That Mitchell and Webb Look looks at what happened during the later years of this once unstoppable force in operettas, when the well of creativity threatened to dry up. (The clip is only up to the 3:45 mark and then repeats itself.)
Mano Singham
Just another Freethought Blogs site
Actually the last few Gilbert & Sullivan operettas were flops. The initial run of Utopia, Limited just barely broke even and The Grand Duke was a financial and critical failure.
But the one about the creationist, though, surely that was a hit…
http://freethoughtblogs.com/cuttlefish/2008/04/18/i-am-the-very-model-of-a-devious-creationist/
@Al Dente -- That’s the whole point of the skit linked to -- Gilbert & Sullivan were having a rough patch but the (fictional) solution was for them to write another racist operetta that pandered to the masses.
@nichrome
Believe it or not, I understood the point of the sketch. However in real life, the last couple of G&S operettas were their worst. Some of their earlier operettas were not as successful as HMS Pinafore or The Pirates of Penzance (I’m thinking particularly of Ruddigore and Princess Ida) but Utopia, Limited and especially The Grand Duke were flops both financially and critically.