In January 1935 the Bristol Light Opera Club staged Sidney Jones’s The Geisha at the Colston Hall, Bristol, over three evenings and a Saturday matinee. The venue was forced on the young Club: its history note explains that “the fire at the Victoria Rooms six weeks before our production was due, entailed some quick decisions”. The large cast gave members “much scope”, and “no less than fourteen of the principals” had never before appeared in an operatic stage production. The programme adds that the first production had let the Club give £50 to charity, names a guest of honour for each evening, among them the Lord Mayor and the Duchess of Beaufort, and invites the audience to vote on whether the Club should next present a Gilbert and Sullivan opera.
Cast
- O Mimosa San — Ella Meadowcroft
- Juliette Diament — Lilia Edwards
- Nami — Gertrude H. Edward
- O Kiku San — Avis L. Viney
- O Hana San — Phyllis Hopegood
- O Kinkoto San — Olga V. Sendall
- Komurasaki San — V. Crook
- Lady Constance Wynne — Vi Sage
- Miss Marie Worthington — Marie Porter
- Miss Ethel Hurst — D. J. Bendall
- Miss Mabel Grant — Peggy Humphries
- Miss Louie Plumpton — Monica Powell
- Miss Molly Seamore — Kathleen Houlden
- Reginald Fairfax — W. E. Leonard
- Dick Cunningham — R. B. Miles
- George Grimston — B. Bamber
- Lieut. Bronville — J. Bulloch
- Tommy Stanley — Olive M. Saunders
- Captain Katana — C. H. Wiltshire
- Takemini — J. C. Sanders
- Wun-Hi — A. K. Houlden
- The Marquis Imari — John F. Heming