Template:POTD/2024-08-12
Ages Ago is a musical entertainment with an English-language libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Frederic Clay that premiered in 1869 at the Royal Gallery of Illustration in London. It marked the beginning of a seven-year collaboration between Gilbert and Clay. The piece features a haunted Scottish castle inhabited by Sir Ebenezer Tare, with other characters including his niece, her poor suitor and a housekeeper with second sight. The paintings of the castle's former owners come to life and step out of their frames. Gilbert re-used the device of paintings coming to life in his 1887 opera with Arthur Sullivan, Ruddigore. Ages Ago was a critical and popular success and was revived many times, including at St. George's Hall, London, in 1870 and 1874, and in New York in 1880. This chromolithograph theatre poster was created to advertise the original production of Ages Ago and is now in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.Poster credit: Stannard & Son; restored by Adam Cuerden