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jmatkinson1 's review for:
The Secret Life of the Savoy: and the D'Oyly Carte Family
by Olivia Williams
In the late 1800s theatrical impresario Richard Cart decided to change his name to D'Oyly Carte and to team up with a composer and librettist to produce a series of successful light operas, Gilbert and Sullivan were the artists and D'Oyly Carte the business brain. Through a series of dubious deals D'Oyly Carte's Savoy Theatre company expanded, first into owning a theatre and then into developing a hotel in London. This was a first, a luxury hotel designed for the wealthy and the famous where nothing was too expensive, too outrageous or too demanding. So the Savoy Group was founded and the D'Oyly Carte family stayed in control for nearly 100 years.
This was a really interesting book about the Savoy group but the real focus is on the D'Oyly Carte family. Although the introduction starts with scandal, the snippets around the guests and staff at the hotel group are very much second to the biographies of the three generations of the family that controlled this institution. Richard was a wheeler dealer and a man moving up in the world, Rupert was someone who understood his clientele and developed a brand through the wars and Bridget a woman beyond her times.
This was a really interesting book about the Savoy group but the real focus is on the D'Oyly Carte family. Although the introduction starts with scandal, the snippets around the guests and staff at the hotel group are very much second to the biographies of the three generations of the family that controlled this institution. Richard was a wheeler dealer and a man moving up in the world, Rupert was someone who understood his clientele and developed a brand through the wars and Bridget a woman beyond her times.