Robert Rounseville

Robert Rounseville (March 25, 1914 – August 6, 1974) was an American tenor and actor born in Attleboro, Massachusetts, whose career spanned opera, operetta, Broadway musicals, and film. His Broadway appearances extended from 1937 to 1973, encompassing both original productions and revivals across several decades.

Rounseville made his Broadway debut in a minor role in Babes in Arms, the Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart musical, subsequently building his stage experience through chorus work in other productions. During the years 1943 to 1945, he performed under the name Robert Field, using his middle name as a surname, and in that period took on small roles in a revival of The Merry Widow and in Up in Central Park. In 1949, he performed as a soloist with the Naumburg Orchestral Concerts at the Naumburg Bandshell in Central Park as part of that venue's summer series.

The year 1951 proved particularly significant for Rounseville's career. He starred as Hoffmann in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's film adaptation of Jacques Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann, distinguished as the first color film of an opera to employ genuinely cinematic techniques rather than simply recording a stage performance. That same year, he created the role of Tom Rakewell in the world premiere of Igor Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress at La Fenice, performing alongside Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Jennie Tourel. In October 1951, he also portrayed Channon in the world premiere of David Tamkin's The Dybbuk at the New York City Opera, with Patricia Neway as his love interest.

In 1956, Rounseville took on two notable roles. He portrayed the fisherman Mr. Snow in the film adaptation of Carousel, the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, opposite Barbara Ruick as Carrie Pipperidge. Later that same year, he opened on Broadway in the original production of Leonard Bernstein's Candide, playing the title role opposite Barbara Cook as Cunegonde.

On television, Rounseville sang the role of Don José in an English-language production of Carmen for NBC Opera Theatre in 1953, and in 1957 appeared on the same program as the Chevalier de la Force in the first American television production of Dialogues of the Carmelites, a broadcast that also featured an early television appearance by soprano Leontyne Price. In 1960, he played Nanki-Poo in a Bell Telephone Hour abridgement of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado, which starred Groucho Marx as Ko-Ko. He was additionally an occasional guest on the television series The Voice of Firestone. In 1969, he starred in the American premiere of Leoš Janáček's opera From the House of the Dead, based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel, broadcast on National Educational Television.

Among Rounseville's studio recordings was a 1952 mono LP of Sigmund Romberg's operetta The Student Prince, recorded with Dorothy Kirsten. At the time of its release it was the most complete recording of that work made up to that point; though long out of print, it has since been reissued on CD.

At the New York City Center, Rounseville appeared regularly in revivals of operettas and musicals, including Brigadoon, in which he played Charlie Dalrymple, and Show Boat, in which he portrayed Gaylord Ravenal. He also appeared in Trial by Jury during his career. In 1965, he joined the original Broadway cast of Man of La Mancha as The Padre, and reprised that role in the 1972 revival of the production at the Vivian Beaumont Theater.

In the final years of his life, Rounseville attended meetings of the New York City founding chapter of the Sons of the Desert, where he performed for fellow members and watched the film comedies of Laurel and Hardy. He maintained a lifelong friendship with Florence Louise Pettitt, an opera conductor from his hometown in Massachusetts. Rounseville died suddenly on August 6, 1974, after collapsing from a heart attack while teaching a singing class in his Carnegie Hall studio, as reported by Theatre World.