It's hilarity on the high seas as the Bay Area's acclaimed Lamplighters Music Theatre opens its 55th season with Gilbert and Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore. As timely as today's headlines with its mockery of incompetence in high political places, this side-splitting operatic send up of snobbery and social class sets sail with a lowly seaman in love with his Captain's daughter, who in turn is pledged by her father to a higher-ranking officer.

In faithful Gilbert and Sullivan fashion, mayhem prevails, as does true love, in this ship-shape satire featuring a live orchestra and the phenomenal voices of the Lamplighters company. Lamplighters Artistic Director Barbara Heroux directs with guest conductor George Thomson at the baton.