"Comedy Opera Company" to produce new works by Gilbert and Sullivan, along with those of other British authors and composers. This allowed Carte to lease the Opera Comique and to give Gilbert and Sullivan firm terms for a new opera. The first comic opera produced by the new company was Gilbert and Sullivan's The Sorcerer in 1877, with a plot involving a tradesmanlike London magician and his patented love potion. Gilbert, Sullivan and Carte were able to select their own cast, instead of using the players under contract to the theatre where the work was produced, as had been the case with their earlier works. They chose talented actors, few of whom were well-known stars; Carte's agency provided many of them. The reception of the piece showed that Carte had been right that there was a promising future in family-friendly English comic opera. The Sorcerer was followed by H.M.S. Pinafore in 1878. It opened to great enthusiasm but within days of the premiere London experienced an unusually strong and protracted heat wave, and business in the ill-ventilated Opera Comique was badly affected. Takings dropped to £40 a night, and Carte's directors in the Comedy Opera Company advocated cutting their losses and closing the show. After promotional efforts by Carte and Sullivan, who programmed some of the Pinafore music when he conducted a season of promenade concerts at Covent Garden, the opera became a hit. Carte convinced Gilbert and Sullivan that when their original agreement with the Comedy Opera Company expired in July 1879, a business partnership among the three of them would be to their advantage. Each put up £1,000 and formed a new partnership under the name "Mr Richard D'Oyly Carte's Opera Company". Under the partnership agreement, once the expenses of mounting the productions had been deducted, each of the three partners was entitled to one third of the profits. On 31 July 1879, the last day of their agreement with Carte, the directors of the Comedy Opera Company attempted to repossess the Pinafore set by force during a performance, causing a celebrated fracas. Carte's stagehands managed to ward off their backstage attackers and protect the scenery and props. The Comedy Opera Company opened a rival production of H.M.S. Pinafore in London, but it was not as popular as the D'Oyly Carte production and soon closed. Legal action over the ownership of the rights ended in victory for Carte,