and Sullivan operas from 1877 to 1896, his performing career spanned more than four decades. He also wrote at least a dozen works for the stage. After two years with a comic touring company, Barrington joined Richard D'Oyly Carte's opera company and, over the next two decades, created a number of memorable comic opera roles, including Captain Corcoran in H. M. S. Pinafore (1878), the Sergeant of Police in The Pirates of Penzance (1880), and Pooh Bah in The Mikado (1885), among many others. Failing in an 1888 attempt to become a theatrical manager, Barrington refocused his energies on acting and occasional playwriting. Beginning in 1896 and continuing for ten years, Barrington played in a series of very successful musical comedies under the management of George Edwardes at Daly's Theatre, specialising in comic portrayals of pompous rulers or other persons of authority. One of the most popular features of his performances was his insertion of topical songs, or verses of songs, into these musical comedies. After leaving Daly's he continued to appear in musical comedy roles and performed in music hall. He also essayed a few Shakespeare and other dramatic roles and appeared in a few silent films. His career ended in 1918, after which he suffered a stroke and lived the last few years of his life in poverty.

Barrington was born George Rutland Fleet at Penge, England, the fourth son of John George Fleet (1818–1902), a wholesale sugar dealer in London. His mother was the former Esther Faithfull (1823–1908) of Headley, Surrey, England. He was educated at Headley rectory and then at the Merchant Taylors' School in London. His six brothers included Indologist John Faithfull Fleet (1847–1917), Vice Admiral Henry Louis Fleet (1850–1923), The Reverend Ferdinand Francis Fleet (1857–1940) and actor Duncan James Fleet (1860–1909). He also had two sisters, one named Esther (one boy and one girl died in infancy). His aunt, activist and dramatic reader Emily Faithfull, helped him to make his first connections in the theatre. Barrington was a keen football player in the mid 1870s and played for the original Crystal Palace FC. In 1880, Barrington married Ellen Louisa "Louie" Jane Stainer (1851–1922), from Woolwich in Kent, the daughter of William Stainer and the former Lucy Mary Wheeler. Barrington and his wife had no children.

Barrington adopted his stage name by 1874 and made his professional debut with Henry Neville's company at the Olympic Theatre that year, playing the role of Sir George Barclay in Tom Taylor's Lady Clancarty, and then in The Ticket of Leave Man (by Taylor) and as LaFleur in The Two Orphans, among others. Later that year, he was hired to appear in the touring company of Mr and Mrs Howard Paul. The company played a hectic schedule of entertainments. In 1877 the producer Richard D'Oyly Carte approached Mrs Paul to play the part of Lady Sangazure in the new Gilbert and Sullivan opera, The Sorcerer, which he was presenting. She accepted, provided her 24 year old protégé, Barrington, was given a part, and he was cast in the role of Dr Daly, the vicar. When he auditioned before W. S. Gilbert, the young actor questioned his own suitability for comic opera, but Gilbert, who required that his actors play their sometimes absurd lines in all earnestness, explained the casting choice: "He's a staid, solid swine, and that's what I want." Barrington went on to say that producer Richard D'Oyly Carte later came to see him, saying, " what's the matter? some one has just come out of the stalls to tell me you are singing in tune. It will never do." Barrington said that "This pleased me so much that I have never sung flat since, except, of course, when I wished " Several contemporaries did find Barrington's singing occasionally flat, including Francois Cellier. Many years later, in her memoir, Ellaline Terriss wrote: " dear old Rutland scarcely ever did sing in tune – but how grand he was He had a beautifully clear diction and a marvellous sense of timing – and was one of the finest singers of the then popular topical songs that our stage ever knew." Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald wrote of Barrington in his 1899 book, The Savoy Opera, "His peculiar tranquil or impassive style has always exactly suited the characters allotted to him, and it would now be difficult to imagine a Savoy opera without him. However, Barrington's performance as Dr Daly impressed the critics and audiences, and he won a permanent place in D'Oyly Carte's company.