Download Christmas at Covent Garden. By Jeannette Hatcher

Christmas at Covent Garden.
By Jeannette Hatcher
What nicer treat could there be before Christmas than to be led through the backstage secrets of The Royal
Opera House Covent Garden and explore the history behind its Christmas shows? Sarah Lenton, archivist,
writer and theatre historian, entertained members of Haslemere Decorative and Fine Arts Society (HDFAS) at
their recent Christmas lecture to such a treat. In lively style she entertained the audience before their festive
tea with a Christmas cracker of a performance.
Explaining that there have been three hundred years of Christmas shows at the theatres on this site, she
emphasised the strong sense of family that exists between all members of cast and crew and the importance
to the theatre in the past and the present, of creating for Christmas the best ‘transformation scene’ in
London.
Not many people who have been lucky enough to see the theatre’s magical expanding Christmas tree in
Nutcracker can fail to be impressed by this example of a ‘transformation scene’ but according to Sarah, what
the audience sees is only half the story. Pillars have no backs, welding is taking place on the coach at the last
minute and the masks on the young girls playing the mice have such big snouts that they have trouble seeing
their feet!
There have so far been three theatres on the site and all have been called the Theatre Royal Covent Garden.
The first one in the early 18th century measured only 52 feet from the front of stage to the back of the
auditorium and as it was lit by candles, those assembled could always be seen. As seats in the gallery and the
front rows were free, the audience could be loud and volatile, so much so that a row of spikes existed around
the pit to slow down any advances they might make towards the stage!
Although the granting of Letters Patent to both the Covent Garden and Drury Lane Theatres Royal gave them
both permission to put on straight drama, according to Sarah, the Drury Lane theatre got all the good
Shakespearian stuff so under the guiding light of John Rich, the Covent Garden theatre turned to what she
described as Shakespeare with gags!
One typical evening started at 6pm with a performance of The Distrest Mother, then at half time followed
with The Necromancer or Harlequin Doctor Faustus. As the second play took place after most people’s supper
and was half price, there are no prizes for guessing which one was the most popular and therefore where the
most important shows were placed!
In the tradition of Commedia dell’arte, they featured the masked characters Harlequin, Columbine and
Pantalone. The plays contained mime and were very knockabout, with the cast racing around until exhausted
when the performance would stop. In typical Harlequin tight costume covered in triangles and a small hat
which wouldn’t stay on, John Rich would stride around the stage slapping the scenery with his Harlequin
stick, a gesture which later would lead to the description of this type of comedy as ‘slapstick’.
With money invested by John Rich, innovations were developed for the Christmas shows and new effects
were created. A performance of Romeo and Juliet for instance featured a moon in the death scene, the moon
being created by a light focussed on a metal disc which in turn was seen through a gauze filter. As for most of
the year the same scenery was often recycled for every play, the Christmas shows were a hit and financed
the rest of the year’s performances.
When in 1808 both the Drury Lane and Covent Garden Theatres Royal burned down, the theatre built on the
Covent Garden site was much larger than its predecessor. This meant that the actors using such gems as ‘Ah
– is this a rusty key I behold’, had to be more explicit in their dialogue in order to tell the audience what they
were seeing. It was also a big theatre to maintain and to save wear and tear on the costumes; a prop man
would bring on a green carpet for anyone in the dying scene to die on.
In a performance of Blue Beard or The Flight of Harlequin in the late
18th century, the figure of Harlequin appears to have become
embedded in fairy tale. At the same time Joseph Grimaldi joined the
company. Adopting the persona of a clown/acrobat, he also indulged
in a very physical type of comedy, but his uniqueness was in the
innocence he brought to his performances. When Grimaldi went on to
play the dame in Cinderella he was also the first male performer to
play a woman in this type of show.
When the theatre had to be rebuilt after yet another fire in 1857 it
was on a much smaller scale. A new audience, following the lead of
the young Victoria and her family demanded a more respectful
atmosphere and plots with more ‘heart’.
Gradually all the elements of the Christmas show as we know it were
beginning to take shape. When Marie Taglioni, the foremost ballerina of her time, went up on points, she
created an effect as she came on through dry ice of being weightless and fairy like. Moon beams were
created by lights focussed on the stage and enormous props made the grown up performers look small. This
‘Careless brilliance’, as Sarah described it, is Covent Garden’s thing - the special thing that they do so well.
Full details of membership and future lectures, outings and study days offered by HDFAS can be obtained by
ringing the membership secretary on 01428 683578 or via the website www.haslemerefas.org.uk
The next lecture, 20th Century Women Collectors: Louisine Havemeyer to Peggy Guggenheim is on January
21st 2014.
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Article printed in Haslemere Herald