opening night, Carte hired a concert singer, Jessie Bond, to play Cousin Hebe. Since Bond had little experience as an actress, Gilbert and Sullivan cut the dialogue out of the role, except for a few lines in the last scene, which they turned into recitative. Other new cast members were Emma Howson and George Power in the romantic roles, who were improvements on the romantic soprano and tenor in The Sorcerer. Gilbert acted as stage director for his own plays and operas. He sought realism in acting, just as he strove for realistic visual elements. He deprecated self-conscious interaction with the audience and insisted on a style of portrayal in which the characters were never aware of their own absurdity but were coherent internal wholes. Sullivan conducted the music rehearsals. As was to be his usual practice in his later operas, Sullivan left the overture for the last moment, sketching it out and entrusting it to the company's music director, in this case Alfred Cellier, to complete. Pinafore opened on 25 May 1878 at the Opera Comique. Roles The Rt. Hon. Sir Joseph Porter, KCB, First Lord of the Admiralty (comic baritone) Captain Corcoran, Commander of H.M.S. Pinafore (lyric baritone) Ralph Rackstraw, Able Seaman (tenor) Dick Deadeye, Able Seaman (bass-baritone) Bill Bobstay, Boatswain's Mate (baritone) Bob Becket, Carpenter's Mate (bass) Josephine, The Captain's Daughter (soprano) Cousin Hebe, Sir Joseph's First Cousin (mezzo-soprano) Mrs. Cripps (Little Buttercup), A Portsmouth Bumboat Woman (contralto) Chorus of First Lord's Sisters, His Cousins, His Aunts, Sailors, Marines, etc. Synopsis Act I The British warship H.M.S. Pinafore is at anchor off Portsmouth. The sailors are on the quarterdeck, proudly "cleaning brasswork, splicing rope, etc." Little Buttercup, a Portsmouth "bumboat woman" (dockside vendor) – who is the rosiest, roundest, and "reddest beauty in all Spithead" – comes on board to sell her wares to the crew. She hints that she may be hiding a dark secret under her "gay and frivolous exterior". Ralph Rackstraw, "the smartest lad in all the fleet", enters, declaring his love for the Captain's daughter, Josephine. His fellow sailors (excepting Dick Deadeye, the grim and ugly realist of the crew) offer their sympathies, but they can give Ralph little hope that his love will ever be returned. The gentlemanly and popular Captain Corcoran greets his "gallant crew" and compliments them on their politeness, saying that he returns the favour by never ("well, hardly