Little Mary Sunshine - Characters

Characters

• Captain "Big Jim" Warington, handsome Captain of the Forest Rangers: baritone - Primarily, Jim represents Rose-Marie's Jim Kenyon, although he gets his Ranger (Mountie) uniform from Sergeant Malone. (In fact, in spite of his rank, in some productions he wears sergeant's stripes). Generically, Jim also represents other operetta leaders of men (and singers of rallying songs) such as François Villon, leader of the Paris rabble in The Vagabond King ("Song of the Vagabonds"); Robert Misson, leader of the New Orleans antiroyalty men in The New Moon ("Stout-hearted Men); and the Red Shadow, leader of the Riffs in The Desert Song ("The Riff Song").
• "Little Mary Sunshine" (Mary Potts), proprietress of the Colorado Inn: soprano (called "Little Merry Sunshine" by the Kadotas) - Mary is primarily a caricature of Rose-Marie's Rose-Marie La Flamme, but also generically represents operetta heroines, the sweethearts of the leaders of men. In the London production, Patricia Routledge, who had an ample figure, brought out aspects of Mary's role linking her with "Little Buttercup" from HMS Pinafore. In practice, to emphasise the humour, Mary is usually played by a character actress rather than a conventional "leading lady".
• Madame Ernestine von Liebedich, an elderly opera singer: contralto - Ernestine resembles Sarah Millick, heroine of Coward's Bitter Sweet, and like her prototype has "sweet memories" of Vienna that "across the years . . . come to" her—words from the song "I'll See You Again". The name Liebedich recalls Edvard Grieg's composition "Ich Liebe Dich" ("I Love You"). Her name also resembles that of opera singer Ernestine Schumann-Heink, on whom she may be partially based.
• Corporal "Billy" Jester, a Forest Ranger: tenor or high baritone - Billy and his girlfriend Nancy, the show's comedic bickering lovers, closely resemble Ado Annie and Will Parker from Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma!.
• Nancy Twinkle, the show's soubrette - Like Ado Annie, Nancy loves her man, yet is perhaps even fonder of men in general.
• Chief Brown Bear, chief of the Kadota (anagram of Dakota) Indians - Brown Bear is based on Chief Sitting Bull, from Irving Berlin's Annie Get Your Gun. Both characters are admirable - wise, restrained, and generous - and both are father figures to their respective heroines.
• Yellow Feather, Brown Bear's rogue son - The show's villain lampoons Rose-Marie 's villainous Black Eagle. Both have two-part names whose first word is a color and whose second word relates to birds. Yellow Feather's conversion to a flag waving patriot in the finale parallels the reform of the pirates in Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance.
• Fleet Foot, an Indian guide - Fleet Foot is elderly and no longer able to live up to his name.
• General Oscar Fairfax, Ret., an elderly Washington diplomat who likes to flirt with younger ladies - Oscar's bringing gifts for the young ladies and asking to be called "Uncle" recalls Uncle (or "Godfather") Drosselmeyer from Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker - although of course the aging roue is also a stock character in operetta and old-fashioned musical comedy.
• Young Ladies from the Eastchester Finishing School: Cora, Henrietta, Gwendolyn, Blanche, Maud, and Mabel (who has no lines). (Millicent added in the vocal score)
• Forest Rangers: Pete, Slim, Tex, Buster, Hank, and Tom (Chuck added in the vocal score)