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Local History Notes
Performances at Richmond's Theatre Royale 1765 - 1853
Opening production
Date:- 15th June 1765
Plays:- Isaac Bickerstaffe ; music by various composers : Love in a Village
William Wycherley; with alterations : The Country Wife
The Company included:Charles Dibdin (1745-1814) – actor, dramatist and song-writer. In the latter capacity he
wrote ballads of ships and sailors (such as Tom Bowling and The Lass that loved a
Sailor) which were said to have ‘brought more men into the Navy in war than all the press
gangs could.’ He also wrote ballad operas – The Waterman, for example – and composed
music for many plays. He quarrelled constantly with his managers, including Garrick whom
he satirized in a puppet play called The Comic Mirror. As an actor he preferred light opera
to straight comedy and between 1788 and 1793 specialised in solo entertainments, in
which he played, sang and recited monologues. The dramatist John O’Keeffe described
these performances thus: ‘He ran sprightly, and with nearly a laughing face, like a friend
who enters hastily to impart to you some good news…A few lines of speaking happily
introduced his admirable songs, full of wit and character, and his peculiar mode of singing
then surpassed all I have ever heard.’
John Fawcett (d. 1793) – the father of the more celebrated actor John Fawcett (17681837). The elder Fawcett played at Drury Lane and in Dublin and appeared on several
occasions at the Theatre Royal, Richmond.
James Love (1722-1774) – the stage name assumed by James Dance, the first manager
and probable founder of the Theatre Royal. He was the son of George Dance, the architect
and city surveyor and the brother of George Dance the younger who followed the same
profession as his father. It seems likely that both father and son were concerned with the
building of the Richmond theatre. Dorothy Stroud’s biography of the younger George
admits that ‘references to the building are vague and two of them, while agreeing as to
sponsors, differ as to the name of the designer. A third gives it to Garrick and it is evident
that there was a good deal of confusion as to the various participants.’ Love wrote various
pieces for the stage, the earliest being Pamela (1742). He performed in Dublin and
Edinburgh and was for some years a manager in the latter. In 1762 he was invited to Drury
Lane Theatre, retaining a connection with that place for the rest of his life. His best
characterisation is said to have been that of Shakespeare’s Falstaff.
John Hayman Packer (1730-1806) – Packer was originally a saddler by trade. He joined
the Drury Lane company under Garrick and in 1759 created the part of Freeman in
Townley’s High Life Below Stairs. He was generally allocated subsidiary roles and, in
later life (according to the Dictionary of National Biography) played ‘as a rule, old men in
tragedy and sentimental comedy.’
William Smith (1730?-1819) – nicknamed ‘Gentleman’ Smith. After being coached by the
actor Spranger Barry, he made his first appearance at Covent Garden in January 1753 in
From Richmond Libraries’ Local Studies Collection
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Local History Notes
the title role of Lee’s Theodosius. His first appearance at Drury Lane was made in
September 1774 when he played Richard III. Some 6 months previously he had publicly
announced his intention to retire and devote himself to fox-hunting (his favourite pastime)
and other country pursuits. His actual retirement, however, did not occur until 1788. Partly
because of his looks and his bearing, he was fortunate in being given leading parts
throughout his career. He always asserted that he never blackened his face, never played
in a farce and never ascended through a trap-door.
Some other performances at the theatre
Date:- 1st July 1769
Plays:- Comus; The Register Office
The Company included:Mrs [Martha] Dodd (d. October 1769) – Wife of the actor James William Dodd (1740?1796). She played at the theatre frequently during the 1760s. Her marriage was not a
happy one and 1769 was a year of special crisis in the relationship between herself and her
husband, each making written denouncements of the other which were published in the
newspapers of the time.
Francis Gododphin Waldron (1744-1818) – Waldron became a member of Garrick’s
company at Drury Lane and was, at different times during his career, manager of
Richmond, Windsor and other country theatres. He was the author of The Richmond
Heiress, a much-altered version of an earlier play of the same title written by Thomas
D’Urfey. Waldron’s play was first performed at Richmond on 8th September 1777, for his
own benefit. On this occasion he took the part of Dr. Guaiacum and also spoke the
prologue. His adaptation of Farquhar’s Beaux’ Stratagem (entitled The Imitation), in
which the female characters were substituted for men – and vice versa – was produced at
Drury Lane in 1783 and, not surprisingly, was coldly received. He made occasional
appearances at the Haymarket Theatre where his son – billed as Young Waldron – also
appeared. Waldron’s editorial work is probably more notable than his career as an actor
and a dramatist. His Literary Museum, a selection of rare old tracts, first appeared in 1792
and the Shakespeare Miscellany – a similar collection – followed in 1802. Both works give
evidence of the mind of an enthusiastic and knowledgeable antiquarian.
Miss Younge [Mrs Elizabeth Pope] (1744?-1797) – the first wife of the actor Alexander
Pope (1763-1835). Her first appearance as an actress was made at Drury Lane in October
1768, when she played Imogen. The performance won her immediate recognition and in
her first season she played many leading roles. During her 1769 season at Richmond she
played Desdemona to Love’s Othello and Lady Townly in The Provok’d Husband – a
comedy altered by Colley Cibber from an unfinished play by Vanbrugh. Throughout her
career, Mrs Pope was generally assigned the parts of lasies of title or fashion. She was a
very versatile actress – Boaden considered her ‘as a daughter of Garrick’s theatre, because
she acquired all the resources of her arts, and they constituted her the most general
actress the stage had ever seen.’ Laetitia Hardy in Mrs Hannah Cowley’s Belle Strategem
– a role which she created at Covent Garden in 1780 – was probably her finest
characterisation. She was buried on the west side of the cloisters of Westminster Abbey,
near the grave of the actress Kitty Clive.
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Local History Notes
Date:- 12th July 1790
Plays:- R.B. Sheridan: A Trip to Scarborough
The Death of Captain Cook (‘Pantomime Ballet’ – author unknown)
The Company included:
George Bland (?-1807) – the brother of Mrs Jordan and the illegitimate son of Francis
Bland. In later life he appeared in America under the stage name of Wilson. Among the
parts he played at the Richmond Theatre were Captain Harcourt in Sophia Lee’s Chapter
of Accidents in October 1789 and Osmyn in The Sultan in June 1790. That same year he
married the actress and singer Maria Theresa Romanzini who had been playing in Dublin
at the same time as Mrs Jordan.
Dorothea (or Dorothy) Jordan (1761-1816) – born near Waterford, Ireland, the illegitimate
daughter of the actress Grace Phillips and Francis Bland. Since Bland’s family had made
her mother an allowance for some rtime on condition that the children did not use the Bland
surname, Dorothy was originally billed as ‘Miss Francis’. When the allowance ceased,
Dorothy’s brother George took his father’s name. On the evidence of extant playbills, Mrs
Jordan’s debut seems to have been at Dublin in November 1779 – in The Virgin
Unmasked. But earlier dates have been given by various writers including Joseph Knight in
the Dictionary of National Biography where he states that she was playing Phoebe in In
You Like It (also in Dublin) as early as 1777. On coming to England, she was befriended
by the actor/manager Tate Wilkinson and appeared at several provincial theatres on his
circuit. It was he who claimed to have suggested the name ‘Jordan’ to her, having jokingly
referred to her ‘crossing the water’ – it was about this time that she first adopted the name.
While performing in the provinces she was seen by the actor William Smith, who was
instrumental in her moving to London. She made her debut at Drury Lane in October 1785
as Peggy in The Country Girl – one of her most celebrated roles which she later (on 3rd
August 1801) performed at Richmond. Other parts played at Richmond included Dorinda in
Dryden’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Tempest (September 1793) and Rosalind in As
You Like It (August 1802). Her talents were better suited to comedy than tragedy and her
‘breeches’ roles were great favourites with audiences. These included Sir Harry Wildair in
Farquhar’s Constant Couple – which she played at Richmond on 29th June 1789 – and
William in Brooke’s Rosina. Mrs Jordan’s domestic life, in the words of Joseph Knight, was
‘brilliant rather than happy.’ By Richard Daly, her first manager, she had a daughter who
became an actress. By Richard Ford she had 4 children and by the Duke of Clarence –
later William IV – she had 10, 7 of whom were born at Bushey House in Teddington. She
separated from the Duke in 1811. Her final appearance took place at Margate in August
1815 after which she went to France where she died on 3rd July 1816. Mrs Jordan’s
performances received high praise from men like Hazlitt, Byron, Lamb and Joshua
Reynolds. Leigh Hunt wrote that she seemed to speak ‘with all her soul; her voice poignant
with melody, delights the ear with a peculiar and exquisite fulness and with an emphasis
that appears the result of perfect conviction.’
Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) – the dramatist and statesman regularly visited
Richmond and lived in Downe House on Richmond Hill from 1806 to 1815. His plays were
frequently performed at the Theatre Royal - the patriotic melodrama Pizaro being
particularly popular. A Trip to Scarborough was his adaptation of Vanbrugh’s Relapse.
Sheridan was well acquainted with Mrs Jordan although Joseph Farington states in his
diary that he was afraid of her ‘as a mouse of a cat.’
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Local History Notes
Date:- 23rd August 1793
Fencing display by the ‘Chevaliere d’Eon’
The Chevalier d’Eon – Charles Genevieve Louis Auguste Andree Timothee d’Eon de
Beaumont (1728-1810) - was one of Louis XV’s secret agents who, whether by choice or
by the demands of his calling – spent most of his life in female dress. As a reward for his
work as an agent in Russia, he received a commission as Lieutenant of Dragoons, later
promoted to the rank of Captain. In 1761 he commanded a company on the Rhine and
fought bravely against both the Scots and Prussians. Soon afterwards he was recalled from
militaryservice and was sent to London to help the French Ambassador (the Duc de
Nivernais) negotiate terms for ending the Seven Years War. He was given the honour of
carrying George III’s Ratification of the Peace Treaty to Versailles and was awarded the
Order of St. Louis.
Nivernais was succeeded by d’Eon’s personal enemy, the Comte de Guerchy. A bitter
private war, involving every kind of intrigue, ensued between the two. Louis XV became
convinced that the Chevalier was insane and, fearing that the secrets contained in
documents in his possession might be divulged, began negotiations aimed at persuading
him to relinquish the documents and return to France. These negotiations continued into
the reign of Louis XVI. The French government enlisted the services of the dramatist
Beaumarchais – a man with political ambitions – who obtained an agreement from d’Eon to
hand over the secret papers in return for the payment of his debts and the confirmation of
his royal pension. The Chevalier also made a statement that he was, in fact, a woman and
undertook to wear feminine attire for the rest of his life. Various reasons for the latter
undertaking have been suggested. Perhaps the most original theory is that the Chevalier,
who during his stay in England had become intimate with Queen Charlotte and was
suspected of being the true father of the Prince of Wales, preserved the honour of the
queen by maintaining his femininity. Thereafter, any attempt on his part to resume male
dress placed him in danger of punishment. In1779 he was imprisoned in the Chateau de
Dijon for almost 3 weeks because he dared to wear his Dragoons uniform.
In November 1785, d’Eon left France, never to return. He spent the remaining years of his
life in England where growing poverty compelled him to seek some means of earning a
living. Remembering a famous fencing match at Carlton House in 1787 when, despite his
age and triple skirts, he had defeated the world champion of fencing, the Chevalier de
Saintes-Georges, he decided to tour the South of England and the Midlands with his former
servant, Jacob de Launay, giving fencing demonstrations and inviting challenges. This
career was cut short in 1796 when he was wounded during a fencing match in
Southampton. Returning to London, he again suffered poverty and in 1804 was imprisoned
for debt. His friend and companion, Mrs Marie Cole, raised the money to secure his
release. The Chevalier died on 21st May that year. The autopsy performed on his body
confirmed, beyond all doubt, that ‘La Chevalier’ was a man. He was buried, in accordance
with his request, in the graveyard of St. Pancras Church.
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Local History Notes
Date:- 22nd September 1817
Plays:- William Dimond: The Broken Sword
Samuel Beazley, Jr.: Is He Jealous?
Three and the Deuce!
The Company included
Charles Moritz Klanert – became the manager of the theatre in June 1817 and held it until
November 1829. Klanert had played minor characters at Covent Garden and first appeared
at Richmond in 1810 when among the parts he played was the triple role that also played
on this night – Pertinax Single, Peregrine Single and Percival Single in Three and the
Deuce! Edward Stirling in Old Drury Lane (1881) describes Klanert as ‘an actor of small
parts at Covent Garden,’ who ‘on his own ground, Richmond, became an actor of great
proportions – so at least he thought.’ Stirling allows, nevertheless, that Klanert was always
word-perfect and that on one occasion when he (Stirling) was playing Malcolm in the final
scene of Macbeth and suddenly forgot his lines, Klanert – as the slain Macbeth – rose
again in exasperation and finished the speech himself.
Whatever his merits of defects as an actor, however, the period when Klanert was manager
of the Theatre Royal was one of the most notable in its history. He was prepared to pay
high salaries in order to attract actors of the highest calibre, such as Edmund Kean. Other
famous players engaged by Klanert were Eliza O’Neill (who later married the member of
Parliament William Becher), Maria Foote (who appeared during several seasons playing
such parts such as Rosalind in As You Like It) and the schoolmaster-turned-actor John
Liston. The latter played Paul Pry, one of his most celebrated roles, at Richmond in
September 1827.
One of the most popular annual events in Richmond at this time was the August rowing
match for local watermen, the prize being a wherry donated by Klanert. In the evening after
the match, the successful competitor would be carried on to the stage of the theatre in the
boat which he had won.
The first performance in this country of Klanert’s Elisina – an adaptation of a French
melodrama –took place at Richmond on 18th August 1817. The work was subsequently
performed many times at the theatre.
Date:- 24th August 1831
Plays:- William Shakespeare: Richard III
George Colman the younger: Ways and Means, or, A Trip to Dover
The Company included:
Edmund Kean (1787?-1833) – the great tragedian’s first recorded performance at the
Theatre Royal seems to have been on 19th October 1814. When he played Shylock in The
Merchant of Venice. The playbill for that performance describes the part as ‘the one in
which he made his first appearance in London, and which stamped at once stamped him as
the greatest actor of the present day.’ Kean is billed simply as ‘Mr K.’! In fact, Kean’s
performance as Shylock at Drury Lane in 1814 was not his first performance in London, but
it was the one by which he achieved star status. In later years Kean played at Richmond on
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Local History Notes
a number of occasions, mostly during Klanert’s management. In 1831 he ook a lease on
the theatre and settled in the adjoining cottage. Despite his failing health, he played there
frequently and, in addition, performed at other theatre in London and the provinces. The
Theatrical Observer of 25th July 1832 remarked that ‘The Richmond Theatre…will open on
Monday next, under the management of Kean, who is to perform there three times a week,
at Windsor twice, and at the Haymarket every Monday during the season;pretty sharp work
that for a man with a shattered constitution.’ As an actor, Kean relied more on movement
and facial expression than on voice production. He was at his best when playing
malevolent, treacherous or frenzied roles rather than noble or virtuous ones. Comedy was,
apparently, outside his scope. He excelled as Shylock, Richard III, Barabas – in Marlowe’s
Jew of Malta – and Sir Giles Overreach in Massinger’s New Way to Pay Old Debts.
Susan Chambers – then living with the Keans – wrote to a friend describing the impact of
Kean’s Sir Giles in January 1816 thus ‘To see him in the last act I think you would never get
over it. Glover got into strong histericks and many ladies fainted.’ Hazlitt wrote of his
Richard III ‘Never was the character represented by greater distinctness and precision, and
perfectly articulated in every part. If Kean did not succeed in concentrating all the lines of
the character, he gave a vigour and relief to the part which we have never seen
surpassed…The transition from the fiercest passion to the most familiar tone was a quality
which Kean possessed over every other actor that ever appeared.’
His last performance took place at Covent Garden on 25th March 1833. Kean was playing
Othello to the Iago of his son, Charles. During the second act he collapsed and a few days
later was taken back to Richmond where he died on 15th May. Crowds of people came to
the funeral and the mourners included many well-known theatrical figures. The body was
interred in Richmond Parish Church and a tablet with a medallion portrait of Kean was
erected on the outside of the west wall by his son in 1839. It was brought into the church
in1904.
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Local History Notes
Robert William Honner (1809-1852) - Honner began his career as a dancer, later becoming
an actor and playing a wide variety of parts. He was lessee of Sadler's Wells Theatre from
1838 to 1840, during which time he tried to establish legitimate drama there.
Charles Selby (1802?-1863) – An actor who played many character roles. He also wrote
many light one-act plays.
The ‘Miss Faucit’ who appeared in this performance was Helen Faucit’s elder sister Harriet
Date:- 26th April 1834
A Grand Concert by Signor Paganini
Nicolo Pagannini (1782-1840) – the Italian Virtuoso was born in Genoa. After being given
preliminary instruction in violin playing by his father, he received tuition from Servetto – a
violinist in the theatre orchestra – and Giocomo Costa ‘maestro di cappella’ at the
Cathedral of St. Lorenzo. His public debut was made at the age of nine. In 1795 he had
lessons in Parma from Alessandro Rolla and Ghiretti. Two years later, accompanied by his
father, he made his first professional tour to Lombardy. Whilst still in his teens he left home
and started to tour independently. He became addicted to gambling and, through losses at
cards, had to pawn his violin. Fortunately he was able to borrow a fine Guerneri from a
French merchant called Livron, who later made him a present of the instrument Thereafter
it became Paganini’s favourite violin. During 1801-4 he lived with a lady of rank in Tuscany
and ceased to play in public. He began to study the guitar for which he composed two sets
of duets with violin.
In 1805 Napoleon’s sister, Elisa Bacciochi, Princess of Lucca and Pioma, engaged him as
director of her private music – a position for which he was poorly paid. At about this time he
composed his Military Sonata for the G String entitled Napoleon and also his Scene
Amoureuse for two strings only. He left the service of the Princess Elisa in about 1813.
While at Venice in 1815 he first met the dancer Antonia Bianchi, the woman who bore his
son, Achillino, in1826. Paganini’s first concert in Vienna took place in 1828. The visit
caused a sensation and even merchandise in the city’s shop windows was advertised as ‘a
al Paganini.’
In 1831 he travelled to England for the first time and eventually made his London debut in
June, after considerable hostility in the press over the high prices of the concert tickets. On
another visit to this country in1834, Paganini gave concert with an American pianist and
composer called Watson, his daughter and a Miss Wells. Both the ladies were singers and
all three appeared in Paganini’s concert at Richmond. A Boulogne newspaper later
accused Paganini of attempting to elope to France with Miss Watson. The violinist
defended himself in the same newspaper, stating that she had come to him as a refuge
from an unhappy life at home, where her father was living with Miss Wells, having
separated from his wife. Whatever the truth, Miss Watson, on a subsequent tour of
America, achieved some publicity by coupling her name with that of Paganini.
By the beginning of 1839, Paganini was in the throes of the disease from which he never
recovered and his death occurred at Nice. He had requested that his funeral should be
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Local History Notes
without pomp and that no Requiem should be played for him. He bequeathed his beloved
Guarneri to his native city of Genoa. Because of the superstitious rumours attached to him
and because he died without receiving the last rite, permission to inter his body in
consecrated ground was not granted until 5 years after his death.
Date:- 3rd October 1834
Plays:- Sheridan Knowles: The Wife: a tale of Mantua
Edward Fitzball: Margaret’s Ghost
The Company included:
John Cooper – born in Bath where he gained his first experience as an actor. He joined the
company of Andrew Cherry in Wales, later moving to Scotland where – in Edinburgh – he
played Edgar to the Lear of Edmund Kean. After his highly successful debut at Drury Lane
as Romeo (November 1820) he again acted with Kean, as Iago to the latter’s Othello.
Cooper was competent, if rather mechanical actor. Among his best parts were Iago and the
Ghost in Hamlet. He was the originator of several roles, including William Wyndham in
Dimond’s Royal Oak, Virginius in Knowles’s tragedy of that name and, most notable of all,
the Doge in Byron’s Marino Faliero.
Helen (or Helena) Faucit (1814-1898 – one of the finest actresses of her generation. She
was the grand-daughter of John Diddear – the actor who had been manager of the Theatre
Royal for a time at the beginning of the 19th century – and the daughter of the actor Saville
Faucit who married Diddear’s daughter Harriet. With her sister, Harriet - also an actress Helen used to spend holidays in Richmond, lodging at No. 3 The Green, now known as
Gothic House. It was there, as a small child, she had a brief meeting with the ageing actor,
Edmund Kean. Her own story of how she entered her profession is related in her book On
Some of Shakespeare’s Female Characters (1885). It seems that, one summer’s day in
1833 during one of her stays in Richmond, she and Harriet had entered the empty theatre
on The Green and as ‘a little frolic’ had, on the stage, enacted the balcony scene from
Romeo and Juliet. Unknown to them the manager, Willis Jones, had been listening in his
private box and was so impressed by Helen’s Juliet that he persuaded her family to let her
play the part before the public. So her first public performance was on 30th September 1833
with Helen appearing in the playbill simply as ‘A Young Lady (her First Appearance on any
Stage’). In the same performance, Harriet played Lady Capulet. Helen was to play Juliet
many times during her brilliant career – it was to become one of her most celebrated roles.
She first appeared in London, at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, in January 1836 as
Julia in Sheridan Knowles’s The Hunchback – a role she had already played at Richmond
in October 1833. Later she worked with such famous actors as Macready and Samuel
Phelps. Her success in Paris equalled that in England: she was highly praised by the critic
Theophile Gautier and Alexandre Dumas contemplated writing a play for her. In 1851 Helen
married Theodore Martin, later becoming Lady Martin when her husband was knighted in
1880. Her best work was done in revivals of Shakespeare’s plays and in new verse
dramas, many of which were written specially for her. On of the finest parts she created
was that of Pauline Deschappelles in The Lady of Lyons by Lord Lytton – she first played
the role in February 1838. Perhaps her greatest success in tragedy occurred in Dublin in
February 1845 when she played Antigone. Joseph Knight summarised her unique qualities
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Local History Notes
in the following words ‘As a representative of wifely devotion, virginal grace and moral
worth it is difficult to know whom to oppose against her.’
Date:- 17th July 1843
Plays:- Shakespeare: Hamlet
Charles Dance: Naval Engagements
The Company included
Charles Kean (1811? – 1868) – was the second son of Edmund Kean who sent him to Eton
in the hope that he would eventually follow a non-theatrical career. In 1827 he was offered
a cadetship in the East India Company’s service but refused to accept it until his father
settled an allowance on his mother, from whom the elder Kean was separated. A quarrel
ensued between father and son. Charles, with no apparent difficulty, secured for himself an
engagement at Drury Lane – the theatre from which his father had recently severed his
connections – and first appeared there in October 1827 as Young Norval in Douglas. In
this and other early performances, Charles tended to imitate slavishly his father’s
mannerisms on stage and the critics were hostile. In 1826 he was reconciled with his father
and in October of that year appeared with him in Glasgow in Howard Payne’s tragedy
Brutus. They also acted together in Dublin the following year in Othello and The
Merchant of Venice. Charles visited America in 1830 for a two-year tour and received
favourable reviews and returned to England in 1833. He married the actress Ellen Tree in
January 1842. She had appeared with him at various times earlier during his career. They
presented a somewhat a quaint sight to observers when walking out together as Cecil
Ferard Armstrong describes in A Century of Great Actors (1912) – ‘Charles wore long
hair which only accentuates the insignificance of his queer little face. Mrs Kean was always
most respectably dressed with a poke-bonnet and enormous hoops, which, when they
became rebellious, as they sometimes did, revealed chaste white stockings and flat-heeled
shoes.’ In partnership with Robert Keeley, Charles entered on a lease of the Princes
Theatre, London in 1850. Later, after Keeley had retired from the management, Kean
began the series of spectacular revivals for which he is best remembered. The first of these
was King John in February 1852 with Charles playing the leading role. At this time he also
scored a great success in Boucicault’s adaptation of Casimir de la Vigne’s Corsican
Brothers. It was not long, however before his lavish scenic effects began to receive
adverse criticism. Blackwood’s Magazine of 1852 carried the following comments – ‘Mr
Kean has great merits, quick appreciation, sound intelligence and occasionally a burst of
something which, if it is not genius, is describable by no other word. But he is certainly
mistaken in relying so much on the resources of the "costumier" and the "painter".’ His last
performance took place in Liverpool in May 1867 when he played one of his best parts –
that of Louis XI. Charles Kean was a painstaking and conscientious actor, though not a
great one. With the exception of Hamlet and perhaps Richard III, most of his performances
were generally regarded as failures.
James Robertson Anderson (1811-1895) – made his London debut in September 1837
when he appeared with Macready at Covent Garden. Later, on the opening of the same
theatre under the Vestris-Mathews management, he played Biron in Love’s Labours Lost.
From 1849 to 1851 he was the manager at Drury Lane. Anderson’s original included Basil
Firebrace in Jerrold’s Prisoners of War, Earl Mertoun on Blot on the ‘Scutcheon by
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Local History Notes
Robert Browning and Charles Courtly on Boucicault’s London Assurance. He had a fine
speaking voice which deteriorated in his later years.
Date:- 8th July 1853
Plays:- Charles Dance: A Wonderful Woman
George Henry Lewes: The Lawyers
The Company included
Charles James Mathews (1803-1878) – was the son of the comedian Charles Mathews. He
trained as an architect but took to the stage professionally in 1835, the same year that he
replaced his father in the management of London’s Adelphi Theatre. In 1838 he married
Lucia Elizabeth Vestris (then his manageress) and , in the same year, the couple toured
America, somewhat unsuccessfully. On their return to London, they took over the
management of Covent Garden and there stages some brilliant productions, including (in
1841) Boucicault’s London Assurance in which Charles played Dazzle, one of the best
characterisations of his career. The couple’s professional triumphs apparently did little to
relieve his financial difficulties – by this time he was very heavily in debt. After the death of
Madame Vestris in 1856, Charles made extensive tours abroad visiting Australia and India.
He excelled in the light, stylish comedy parts requiring little emotional depth. In the opinion
of George Henry Lewes, he was ‘utterly powerless in the manifestation of all the powerful
emotions… He cannot even laugh with animal heartiness. He sparkles: he never explodes.’
Madame Vestris [Lucia Elizabeth Bartolozzi] (1797-1856) - had been married to the dancer
Armand Vestris, who deserted her in 1820. Besides her dark, attractive looks, she
possessed an excellent singing voice and appeared in productions of Mozast’s operas The
Marriage of Figaro and Cosi Fan Tutte. It was during her tenancy of the Olympic Theatre
in London (1831-1839) that she engaged her future husband, Charles Mathews. She was
at her best in burlesque and high comedy, but her ‘breeches’ roles – such as Macheath in
The Beggar’s Opera and Don Giovanni – were also popular. Her last appearance was for
her husband’s benefit at the Lyceum in July 1854. Madame Vestris is credited with certain
innovations of theatrical production, including the use of real (as opposed to artificial)
properties and the development of the ‘box’ set.
Robert Roxby (1809?-1866) – acted frequently with Charles James Mathews and played
the latter’s principal parts himself in the provinces. From 1847 to 1855 he was with
Mathews at the Lyceum.
Charles Dance (1794-1863) – was the son of the architect George Dance the younger and
nephew of James Dance, the actor and first manager of the Theatre Royal, Richmond. He
wrote numerous light pieces for the stage, including extravaganzas for Madame Vestris.
George Henry Lewes (1817-1878) – was the author of works on natural history, science
and philosophy. He also contributed literary and dramatic criticism to various periodicals.
His book On Actors and the Act of Acting was published in 1875. His play The Lawyers
was first produced at the Lyceum in May 1853. In 1851 he met Mary Ann Evans – the
novelist George Eliot. They subsequently lived together as husband and wife and between
1855-1859 stayed in Richmond at No. 8, Parkshot.
From Richmond Libraries’ Local Studies Collection
Page 10 of 11
Local History Notes
More information on Richmond's Theatres is available from the Local Studies Collection.
From Richmond Libraries’ Local Studies Collection
Page 11 of 11