THE D'OYLY CARTE OPERA COMPANY

J. J. Benitz

J. J. Benitz (1880, 1881)

[Born Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15 Oct 1848, died Pittsburgh 17 Jun 1887]

John Joseph Benitz made his only recorded appearance on the New York Stage as the Notary in The Chimes of Normandy with the C. D. Hess Opera Company (Fifth Avenue Theatre, October-November 1877). In February 1879 he appeared as Dick Deadeye with Saville & Lee's H.M.S. Pinafore company in Albany, New York, one of many pirate productions of Gilbert & Sullivan's nautical comic opera sweeping North America at the time.

According to Reginald Allen's "Gilbert & Sullivan in America" he appeared at some pont as the Pirate King with D'Oyly Carte's Third American Pirates Company. It toured throughout the North American east and mid-west from February to July 1880. Benitz was later in another D'Oyly Carte tour, as Ben Barnacle in Stevens and Solomon's Billee Taylor when it played in Philadelphia in March 1881.

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