MY
GREAT-GRANDFATHER
WAS
QUEEN ISABELLA OF
SPAIN
In
the late 1880s, the First Corps of Cadets, Massachusetts
Volunteer
Militia, wanted to build an armory. One of their
fundraising techniques
was to put on amateur theatricals.
Robert A. Barnet, thereafter
known as "the Cadets' Laureate" and
Boston's "Extravaganza King," was
hired. He wrote extravaganzas,
burlesques, musical comedies, comic operas
and farces-all were
characterized by catchy music, loose plots, ballets
and marches
involving casts of 100-125, and "specialty" acts having
nothing
whatsoever to do with anything. The cadets played all the roles,
male
and female. Barnet himself played the role of Henry Rufyan in
Injured
Innocents, the Grand Vizier of Tangiers in Tabasco and Isabella,
the
Daisy Queen of Spain, in 1492, his most successful
extravaganza.
Between 1890 and 1906, there were 12 Cadet shows,
starting with
Injured Innocents and ending with Miss Pocahontas. Some were
based on
nursery rhymes: Simple Simon, The Strange Adventures of Jack and
the
Beanstalk, Cinderella and the Prince. Some were re-dos of
popular
themes like William Tell (Excelsior, Jr.) or the Three
Musketeers
(Miladi and the Musketeer). Some were froth (Cap of Fortune and
the
Show Girl) and some were creative hodgepodges like 1492 and
Tabasco
(based on the hot sauce). The armory, finished in 1897, is now
known
as the Park Plaza Castle.
Barnet also wrote two big shows
for the Bank Officers'
Association: Miss Simplicity in 1901 and Baron
Humbug in 1903. A
young Julian Eltinge, on the verge of 30 years as a
famous female
impersonator, starred in both shows.
R. A. Barnet,
the Cadet Theatricals and the Bank Officers'
Association shows were lost
to history...until now.
Extravaganza King: Robert Barnet and Boston Musical Theater by Anne
Alison
Barnet (Northeastern University Press) will be in bookstores early in the
summer of 2004. It can be ordered now through
Amazon.com
or Northeastern
University Press.
Alison Barnet
(great-granddaughter)