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The Pennsylvania State University
The Graduate school
The College of Liberal Arts
ACTRESSES ON THE LONDON STAGE, 1670-1755:
A PROSOPOGRAPHICAL STUDY
A Dissertation in
English
by
Susan M. Martin
© 2008 Susan M. Martin
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
May 2008
ii
The dissertation of Susan M. Martin was reviewed and approved* by the following:
Robert D. Hume
Evan Pugh Professor of English
Thesis Adviser
Chair of Committee
Clement C. Hawes
Professor of English
John T. Harwood
Senior Director, Teaching and Learning with Technology
Associate Professor of English
Associate Professor of Science & Technology
Laura Knoppers
Professor of English
Philip Jenkins
Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Humanities
Robert Edwards
Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English and Comparative Literature
Director of Graduate Studies
*Signatures are on file in the Graduate School.
iii
Abstract
When the London theatres re-opened after the restoration of the monarchy in
1660, actresses appeared on the public English stage for the first time. At first a novelty,
women playing women’s roles became not only desirable but essential to theatrical
operations henceforth. This thesis argues that in order to gain an accurate picture of the
place which women occupied in the theatre, and how this new occupation functioned,
actresses at different levels need to be considered. To this end I will employ the technique
of prosopography (group biography) for tracking and analyzing the professional and
personal experiences of a significant number of actresses in the long eighteenth-century.
For a prosopographical study two elements need to be in place, (1) sufficient data
for a detailed survey, which can provide credible results, to be carried out, and (2) a
system which enables the relevant data to be extracted from the information available. I
contend that the advantage of this method, often employed by historians and social
scientists, is that it allows for consideration not only of the major actresses of the period,
but also the minor company members. My aim is not to create detailed biographies of
individuals but to look for patterns and trends in the group as a whole and thus provide as
broad a view of female acting careers in the eighteenth-century as extant records will
allow.
Table of Contents
Abstract
iii
Preface
v
Acknowledgements
vii
Chapter One: The Profession of ‘Actress’ and
the Potentialities of Prosopography
1
Chapter Two: Sample 1 1670-1675
Susanah Elliott
Margaret Rutter
Eleanor Leigh, née Dixon
Elizabeth Barry
26
28
29
31
34
Chapter Three: Sample 2 1710-1715
Mrs. Clark(e)
Mrs. Hunt
Hester Booth, née Santlow
Anne Oldfield
87
90
91
99
127
Chapter Four: Sample 3 1750-1755
Sarah Toogood
Miss(es) Davis
Jane Green, née Hippisley
Kitty Clive
173
187
189
193
207
Chapter Five: Conclusion
252
Works Frequently Cited
288
Appendix A: London Theatre Chronology
289
Appendix B: Actors’ careers
298
Appendix C: Will transcriptions
Hester Booth
Barton Booth
Anne Oldfield
Jane Green
307
311
313
317
v
Preface
Actresses on the London Stage 1670-1755: A Prosopographical Study
investigates the development of acting as a profession for women from its early years to
the middle of the eighteenth century. During this time period, women performing on the
public stage progressed from being a novelty to being a standard part of theatrical
operations; this study examines how the actresses engaged with this “new” profession.
The method of prosopography (group biography) focuses on gathering as much
information as possible, about as many members of a given population as possible, and
thus allowing group patterns and variations to become discernible. This approach is ideal
for the study of actresses in the long eighteenth century since it takes into consideration
not only the experiences of all the members of the group but also allows for variations
within the amount, and type, of data available. Since prosopography has not previously
been used either in the context of the eighteenth century, or theatre history, Chapter One
explains both the method and the way in which I have applied it to my subject matter.
Since the number of actresses active in the years 1670-1755 is too great for this
study to cover completely, I have chosen three sample groups—1670-1675, 1710-1715,
and, 1750-1755—wherein all actresses active, whether at the beginning or end of their
careers, are included. These groups are not statistically random but have been chosen to
give as broad coverage as possible of a time when many changes took place in the
theatre, the drama performed, and the society in which they operated. Chapter Two deals
with the 1670-1675 sample group, Chapter Three with 1710-1715, and Chapter Four with
1750-1755; all are organized in a similar manner.
vi
Each chapter concerned with a sample group examines the professional and
personal lives of four actresses whose careers exemplify four different “types”: a very
brief involvement with the theatre and little or nothing known about the actress’s
personal life; a career spanning a number of years where there is some detail on
professional activity but little on personal life; a longer career where information on both
professional and personal lives is available, but the actress in question remained minor; a
long career with professional and personal information extant, where the actress became
one the leading players of her day. For each actress all extant information is examined
both in the context of her individual career and how that career compares with, and
relates to, those of others in the same sample group.
The final chapter draws together the material from the three sample groups and
discusses the patterns that have emerged from the data regarding the actresses’
professional, and personal, lives. An important part of this study is the consideration of
how the professional, and personal, overlap and interweave—previous works on
eighteenth century actresses have tended to focus on one aspect or the other. I contend
that, only through a detailed examination of all professional and personal extant
information, can conclusions be drawn about the development of acting as a profession
for women in the long eighteenth century.
vii
Acknowledgements
A dissertation is rarely the product of individual effort and my work is certainly
no exception. I want to thank all the people who have helped me throughout this long
process.
My advisors Robert D. Hume and Clement C. Hawes have provided advice and
guidance above and beyond the call of duty—my thanks to them for plowing through
endless drafts of the “weekly pages” which have, indeed, finally become this dissertation.
Thank you also to my committee, John Harwood, Laura Knoppers, and Philip Jenkins,
for their help and support.
Many and heartfelt thanks go to all my friends, on both sides of the Atlantic, for
their constant encouragement, sense of humor, and willingness to listen—at all hours of
the day and night.
Finally, I would like to dedicate this work to my mother, Catherine Martin, and to
the memory of my late father, Patrick Ormond Martin, both of whom have always
encouraged me to take the more interesting road.
1
CHAPTER 1:
The Profession of ‘Actress’ and the Potentialities of
Prosopography
When the London theatres re-opened after the restoration of the monarchy in
1660, actresses appeared on the public English stage for the first time. At first these
women were a novelty, something new and scandalous to attract public attention to
theatres that had been officially closed during the interregnum. However, within a short
space of time, as the public grew to expect women on the London stage, women playing
women’s roles became not only desirable but essential to theatrical operations. The aim
of this study is to examine this new profession for women in the long eighteenth-century
and to analyze the personal and professional patterns that emerge from consideration of
the data gathered.
Actresses in the long eighteenth-century: existing scholarship.
While a certain amount of scholarly attention has been directed towards the question of
why women became acceptable on stage in the Restoration era and a number of
individual biographies have been written about the leading actresses, no one has yet
attempted to pull together the collective experiences of these first female actors. In the
past, the fragmentary nature of extant records combined with the large number of
individuals involved would have made such a study a very daunting task.
Contemporary eighteenth-century biographies of actresses such as Ann Oldfield
tend to be sensationalist in nature and mercenary in aim— several accounts were rushed
into print at the time of her death to capitalize on public interest. More recent works
either concentrate on a single actress, for example Mary Nash’s The Provok’d Wife
2
(1977)1, a study of the actress Susannah Cibber, or look at a group of leading performers,
Elizabeth Howe’s The first English actresses (1992) and Gilli Bush-Bailey’s Treading
the Bawds (2006)2.
The studies which have been done on the role of the actress in Restoration and
eighteenth-century theatre have been few in number, highly selective in their choice of
material, and, especially with the older works, given to sweeping generalizations rather
than detailed analysis. In the twentieth century, interest in the first females on the British
stage seems to occur sporadically, with a number of works appearing in the late 1920s
and early 1930s.3 These works tend to be conversational in tone, imparting to the reader
long forgotten tidbits of gossip and rumour, with little, if any signs of the academic rigour
demanded today. For example, Rosamond Gilder, in 1931, states that
The actresses [of the Restoration] were particularly difficult to control.
They were forever dashing off on private business, handing over their parts
to some more stolid sister who at the moment had no lover to divert her from
her duties.4
While this pronouncement may or may not be true, Gilder offers no definite evidence to
support her claim. Her project was very ambitious, probably overly so, as it attempted to
trace the ancestry of women on the stage from the classical Greek and Roman eras
through to their emergence on the stages of continental Europe and then to England. Her
1
Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1977.
Elizabeth Howe The first English actresses: Women and drama 1660-1700 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1992); Gilli Bush-Bailey Treading the Bawds: Actresses and playwrights on the LateStuart stage (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006) .
3
For example: Otis Skinner Mad Folk of the Theatre: Ten Studies in Temperament (Indianapolis: The
Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1928); Henry Wysham Lanier The First English Actresses, From the Initial
Appearance of Women on the Stage in 1660 till 1700 (New York, The Players Series, 1930); Rosamund
Gilder Enter the Actress: The First Women in the Theatre (Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1931).
4
Gilder p. 147.
2
3
mission seems to have been, at least in part, to try to reclaim the character of the
Restoration actress— she freely acknowledges that many were “light-hearted and lightheaded” (p. 150) but goes on to describe others who
devoted their whole existence to the theatre, who lived and breathed
and had their being within its bounds, acted an inconceivable number
of parts and brought to their profession a hardy devotion which made
them true mainstays of the stage. (p. 150)
Gilder seems to divide these first actresses into sinners and saints, leaving little room for
any consideration of their actual contribution to the theatrical life of the time. Enter the
Actress, while giving an interesting view some of the concerns of theatre historians in the
1930s, belongs to the “genteel amateur” genre and unfortunately provides little
substantial scholarship from which to build more detailed investigations.
In his A History of English Drama 1660-19005, first volume published in 1923,
Allardyce Nicoll refers to the shady reputations and mercenary nature of many of the
first actresses while grudgingly acknowledging that they may have had some talent:
We have to recognize that some of these women had a true artistic
genius for the stage: but, at the same time, we must be careful not to
assume that they always aided unselfishly in the interpretation of the
works of dramatic art. The majority must have thought more of a fine
gown, or maybe of a coach and pair, than of a fine play. (Vol. 1, p. 72)
Nicoll does not find it necessary to describe the actors of the Restoration in such terms,
Thomas Betterton, Michael Mohun, Charles Hart, are all discussed only in terms of the
roles which they played and the acting styles which they adopted; no mention is made of
5
6 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1923 - 1959.
4
their possible personal motivations or reasons for their choice of career. Although his
primary focus was the drama, Nicoll does also include sections in each volume on
theatrical matters—the theatre space, scenery, audience composition, actors and
actresses—but given the large scope of the project, these tend to be brief notes with the
aim of helping the reader gain greater insight into the types of drama under discussion,
rather than a comprehensive account of theatrical business of the era. With regard to the
sections devoted to actors and actresses, no mention is made of any changes in conditions
or practices, other than those of acting styles and how they related to the plays being
performed.
More recently, scholarly interest in actresses of the long eighteenth-century has
been sporadic, with only two full books devoted to the subject — John Harold Wilson’s
All the King’s Ladies: Actresses of the Restoration (1958)6 and Elizabeth Howe’s The
first English actresses— both of which deal primarily with the Restoration and late
seventeenth-century. No recent works have considered the actual eighteenth-century, and
none has attempted to trace the development of women’s acting throughout the period.
Wilson states his purpose as “to gather all available information about the actresses … to
consider what kind of women they were, the conditions under which they lived and
worked, their behavior on stage and off, and finally, the effect they had on late
seventeenth-century drama.”7 To achieve this, his method is to provide five general
chapters (Enter the Actress; Behind the Scenes; On Stage; In Petticoats and Breeches;
and The Actress and the Play), followed by an eighty-three page appendix which lists
alphabetically, and provides as much information as possible on, the actresses of the
6
7
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958.
Preface p. viii.
5
London stage from 1660 to 1689. Given that Wilson was working before the publication
of either The London Stage 1660-18008 or A Biographical Dictionary of Actors,
Actresses, Musicians, Dancers etc. in London 1660-18009 he does well to have achieved
some of his goals. However, the value judgments that are implied in the preface by
Wilson’s concern for his actresses “behavior” continue throughout his analysis in the
text. In the fifth chapter, when evaluating the possible influence of actresses on the plays
being written, he concludes that “Regrettably, we must add, their influence was not
always good, morally or dramatically.” (p. 92) Such comments seem impressionistic at
best, and there seems little to gain in moralizing about the sex lives of actresses.
When reading one of Wilson’s general chapters, such as “The Actress and the
Play,”one finds quite a lot of detail on leading performers but little if any sense of how all
the performers within a given company operated as a whole. He discusses the pairing of
actresses that took place, beginning with Rebecca Marshall and Elizabeth Boutel in the
Kings Company of 1666—two physically contrasting actresses who played villainess and
ingénue respectively, with great success in a number of different plays—and
demonstrates how this tradition continued with such notable actresses as Elizabeth Barry
and Anne Bracegirdle. While it would be impossible to consider each female performer
in detail, given both lack of primary information and constraints of length, Wilson makes
no attempt to link the theatrical world of the stars to that of the foot soldiers. His entry on
the minor actress Mrs. Norton reads:
NORTON, MRS. (Duke’s Company, 1662-70). Mrs. Norton is not mentioned
8
9
11 vols. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1960-8.
16 vols. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1973-93.
6
by Downes, yet according to Pepys (December 27, 1662) she was the “fine
wench” who replaced Mrs. Davenport as Roxalana in The Siege of Rhodes
and played the role “rather better in all respects for person, voice and
judgment than the first Roxalana.” Since Mrs. Davenport left the stage
in January, 1662, and Pepys first saw Mrs. Norton on December 1, 1662,
she must have joined the company at some time between those dates.
Her name appears in no dramatis personae, yet she remained a
member of the company for eight years. On July 2, 1666, Pepys met her
at Peg Pen’s house and described her as “a fine woman, indifferent
handsome, good body and hand, and good mien, and pretends to sing, but
do it not excellently.” In 1670 she left the company under unpleasant
circumstances. On December 5, 1670, the Lord Chamberlain issued a
warrant to “take into Custody the body of Mrs Norton late one of his
Maties Comoedians & to bring her before mee to answer unto such
things as shall be then & there objected agt her” (LC 5, 188, p. 61).10
This entry gives most of what is known about Mrs. Norton; all the Biographical
Dictionary has to add is the fact that she became a member of the King’s Company at
Bridges Street in the 1669-70 season, and the suggestion that her Christian name may
have been Ruth—based on a petition by one Ruth Norton against her husband Luke on 28
October 1671. Therefore it is neither the quality nor the quantity of the information
provided by Wilson with which I wish to take issue, but rather the manner in which he
organized his material and dealt with his subject matter. His five chapters are a mixture of
fact and historical gossip; we gain a certain sense of how the principal actresses fitted in
10
All the King’s Ladies pp. 175-176.
7
with the theatrical scene of the time but no real impression of how a theatrical company
worked. Wilson does not, for example, try to account for the rise of certain actresses,
consider the importance to a performer of owning a role or look at how new roles were
apportioned. While the appendix of actresses was the only one of its kind at the time and
thus very useful for readers, it would perhaps have been more appropriate, given
Wilson’s stated aims at the beginning of the book, had he instead tried to work some of
the lesser-known actresses in to his overall picture. The information Wilson gathered
was as accurate as could be at the time but he makes little or no attempt to take the next
step and construct some form of argument with or develop an analysis of that which he
has collated.
Writing thirty-four years after Wilson, Howe acknowledges his “pioneering study
. . . a useful and informative book which nevertheless seem out of date in the light of
more recent research of the period and its theatre” (p. x). She points to the interesting
absence of detailed and separate “critical evaluation” on the influence early actresses had
on both individual plays and the general style of popular drama being written at the time.
Howe outlines two strands of enquiry for her work (1) to look at the consequences of the
introduction of women to the English stage for the drama of the period and (2) to study
the “individual influences” which a number of the leading female players had, through
plays that were written for them.11 Howe’s individual chapters are a mixture of general
information and theorizing on the role of women in changing drama, combined with
individual case studies:
1. The arrival of the actress (Why actresses in 1660?; The new professionals
and their status; The actress as prostitute)
11
Preface p. x.
8
2. Sex and violence (The actress and her body in tragedy; Rape; Sexual
rhetoric; Venice Preserved; Comic objects of desire; Breeches roles; The
actress and comic change)
3. The actress, the dramatist and comedy (Nell Gwyn and the creation of the
gay couple; Comic heroines 1670-8; Elizabeth Currer as whore 1675-9;
Elizabeth Barry as comedienne 1676-81; Susannah Mountfort and Anne
Bracegirdle)
4. Life overwhelming fiction (Prologues and epilogues; The relation between
actress, persona and stage roles: Anne Bracegirdle, Elizabeth Currer, the
actress in general)
5. Elizabeth Barry and the development of Restoration tragedy (The
actresses and the decline of heroic drama 1670-80; Thomas Otway and
Elizabeth Barry; Elizabeth Barry and ‘she-tragedy’; Elizabeth Barry and
Rowe’s The Fair Penitent)
6. The actress as dramatic prostitute (The Revenge and Elizabeth Barry;
Elizabeth Barry and Aphra Behn 1681-2; The Barry cast-mistress 16901700)
7. The angel and the she-devil (Angels and devils 1660-5; The impact of
Rebecca Marshall and Elizabeth Boutell; The Barry-Bracegirdle
partnership 1689-1700; Female pairing in comedy; Congreve’s use of
Barry and Bracegirdle)
8. Conclusion: the achievement of the first English actresses
9
As can be deduced from these chapter headings, as well as Howe’s stated aim, her central
focus is on the connection between the drama of the Restoration period and its actresses,
rather than on actresses as part of a theatre history. Some chapters are more cohesive
than others, for example: Chapter 2 – Sex and Violence - has a rather random series of
subheadings which to a certain extent distract and detract from the points which are being
made. Howe also tends to concentrate on particular individuals, such as Elizabeth
Barry—details of whose life and career form the backbone of four of the eight chapters—
while this is understandable, since Barry is one of the early actresses about whom we
have a considerable amount of information, it does provide a very one-sided view of
acting as a career for women in the late seventeenth-century.
The general conclusions at which Howe arrives are that actresses were
commercially very successful for their theatres, though less well paid than their male
counterparts; they were exploited sexually on and off stage; no actress ever turned to
playwriting whereas many actors did; though Restoration comedy may appear to display
equality between the sexes, it actually supported the gender norms and stereotypes of the
time; the presence of women on the stage appears to have encouraged writers of tragedy
to provide ever more lurid examples of physical female suffering. As Howe phrases it
“The legacy of the first English actresses to drama, to theatre and to their own sex is a
mixed one.”12
As well as the chapters described, Howe also provides two useful appendices:
“Major actresses and their roles in new plays,” and “Plays in which Barry and
Bracegirdle appeared together.” In the first of these she gives the year of first
performance, the dramatist, the role, and the type (young girl, wife, villainess etc.);
12
The first English actresses p. 176.
10
however, what is not indicated is how long these roles remained in an individual’s
possession. This would have provided readers with a much more valid sense of an
actress’s career path and could also have given a sense of the possible connections
between performers—if a leading actress did surrender a part, to whom was it allocated?
Also, probably because of given restraints on time and page numbers, Howe does not
give a complete list of roles performed for any actress and while the list of new roles does
give a sense of the style of parts played it is only a portion of the whole picture.
What both Wilson and Howe fail to do is to provide any real sense of how acting
as a career choice affected all the women involved, as a group; they look at the major
players and the influence, if any, which these women exercised over their working
conditions. While this is understandable given the lack of detailed source material for
many seventeenth and early eighteenth-century actresses, I consider that it is possible to
give an account of acting as a profession for women in the long eighteenth-century by
using methodologies other than those adopted by either Wilson or Howe.
Covering similar territory to Howe but with a different emphasis is Bush-Bailey’s
Treading the Bawds (2006) which looks at the inter-relationship between leading
actresses and female playwrights at the end of the seventeenth century. Her focus is on
the “star” players, particularly Elizabeth Barry and Anne Bracegirdle, and the power
which they wielded both as actresses and co-managers of the Lincoln’s Inn Fields
company with Thomas Betterton. Given the direction that Bush-Bailey has chosen for
this study, a consideration of the lower ranks of actresses is not strictly necessary but in
her desire to prove that the theatre of the time was not completely male dominated, she
11
does ignore the experiences of the vast majority of women involved in the acting
profession.
Two other recent publications include actresses from the long eighteenth century
as part of a wider history of women on the stage. Kirsten Pullen’s Actresses and Whores:
On Stage and in Society (2005) looks at actresses from the eighteenth to twentieth
centuries in the context of the links between performance and prostitution.13 For the
chapter on “Betty Boutell”, she argues that “Within the ideology of rake sexuality,
women are aggressively constructed as objects available for pleasure” (p.29), but fails,
for example, to take into account that the audience was not composed entirely of rakes, or
indeed, of men. Pullen’s concern is with the sexuality of the actresses and her
understanding of how that sexuality was perceived by the audience; she does not attempt
to make any evaluation of acting as a profession for women either in the context of the
individual actresses, or over the time periods covered.
Edited by Maggie Gale and John Stokes, The Cambridge Companion to the
Actress (2007) is a collection of sixteen essays which “pursues the professional actress
across the centuries and across two continents.”(p.3).14 The structure of a Companion
allows for broad coverage of the topic of “the actress” but at the same time its authors are
necessarily bound by the format—the essays are approximately twenty pages in length
and are quite general in nature. The two essays which cover the Restoration and the
eighteenth century—Gilli Bush-Bailey’s “Revolution, legislation and autonomy” and
Elizabeth Eger’s “Spectacle, intellect and authority: the actress in the eighteenth
13
14
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
12
century”—both provide an introduction to the subject that is for a general, rather than a
specialized, audience.
A very different approach to the study of the acting profession is taken by G. E.
Bentley in The Profession of Player in Shakespeare’s Time (1984).15 His stated intention
is to “help to indicate the usual conduct of the Elizabethan playwrights and their
employers…” (p. x) and thus to correct many incorrect assumptions that studies of
individual playwrights and their works frequently make about conditions of performance.
Bentley deliberately chooses the term ‘player’ over that of ‘actor’ based on extant records
such as parish registers, diaries, and the records from the office of the Master of the
Revels; he clearly states in the preface that he does not seek to collect together such
contemporary records as are available but rather to offer an interpretation of the
documents he has found. Bentley organizes his work into three sections
first the relations between the player and his company; then the
three components of all adult companies—sharers, hired men, and
apprentices; then three aspects of the players’ activities—managing,
touring, and casting; and then an attempt to draw some of the material
together in a summarizing statement. (p. xiii)
The sources which he has available to him are even more sporadic than those available
for the eighteenth-century. Therefore while Bentley is in essence trying to categorize
acting as a profession, a lack of specific evidence about a substantial number of
individual actors makes treatment of them impossible in group-biographical terms. There
is, however, extant and reliable information for certain very well-known players, such as
Edward Alleyn, who left large estates, detailed wills and charitable bequests—but these
15
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.
13
are very much the exception rather than the rule. Thus Bentley’s work concentrates on
setting the background conditions for performance in the time of Shakespeare as opposed
to considering the minutiae of performers’ lives and career paths.
In contrast, Tracy C. Davis in Actresses as Working Women: Their Social
Identity in Victorian Culture (1991)16 and The Economics of the British Stage, 1800-1914
(2000)17 provides a very detailed and exacting analysis of women acting in the
nineteenth-century. One of the principal advantages of working in this century is the
advent of the census, introduced in Britain in 1841; another is the existence of more
complete records for theatres and companies. Though analysis of sources for the
eighteenth-century should provide a view of the acting profession for women, without
census reports it is impossible to place this in the larger context of women’s work during
that period. Although Davis’s sources cannot be replicated, her methods and approach to
the topic are of interest, particularly the manner in which she chose to tackle her central
question— how does women’s work on the stage relate to their social existence off it?18
Davis does not consider personal and professional lives to be separate entities and
therefore cannot see how one can be studied without the other, a point with which I agree
wholeheartedly. She chooses to conduct her study by applying different methodologies
to the same central questions. Using first the perspective of social and labor history, then
the historical demography of the acting profession, followed by an analysis of the
interconnections between economic circumstances and social consequences for women in
the nineteenth-century workplace, Davis constructs a detailed picture of the social and
economic lives of women who worked as actresses during this period. The depth of the
16
London: Routledge, 1991.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
18
Introduction to Actresses as Working Women p. xi.
17
14
information available for the nineteenth-century allows for such an approach whereas that
available for the eighteenth does not.
A different approach is taken by Deborah Rohr in The Careers of British
Musicians, 1750-1850: A Profession of Artisans19, a study which bridges the eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries and looks at a related profession, that of musician. She attempts
to reconstruct the position which professional musicians held in society and explore the
links which bound the members of this particular profession together. The methodology
which Rohr devises for this work draws on a number of sources: what she describes as
her “gently Marxist assumption” that the lives of the musicians are closely interwoven
with the life of the music of the period; developments in the history of the transmission of
social ideas; and the “evolution of gender studies and feminist history” which have
provided new perspectives for studies in social history.20
Rohr considers that professional musicians in Britain in this period “occupied a
complex and ambiguous social status that did not fit neatly into existing social
categories” (p. 1). Furthermore, her attempts to place musicians in a wider social context
led her away from a consideration of individual lives towards “a study of career patterns
and perceptions” (p. 2). Rohr organizes her materials into ten chapters—the first two and
the last dealing with the social and professional perceptions of musicians by others and
themselves, including detailed information on their family backgrounds where available;
chapter three looks at the issue of patronage; chapter four considers musical education;
chapters five to eight divide the profession into church musicians, secular musicians
(singers and instrumentalists), teachers and composers; chapter nine deals with the varied
19
20
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Introduction p. 4.
15
financial repercussions of life as a professional musician. The sources which she uses are
a combination of the records of such groups as the Royal Society of Musicians and the
Royal Academy of Music, and early editions of dictionaries such as Sir George Grove’s
Dictionary of Music and Musicians.21 These, and others, Rohr used to create a
biographical catalogue of “almost 6,600 professional musicians who worked between
1750 and 1850 in all branches and levels of musical activity” (p. 2) which she then uses
as her statistical basis. Her aim with this book is to provide as detailed and
comprehensive an account as possible by considering (1) “The social and economic
conditions of musical careers” (p. 4) with all there inherent challenges and (2) “the
complex networks of values and perceptions that were interwoven with musical
experience” (p. 4). To this end she determines that
A synthesis of approaches to both these groups of issues is essential if
we are to understand musicians who focused simultaneously on
sometimes desperate economic struggles, complex social interactions,
and the creation and production of music. We need to take all these
elements into account in order to reconstruct the mentalitiés of
professional musical life. (p. 4)
Much the same could be said for the professional actor, and as with the records for actors,
the extant information increases greatly as one moves into the nineteenth century; almost
all the tables in the book deal with material collated from post-1800 sources. For
example, in chapter nine, “The fortunes of musicians,” Rohr looks at the catalogue of the
Royal Society of Musicians; while this organization was founded in 1738, its records
become more detailed towards the end of the eighteenth-century, allowing the creation of
21
London: 1879.
16
tables such as Table 20, page 158, which shows the RSM premiums for the year 1822.
The information is significant as premiums paid by musicians were dictated by age,
therefore this information allows Rohr to display the age range of professional musicians
active during this period. The existence of financial details over a period of time also
permits such statements as
The amounts earned by musicians in a single year are less useful in
assessing the economic realities of their careers than their lifetime
earnings. Indeed, a long-term view of musicians earnings makes it
clear that their chances of avoiding destitution were very slim . . . . (p. 157)
When dealing with actresses of the eighteenth-century no such generalizations are
possible as we do not have a consistent record of what actresses were paid over the length
of their careers. Thus while some of Rohr’s approach is of interest when considering
actresses of the long eighteenth-century, as with Davis, the difference in both quantity
and quality of sources makes a huge impact on what is possible.
Questions and problems
Previous studies of actresses in the long eighteenth-century have failed to offer
any comprehensive view of the profession as a whole; the aim of this dissertation is to
analyze the personal and professional patterns that emerge from the consideration of such
questions as the following:
•
How were these women recruited to this new form of employment?
•
Were their family backgrounds an influence?
17
•
Did actresses marry, and have families?
•
As actresses became the norm and not a novelty, did their motivating
factors change?
•
How did different careers paths develop for different women?
•
How long did their careers last?
•
Were those who specialized in a particular type of role more, or less,
successful than those who did not?
•
Were conditions for actresses the same, or different, in the various
companies?
•
Did their working conditions differ from those of actors, and if so, how?
•
What impact did individual actresses have on the writing and production
of plays?
•
What changes took place in the acting profession as the long eighteenthcentury progressed?
•
What estates did actresses leave?
I propose to answer these and related questions by examining the biographical and
professional information available for a large and varied sample of actresses from 16701755, and therefore developing as detailed a picture as is possible from archival evidence
of how acting as a profession for women expanded and developed during this time
period. This composite or collective biography will include looking at the details of how
the different companies operated and the place which the actresses occupied in the
theatrical hierarchies which developed. This dissertation will differ from previous works
on actresses of the eighteenth-century as it will consider not only the major actresses of
18
the period, but also the minor company members, and will try to give as broad a view of
acting careers as extant records will allow.
To look at what may be gleaned about a particular individual, we can set out what
is known about any actress from a starting point of her Biographical Dictionary entry.
Take for example Charlotte Butler, who was active on the stage from 1673-93 as actress,
singer and dancer:
Family – supposedly daughter of “a decay’d knight”
Company – Duke’s
First recorded performance – late February 1680 at Dorset Gardens
First role – Serina in The Orphan, also spoke the epilogue.
Other known roles – Marinda in The Revenge
Lucretia in The Atheist
Sophia in The Fortune Hunters
Flavia in The Libertine
Philadelphia in Bury Fair
Statilia in The Treacherous Brothers, plus the epilogue
Airy in The English Friar
Levia in The Amorous Bigot, plus the prologue
Belinda in The Man of Mode
Constantia in The Chances.
Singing assignments – in Dioclesian
Amphitryon
Sir Anthony Love
19
The Prophetess
King Arthur
The Wives’ Excuse
Cleomenes
The Fairy Queen.
Known salaries – 1693/4 40s per week
Change in company – moved to Smock Alley, Dublin, in 1694 after request for
salary increase to 50s per week was rejected by the Duke’s company
management.
Last performance – she never returned to the London stage and the details of her
performances in Dublin are lost.
Contemporary comment – yes, unflattering from a number of anonymous satires;
praise from Cibber for her acting and from Richard North for her musical ability.
Physical appearance- brunette, dark eyes, considered very handsome.
As can be seen from this summary of available information, there is not enough data here
upon which to base any general comments about actresses in the late seventeenthcentury. We cannot say that because Butler’s request for a salary increase was denied
that others were also; neither can we state that those who left the London stage invariably
went to Smock Alley never to return. Many others may have been refused increases and
may have gone to Dublin, but evidence from one individual is not enough to suggest a
particular practice or even suggest a trend. However, when a number of such accounts
are considered together, then some overall picture should begin to emerge.
20
Prosopography
In The Past and the Present Revisited (1987)22 Lawrence Stone defines
prosopography as
the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of
actors in history by means of a collective study of their lives. The method
employed is to establish a universe to be studied, and then to ask a set of uniform
questions – about birth and death, marriage and family, social origins and
inherited economic position, place of residence, education, amount and source of
personal wealth, occupation, religion, experience of office, and so on. (p. 45)
Stone discusses the roots of such studies and their uses in the field of historical research,
differentiating between what he terms (1) the elitist school, concerned with small groups
of subjects in great detail and (2) the mass school, which deals with large numbers of
subjects for whom there is little detail available (p. 46). Historians, of both schools, have
been using the methods of prosopography since the 1920s but in the last twenty years
most scholars appear to have used the ‘mass school’ approach, possibly because the
manipulation of large amounts of data has become increasingly feasible with advancing
computer technology. A reflection of the popularity of prosopography among historians
can be seen in the establishment of a journal, Medieval Prosopography in the early
1980s.
A large number of studies have been carried out in areas where there is a lot of
basic statistical information available but not much detail on particular individuals. For
22
London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd, 1987.
21
example Keats-Rohan’s work on the Domesday Book,23 her collection of essays on the
prosopography of Britain and France in the tenth to twelfth centuries,24 and a number of
studies on the classical world25 illustrate this approach. In her essay “’Un vassal sans
histoire?: Count Hugh II (c. 940/955-992) and the Origins of Angevin Overlordship in
Maine” Keats-Rohan opens with the statement:
The analysis of Prosopographical data is perhaps at its most useful
when it provides an insight into the dynamics of a society by permitting
us to trace the way that relationships were formed, developed and
ultimately changed. 26
She then proceeds to disentangle an interlocking, and sometimes contradictory, mass of
charters, contemporary personal accounts, and contemporary histories, saying that while
little is known of the individual counts of Maine there exists enough information to piece
together an overview within the general context of French and British history, when all
these different accounts are correlated. Keats-Rohan concludes that:
None of the disparate texts we have examined here tells a complete
or comprehensible story on its own . . . the details we have isolated from
these texts do not make much sense in their original contexts; once assembled and
pieced together, they yield a cogent story within a fairly clear chronological
framework.27
23
KSB Keats-Rohan Domesday people: a prosopography of persons occurring in English documents,
1066-1166 (Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press, 1999).
24
Ibid Family Trees and the Roots of Politics: The prosopography of Britain and France from the tenth to
the twelfth century (Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell Press, 1997).
25
For example: Debra Nails The People of Plato: a prosopography of Plato and other Socratics
(Indianapolis: Hackett Publications, 2002); Catherine Custner Prosopography of Roman Epicureans from
the second century B.C. to the second century A.D. (Frankfurt: P. Lang, 1988); AHM Jones The
prosopography of the later Roman Empire 3 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1971-1992).
26
Family Trees and the Roots of Politics essay 10, p. 189.
22
The technique of prosopography does not appear to have been utilized in the
fields of English literature or theatrical history; studies in these areas have tended to
concentrate on individual authors, theatres, or specific themes within the literature of a
given period. For any prosopographical study two elements have to be in place, (1)
sufficient data to enable a detailed study that can produce credible results, and (2) a
system or set of questions developed to extract the information required from the data
available. As with any form of analysis, the results obtained can only be as relevant as the
questions asked. The importance of choosing the right questions, and operating on as
broad a scale as possible, can be seen in the work of Lewis Namier, the political historian
often considered to be the “father” of prosopography. As Linda Colley28 points out,
Namier’s interest in psychoanalysis and his belief in the importance of personal
correspondence led him to ignore more public sources such as newspaper articles and
pamphlets, which were often very useful indicators not only of trends in opinion but also
areas of potential controversy. By omitting such sources, Namier’s work,29 although still
considered groundbreaking for its time, is now viewed in many instances as being
seriously flawed. By devising a set of questions that cover both personal and
professional aspects of actresses’ lives I hope to avoid such possible pitfalls.
His determination to follow a pre-set path led to his ignoring such factors as
religion, which in the study of allegiances formed in the British House of Commons in
the Georgian era has since proved to be crucial to the networks and interconnections
27
Ibid p. 208.
Lewis Namier (London: Weidenfield and Nicolson, 1989) Chapter 2.
29
Including The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III (1929) and England in the Age of the
American Revolution (1930).
28
23
which developed. In England in the Age of the American Revolution when looking at the
groups and factions of the British parliament of 1761 Namier says that:
There were no parties or groups with an exclusive, registered
membership . . . each Member was bound by different, and often
conflicting, loyalties, and was directed by various, frequently
contrary, interests . . . (p. 203)
That picture is one of many small, loosely knitted, shifting
groups of which hardly any is of a uniform character, but most
show some predominant characteristic, and can be described accordingly
as bearing an oligarchic, territorial, professional, political, or a family
character. (p.206)
While Namier investigates certain aspects in great detail, his didactic style allows no
room for possibilities other than those he has included.
In a more recent work that utilizes the technique of prosopography, Ralph W.
Mathiesen working on the Roman world of Late Antiquity (c. A.D. 260-640)30 stresses
the fact that the prosopographer needs
1) to include as much relevant information as possible about each person
and, at the same time, 2) to store the data in a structured format which allows for
rapid access and quantitative analysis. (p. 258)
Although I agree that the data collected needs to be easily accessible, I do not assume
that quantitative analysis should always be the primary goal. Mathiesen’s collection of
essays focuses primarily on political and military appointments, where in many instances
he has only the names of the individuals involved with perhaps some indication of
30
Studies in the History, Literature and Society of Late Antiquity (Amsterdam: Adolf M. Hakkert, 1991).
24
kinship; therefore his use of prosopography is necessarily slanted towards the
quantitative. The aim of my study is not simply to provide lists of tables showing, for
example, numbers of actresses employed over the long eighteenth-century by different
companies, but rather to use such data to form as comprehensive a picture as possible of
the lives and working conditions of actresses in this period. To this end a certain amount
of subjective analysis will be necessary, particularly when working with the varieties of
sources that are extant for the eighteenth-century, including diaries, poems, and memoirs,
as well as the more easily quantified theatrical records and cast lists.
I envisage my work taking place in a mid-point between the schools identified by
Stone, since the records available are extensive but vary wildly in individual detail. I
want to avoid becoming part of the elitist school since not only do most of the existing
works on eighteenth-century actresses concentrate on those women who reached the top
of their profession, but I believe that any analysis of the major figures cannot and will not
produce an accurate synopsis of the profession as a whole. The mass-school approach is
not entirely appropriate for this study either as it focuses on large populations for whom
there is very little data across the board— for some actresses we have a great deal of
information, both professional and personal, while for others we know little but their
names and a few of the roles which they performed. Also, there is no chronological
progression in the amount of information available: that is, although theatre records
generally become more detailed as the long eighteenth-century progresses, there are still
large numbers of obscure actresses from the later period about whom we know very little.
Thus this study needs to accommodate the differing levels of information available and I
do not wish to confine the possibilities by electing to conform to one particular school of
25
thought or another. The implications of the results of this study, promise to provide a
broad impact with the potential to alter received narratives of theatre history.
26
Chapter 2:
Case Studies – Sample 1 1670-1675
In order to illustrate the different types of career paths and amounts of extant
information on the actresses working during this time period, I am including a case study
for each of the following: Susanah Elliott (1671-1673); Margaret Rutter (1661-1680);
Elinor Leigh (1670-1707); Elizabeth Barry (1675-1710).31 These four actresses provide
examples of the differing types of career which can be found during this period:
1. A very brief involvement with the theatre and little
or nothing known about the actress’s personal life.
2. A career spanning a number of years where there is some
detail on professional activity but little on personal life.
3. A longer career where information on both professional
and personal lives is available, but the actress in question
remained minor.
4. A long career with professional and personal information
extant, where the actress became one the leading players
of her day.
These different career paths illustrate the variety of ways in which actresses interacted
with the theatre—for some, being a professional actress was no more or less than a job;
when something, or someone, better became available they moved on. For others, acting
became a lifelong career which brought a modicum of success and modest, though
reasonably secure, financial returns. For a few, the stage was where they gained fame
and fortune—whether or not either of these lasted varied considerably from actress to
31
The dates given indicate beginning and end of career.
27
actress. The four actresses included in this case study not only provide examples of these
types of career but also act as illustrations of the sort, and amount, of information
available for study.
Table 1.
All actresses active during the years 1670-1675.
Note: The career lengths given here have been rounded up to the nearest year.
Barry, Elizabeth
Betterton, Mary
Boutel, Elizabeth
Burroughs, Mrs
Butler, Charlotte
Cartwright, Mrs
Clough, Mrs
Corbett, Mary
Corey, Katherine
Cox, Elizabeth
(Betty)
Coysh, Mrs John
Currer, Elizabeth
Eastland, Mrs
Elliot, Susanah
Farley, Elizabeth
Ford, Mrs
Gwyn, Eleanor
James, Elizabeth
Jennings, Mrs
Johnson, Mrs
Knapper, Mrs
Knepp, Mary
Lee, Mary
Leigh, Elinor
Lilburne, Mrs
Long, Jane
Career
length
(in years)
35
34
32
1
12
1
3
7
32
10
11
15
10
2
18
1
7
7
9
3
3
15
15
37
1
12
Date of first
performance
1675
1660
1664
1672
1680
1671
1670
1675
1660
Date of last
performance
1710
1694
1696
1673
1692
1671
1673
1682
1692
1671
1668
1675
1661
1671
1660
1671
1664
1669
1662
1670
1674
1664
1670
1670
1670
1661
1681
1679
1690
1671
1673
1678
1671
1671
1676
1671
1673
1677
1679
1685
1707
1670
1673
28
Mackarel, Betty
Marshall, Rebecca
Norris, Mrs
Norton, Mrs
Osborn, Margaret
Pratt, Mrs
Rathbun, Jane
Reeves, Anne
Rutter, Margaret
Shadwell, Anne
Slade, Elizabeth
Spencer, Mrs
Twyford, Mrs
Timothy
Uphill, Susanna
Wright, Mrs
Wyatt, Mrs
30
17
22
8
23
21
1
5
19
26
7
2
1674
1660
1662
1662
1671
1671
1671
1670
1661
1661
1668
1673
1704
1677
1684
1670
1694
1692
1672
1675
1680
1687
1675
1675
13
6
1
1
1676
1669
1670
1675
1689
1675
1670
1675
SUSANAH ELLIOTT
Very little is known of Mrs. Elliott’s career with the King’s Company, and
nothing of her personal circumstances has survived. The Biographical Dictionary cites a
warrant from the Lord Chamberlain re-admitting her to the company in March 1673—she
had been on the company lists for 1671 and 167232—but no explanation is given either
for her dismissal or her re-admittance.
There are no roles listed for Susanah Elliott so presumably she had such minor
parts that they did not merit mention in the cast lists. Although the extant lists for the late
seventeenth-century are not comprehensive, if Mrs. Elliott had moved up the ranks there
would have been some mention of her over the course of the three years she seems to
32
As given by The London Stage.
29
have been active. She disappears from the King’s Company lists after 1673 and does not
appear again.
Of the thirteen minor actresses with the company during this period, three acted
for one season only, and excepting Mrs. Elliott, the rest had careers which lasted from
five to twenty years. The extant information on these actresses varies considerably—for
some we know only the roles that they played; for others more personal information is
available, usually dependant on the connections these actresses had with more well
known figures from inside and outside the theatrical world, and whether or not they were
involved in any legal claims for which records have survived.
MARGARET RUTTER
Also a minor actress with the King’s Company, Mrs. Rutter’s career lasted from
1661 to circa 1680—she is listed as one of “His Majesty’s Weomen Comaedians” in the
company roster from March 26, 166133—and slightly more is known about her career and
personal life than is of Mrs. Elliott’s. We do not know how she came to be one of the first
actresses on the English stage, nor anything of her martial status. As the Biographical
Dictionary points out, her name was quite a common one and it appears in a number of
London parish registers during the period when we know she was working in the city;
thus making impossible any claim that one or other of the entries definitely refers to the
actress Margaret Rutter.
Extant records do however show that she was sued for debt twice, in December of
1667 by John Humphreys for the sum of ₤9 and in July of 1671 by Humphrey Weld for
₤200—a huge sum of money at the time. We do not know the outcome of these actions
33
Document Register item 70.
30
against Mrs. Rutter but the Biographical Dictionary suggests that her absence from the
stage between the 1673/74 season and January 1675 might be because she was being held
in debtors’ prison. Other explanations are of course equally possible: she could have left
the stage because she was being ‘kept’ by some man and returned when the arrangement
ended; she might have become pregnant and had to take some months off; she could have
moved temporarily to Ireland or Scotland—evidence from a promptbook cast list shows
her performing in The Man of Mode in Edinburgh circa 1679/80, and she may have been
there earlier also. However, given the magnitude of the second debt,34 the explanation of
debtors’ prison is at least as plausible as the others.
Of the roles that Margaret Rutter played, we have fourteen reasonably certain
ones. The first mention The London Stage has of her is for the role of Dame Pliant in
Jonson’s The Alchemist on December 16, 1661; the Biographical Dictionary suggests she
may not have played this part until later in her career. However, the role of Dame Pliant
(a meek and malleable young widow) is a secondary one, which acts as a foil to the feisty
and cunning nature of Doll Common. In terms of performance, Dame Pliant is not a
challenging or demanding part— therefore her playing this role early in her career is a
distinct and reasonable possibility.
Mrs. Rutter went on to play a series of ladies and attendants in both new plays and
revivals of works by Beaumont and Fletcher, and Shakespeare; extant cast lists never
show her rising above the heights of Emilia in Othello but nevertheless she developed a
steady line in such roles, both in comedies and in tragedies, that kept her employed on the
34
We have very few surviving salary figures for actors of this period, but Judith Milhous in “United
Company Finances, 1682-92” Theatre Research International (1981-82) 46, estimates that for the 1682-3
season the United Company actors’ pay scale went from £19 and 5s to £115and 10s. Given that actresses
were paid less and that Mrs. Rutter’s debt was incurred some eleven years previous to these estimates in
1671, a debt of £200 was vast indeed.
31
London stage for nearly twenty years. The roles that we have listed for Margaret Rutter
show that she seems to have settled into a pattern early on in her career of playing either
‘the confidant’ of the leading lady, or ‘the older woman’ who offers advice to the leading
characters. While this pattern could be regarded as showing a performer stuck in a series
of minor roles and thus indicative of a lack of success, it does show an actress who was in
constant employment and one who would have been a necessary part of the company.
Any theatrical company needs a number of flexible and reliable players who know the
repertory and who can be depended upon to learn their lines and perform their roles, in
either tragedy or comedy, without any fuss. Other than her two encounters with the law
over debt, there is nothing in the records to suggest that Margaret Rutter was not one of
these necessary players—if she had been unreliable, the King’s Company would surely
not have continued to employ her steadily over such a long period. Other than the
reference to Mrs. Rutter in the Scottish promptbook list of 1679/80, there is no further
evidence of her acting career, or life, after the autumn season of 1677.
ELINOR LEIGH (née Dixon)
An actress with the Duke’s Company for over thirty years, Elinor Leigh’s career differs
significantly from many of the other minor actresses of her time. Although the details of
her beginnings in the theatre are unclear, the assumption of the Biographical Dictionary
that her father was James Dixon—one of Davenant’s original actors—is logical since a
family connection is one of the most likely answers to the question of how young women
became introduced to the world of the theatre at this time. She acted with the Duke’s
under the name of Mrs. Dixon from September 1670, or possibly a little earlier, until
32
November 1671; married a fellow actor, Anthony Leigh in December of 1671 and
continued to act under her married name until her retirement in 1707.
Elinor Leigh differs from most other actresses of this period in that we know more
about her, primarily because she was married to one of the Duke’s Company’s leading
actors, and also in the way in which her career developed and was sustained. She has
more known absences from the stage than any other actress—which correlate with her
family circumstances. She bore nine children and suffered the loss of her husband, in
1692, and yet her career continued and is woven around these events, as can be seen
below:
Event date
Period of absence from stage
1673 birth of Michael
March 1676 baptism35 of Marmaduke
April 1678 baptism of Elinor (died)
July 1680 baptism of Francis
September1681 baptism of Elinor
July 1684 baptism of Anthony
September 1686 baptism of Charlot
July 1688 baptism of John
July 1691 baptism of Anne
December 1692 death of husband
May 1673 - October 1676
April 1677 – January 1680
April 1682 - March 168336
January 1686 – January 1688
January 1691 – December 1691
January 1691 – February 1693
The number and duration of Mrs. Leigh’s absences from the stage is very unusual and
demonstrates both her own interest in remaining a professional actress and the Duke’s
Company’s willingness to retain her as such.
35
The dates for Anthony and Elinor Leigh’s children come from various parish registers and therefore refer
to baptism rather than birth. Given the rates of infant mortality for the time, and the belief in the
importance of infant baptism, the ceremony would most likely have performed within a few days of the
child’s birth.
36
This is the one period of absence which does not correspond with a birth or death in the family; as the
Biographical Dictionary (9: 227) points out, this was around the time of the unification of the companies;
Mrs. Leigh may simply have decided to take a break until the new company had settled down.
Alternatively, and probably more likely, is that in the jockeying for position that occurred at the formation
of the United Company, she may have had difficulty in getting roles.
33
As the wife of Anthony Leigh, Mrs. Leigh would not have needed to continue
acting for financial reasons—her long absences from the stage alone would seem to
indicate that money was not a consideration; many other actresses had children or
suffered personal losses and were back on stage within a week. Thus the logical answer
as to why she continued her career for over thirty years would seem to be that she
enjoyed the theatre and her work there. Given her husband’s profession, and, if the
Biographical Dictionary is correct, her father’s as well, then the ‘one big family’ factor
also needs to be taken into consideration. Mrs. Leigh’s first roles were in productions
where Mrs. Mary Betterton played the leading female part, and even when Mrs. Betterton
retired from the stage she remained very involved in training and helping the younger
performers. Both the Bettertons seem to have taken a very familial approach to the
Duke’s Company members—including looking after widows of company members.
Records show that Elinor Leigh was receiving a weekly salary of 10s in the period before
her husband’s death and that this was increased to 30s per week after his death in
December 1692. This increase would seem to indicate that the company management
recognized and honored a responsibility towards its long time actors and actresses. How
this related to an actor’s position within the company is not possible to estimate.
Mrs. Leigh’s first role, under her maiden name Dixon, was as an attendant named
Melvissa in Edward Howard’s The Women’s Conquest, 1670; followed by the role of
Orinda, the leading lady’s sister, in Settle’s Cambyses in 1671. This began the
establishment of a career pattern similar to that of Margaret Rutter—playing the role of
friend, confidant, or sister to the leading female in a wide variety of tragedies and
comedies. Over the course of her thirty-three year career Mrs. Leigh’s roles did not
34
change to any noticeable degree; in fact she began to play ‘older’ parts very early in her
career and then simply maintained them. Her absences from the stage do not appear to
have had any effect on the roles she played—she was never demoted to smaller parts on
any of her returns. Of course given the lack of extant records for most minor performers
with whom Mrs. Leigh can be compared, the influence her husband’s position as a
leading actor exerted is not possible to determine; however it cannot have hurt.
ELIZABETH BARRY
Public private life
Both the career and life of Elizabeth Barry differ greatly from those of the three
actresses already considered. In terms of her career path, success, popularity, infamy, and
the amount of extant information available on her, Mrs. Barry is unique for this period.
The Biographical Dictionary refers to her as “the first great English actress”37; she had a
career which spanned thirty-five years and which saw her rise to being the leading actress
with the Duke’s Company, maintain her position on the unification of the two patent
companies and become co-manager with Thomas Betterton when the senior actors left
the United Company and set up at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Although Elizabeth Barry was
second-in-command to Thomas Betterton she never became a sharer in the company; at
this point none of the actor/managers were, so in 1700 the Lord Chamberlain, to help
restore order, gave Betterton (alone) the power to spend up to 2 pounds on immediate
necessities, but decisions still had to be ratified by the sharers.
Unlike the extant records on Mrs. Elliott, Mrs. Rutter and Mrs. Leigh—for whom
we have little personal detail—there appears to be a wealth of information on Mrs. Barry.
37
Biographical Dictionary ( I, 313).
35
The issue when dealing with this information on Elizabeth Barry becomes how to sift ‘the
truth’ from the rumors, gossip and scurrilous verses which surround her. Her original
family circumstances are unclear but she was living under the guardianship of Sir
William Davenant and his wife by 1668, when she would have been approximately ten
years old. Her first recorded performance with the Duke’s Company was in 1675, when
she played the minor role of Draxilla, a maid, in Otway’s Alcibiades.
The story of her stage training, which seems to have made its first appearance in
print in The History of the English Stage (1741)—author uncertain but published by the
infamous Curll—has been recounted in every work which mentions Mrs. Barry,
including the Biographical Dictionary.38 The author of this history states that Mrs. Barry
performed at an earlier date and was so bad that she was sacked; her performance was
seen by John Wilmot, the Earl of Rochester, who made a wager with some friends that he
could turn this girl into one of the finest actresses on the stage in six months; he then took
Mrs. Barry to the country where he coached her for the six months and then returned her
to the Duke’s Company a highly polished and accomplished actress. That Mrs. Barry
became Rochester’s mistress sometime around 1675 is not in dispute—a number of his
letters to her survive, and she bore him a daughter in December 1677—however, the
chances that the anecdote about her training is true are not very good. Robert D. Hume
has pointed out that, not only would the Earl of Rochester have lacked the necessary
stage experience to train anyone in voice projection and gesture, but that other records
38
Most recent works, such as Elizabeth Howe’s The first English actresses: Women and drama 1660-1700
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992) p. 114, include Barry’s supposed training as an anecdote
which is possible though not provable.
36
concerning him show that he was elsewhere during the period he was supposed to have
been sequestered with Mrs. Barry. 39
Unfortunately, even current scholars fall into this trap—the most recent
biographer of the Earl of Rochester, James William Johnson, repeats the Barry anecdote
as if there were no doubt surrounding its veracity. 40 Johnson asserts that
Just fifteen, pretty but inexperienced, Mistress Barry left the
protection of Lady Davenant for that of Lord Rochester. The gauche
and seemingly untalented girl became a Galatea to his Pygmalion;
during the first months of cohabiting, he coached her in the tricks of acting,
imparting to her the secrets of feminine charm and coquetry he
instinctively knew… By his own playful seductiveness, he showed her
how to win over future audiences. (p. 178)
This statement demonstrates a distressing lack of understanding of the theatrical world
and the skills needed to thrive therein. The Earl of Rochester appears to have been a
theatre-goer but there is a very large gap between being an interested, well-informed
audience member and being a theatre professional. An ability to appreciate a “good”
performance or play is very unlikely to translate suddenly into the ability to teach the
voice projection and inflection, movement, blocking, and gesture needed for the stage.
Acting, at least good acting, whether in the eighteenth-century or today is much more
than a collection of “tricks” and while we have few extant instruction manuals in English
from the period, there are a number from France which demonstrate the complex series of
movements and gestures which were expected, particularly in tragedy.
39
Theatre History Studies, 5 (1985), 16-19.
James William Johnson A Profane Wit: The Life of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester (Rochester: The
University of Rochester Press, 2004), p. 178.
40
37
Johnson is also making an automatic assumption about Elizabeth Barry’s physical
appearance—she was young and became an actress; therefore she was “pretty.” On the
contrary, all contemporary accounts describe her as not particularly attractive; the
Biographical Dictionary quotes Anthony Aston’s description
She was not handsome, her mouth opening most on the right
side, which she strove to draw t’other way . . . she was middlesized and had darkish hair, light eyes, dark eyebrows, and was
indifferent plump . . . (I: 325)
Not even her greatest admirers would have described Elizabeth Barry as ‘pretty’—her
strength lay in her ability to convince an audience with her voice and gestures in spite of
her lack of physical beauty. While there are few contemporary descriptions of actresses,
comment is usual made if they were particularly beautiful; this is never the case with any
remarks about Mrs. Barry—Cibber, describes her in his Apology as
Mrs. Barry, in Characters of Greatness, had a presence of elevated Dignity,
her Mien and Motion superb, and gracefully majestick; her Voice full, clear,
and strong, so that no Violence of Passion could be too much for her.
He continues to praise her abilities in the other emotions but never extols her beauty.
Since Johnson’s work is a biography of Rochester, not Mrs. Barry, one cannot
expect many pages to be devoted to her as an individual. However, to view her only in
terms of Rochester does a disservice not only to Elizabeth Barry and her acting abilities
but also to the profession of which she was a member. Johnson even describes Mrs.
Barry’s great tragic roles in terms of her relationship to Rochester and the child,
38
Elizabeth, that she bore him—he removed their infant daughter from her mother’s care
for a time, and Johnson states
But she never was returned to her mother, who acquired “a scandalous
reputation as a mercenary whore.” Barry’s growth as a tragic actress
was marked after Betty’s loss . . . We can only wonder whether her
former lover saw her in The Orphan and how he reacted when the
mother of his bastard daughter lamented the fate of a love child
born of a doomed and illicit union. (p. 305)41
This ignores several facts: Rochester died when their daughter was only three years old
and she appears to have been returned to Mrs. Barry before that; we do not have an exact
date for Betty’s death, but she as was twelve or thirteen at the time this occurred in 168990 whereas The Orphan, which was the real beginning of Mrs. Barry’s career in tragedy,
premiered in 1680, when her daughter was alive and well. Elizabeth Barry was a well
established actress fifteen years into her career when her child died. While there is no
definite proof as to Rochester’s whereabouts during February 1680, when The Orphan
premiered, this was five months before his death on July 26th 1680, and he had been
seriously ill for some months prior to this. Therefore his attendance at the theatre, even if
he were in London during this time, seems highly unlikely. Johnson’s re-arrangement of
information and the highly dramatic language in which it is expressed might be suitable
for a tragedy to be performed on stage but adds nothing to our understanding of Mrs.
Barry and her role as one of the leading actors of her time.
41
Johnson’s quotation is taken from John Harold Wilson’s Court Satires of the Restoration (Columbus:
Ohio State University Press, 1976) pp. 220, 224.
39
The account of Mrs. Barry’s “training” is an example of the type of story or
anecdote which begins with an unreliable source but when often repeated gains
acceptance and eventually becomes treated as fact until someone takes the time to
investigate the account and its circumstances in detail. As with all information for this
period, however, records of individuals and families are scarce and frequently
incomplete—no matter how diligent the scholar, some things are impossible to prove one
way or another; an informed estimate using the available material is all that can ever be
achieved.
While the theatrical records for the late seventeenth-century are not complete, the
extant cast lists for the Duke’s Company do show Mrs. Barry’s progress from her first
minor role to the part which secured for her a reputation as the company’s leading
tragedy actress—Monimia in Otway’s The Orphan. This she first played in 1680, some
five years after her debut and it was a role which was created specifically for her by the
playwright. Thomas Otway had also written the play in which Mrs. Barry first performed
and he continued to write parts tailored to her strengths, not only for artistic reasons but
personal ones also. Most playwrights sensibly wrote plays suited to the members of the
company to which they were directly attached or if they were freelance, tailored their
work to the company they hoped would accept the play for performance. However,
Otway apparently nursed an unrequited passion for Elizabeth Barry for a number of years
as his surviving letters show
“I love you, I dote on you; Desire makes me mad, when I am near you;
and Despair, when I am from you … I lov’d you early…”
“. . . I have languish’d for seven long tedious Years of Desire, jealousy
40
and despairing; yet, every Minute I see you, I still discover something
new and more bewitching . . . Give me a word or two of comfort . . . I cannot
bear a Kind look, and after it a cruel Denial.”42
If genuine, these letters show not only Otway’s crushed feelings and continuing devotion
but also indicate some of the capriciousness which was considered to be part of Mrs.
Barry’s character. The problem with these letters however, is that we cannot say either
that they were definitely written by Thomas Otway, or that they were written to Elizabeth
Barry.
The Biographical Dictionary notes that the letters were not published until 1697,
and then anonymously, and not attributed to Otway until 1713, the year of Mrs. Barry’s
death. However, an edition of 1699 in which these letters are included names Otway not
only on the individual letters but in the title matter—Familiar Letters; Vol 1. Written by
the right honourable John, late Earl of Rochester, to the Honble Henry Savile, Esq; and
other letters, by persons of honour and quality. With letters written by the most
ingenious Mr Thomas Otway, and Mrs. K. Philips. Publish’d from their original copies.
With modern letters by Tho. Cheek, Esq; Mr Dennis, and Mr Brown, London: printed for
Rich, Wellington, at the Lute in St Paul’s Churchyard, 1699. The Biographical
Dictionary does not say by whom the attribution was made nor does it comment on its
reliability. Otway had been dead since 1685, and given the volume, and scurrilous nature,
of items written about Elizabeth Barry she was unlikely to have made any complaint
about these letters, so any attribution issues would not have been contradicted by the
principals supposedly involved. Although modern scholars cannot hope to prove
42
The Biographical Dictionary (1: 316-317) quotes this letter and excerpts from several others.
41
attribution one way or the other, we can examine both the letters themselves and the
possible circumstances surrounding their release into print.
The only letters of Otway’s included in the 1699 volume are the six “LoveLetters, by Mr. Thomas Otway” which are addressed only “To Madam_________”. In
content they are very general—there is no mention of the theatre or his writing characters
in his plays for her at which she could excel. The author uses highly emotional language
such as
Could I see you without Passion, or be absent from you without Pain
I need not beg your Pardon for this Renewing my Vows, that I love
you more than Health, or any Happiness here
(Letter 4)
and several times rebukes his beloved for ignoring him and favoring others
But when You became anothers, I must confess, that I did then rebel,
(Letter 1)
I have consulted my Pride, whether after a Rival’s Possesion, I ought
to ruine all my Peace for a Woman that another has been more blest in,
(Letter 2)
but never is anything specific mentioned. The phrasing of these letters is so general that
they read, at least to a modern audience, more as sort of template for letters from a
lovelorn swain to the woman who persists in ignoring him rather than letters from a real
man to a real woman expressing genuine feeling. Montague Summers quotes a “great
modern critic” though he does not say whom, as saying of these letters “They might be
the letters of any man to any woman” to which Summers adds “Perhaps, after all, the true
42
love-letter is that which might be written by any man to any woman.”43 This I take issue
with—universality may be the mark of a great love-letter in the literary sense, but I doubt
any woman, particularly one so well used to compliments and praise as Elizabeth Barry,
would find a generic exercise in the genre either appealing or flattering. Summers, though
he acknowledges Mrs. Barry’s great acting talent obviously had a very low opinion of her
as a person
Mrs. Barry, I doubt not, was hard as adamant, and possibly sexless.
I imagine she was the perfect whore . . . Such a woman whilst having
no care for impoverished Otway would never release him. For he
could write her parts as scarce any other contemporary dramatist save
Dryden could offer. The wretched broken-hearted poet was held in
captivity, realizing the hopelessness of his love, never able to break
his chain.44
In his unquestioning acceptance of the attribution of the love-letters, Summers fails to
account for two factors. First, as he himself says, Otway knew Mrs. Barry, he wrote
wonderful parts for her—why then would he not, when writing these letters, make
reference to her acting and the fabulous roles he wished to continue creating for her; he
was not writing to some unknown actress glimpsed only on the stage, he knew and
worked with this woman. Secondly, knowing her as he did, Otway’s use of sentimental
appeal seems highly inappropriate—even allowing for the bias of contemporary satires
and comments on Mrs. Barry’s character; she must have been a tough and independent
woman to prosper in the theatre world of the time—ending his first letter
43
Montague Summers, ed., The Works of Thomas Otway, 3 vols. (London: The Nonesuch Press, 1925),
Introduction p. lxiv.
44
Ibid p. lxiv.
43
You never were belov’d or courted by a Creature that had a
nobler or juster Pretence to your Heart, than the Unfortunate,
and (even at this time) Weeping
Otway
does not seem the best way in which to win over an actress who dealt every day with an
excess of emotion on stage. Otway knew the type of man who attracted Elizabeth Barry,
surely if had written love letters to her, he would have used his writing skills to better
effect to counter his deficiencies, such as lack of fortune and position. The final letter
printed in the collection is the shortest, least sentimental and most specific of the group
To Madam____________
You were pleas’d to send me word you would meet me in the
Mall this Evening, and give me further Satisfaction in the
Matter you were so unkind to charge me with; I was there
but found you not; and therefore beg of you, as you would
ever with yourself to be eased of the highest Torment it
were possible for you Nature to be sensible of, to let me
see you sometime to Morrow, and send me word, by this
Bearer, where, and at what Hour, you will be so just, as either
to acquit or condemn me; that I may, hereafter, for your sake,
either bless all your bewitching Sex; or, as often as I henceforth
think of you, curse Womankind for ever.
This letter, although it does contain some sentiment, seems at least more like the sort of
note that could have been sent after a missed rendezvous—there is no need for specifics
44
as both parties are aware of the incident at hand. Then again, the situation does seem
generic and could belong to any couple or no real couple at all.
Having considered the style of the letters, I will take up the next issue: how did
they find their way into print? There are two possibilities, one, that Otway wrote out and
kept copies of all his letters which were then discovered or salvaged by a friend after his
death and these eventually found their way onto a publisher’s desk. The alternative is
that the letters were kept by Elizabeth Barry and that some enterprising servant or
acquaintance found them and sold them to a publisher. Neither of these scenarios seems
particularly likely. Otway was a professional playwright who at times was financially
secure but mostly not—would he have had the leisure to copy out letters sent, when that
time could have been better spent writing for the stage and thus earning a living; what
would have been the purpose of copying the letters, if they were a true expression of his
feelings then he would not have needed a written reminder. Whether or not Elizabeth
Barry was as hard hearted and mercenary as she has often been painted, the likelihood of
a woman with a myriad of admirers keeping the love-letters of a man in whom she had
absolutely no romantic interest seems slim indeed. If she tossed them aside they could
have been picked up and kept by a servant, but why? Otway was just another cog in the
wheel of the theatre, another playwright trying to make a living getting his work
performed; he had no title, no independent fortune, he was respected for his plays but he
was no superstar whose letters might be worth something if collected.
The next consideration with these letters, since we cannot definitely prove them
either true or false is: What do they contribute to our knowledge of Elizabeth Barry and
the times in which she worked on the London stage if they are genuine, and also what do
45
they tell us if they are a fabrication? If these letters were written by Otway to Mrs. Barry
then they help support the picture of her as a cold woman who happily dallied with a
variety of other men while ignoring him. During the time of her acquaintance with
Otway, Elizabeth Barry was Rochester’s mistress for a number of years, possibly the
mistress of another playwright, Sir George Etherege, following that and also—if even
half the contemporary satires and lampoons on her private life are to be believed—
countless others before, during and afterwards. Why she remained aloof from Otway is
not known. One possibility is that, since he had neither rank nor fortune, he was of no use
to her except for the roles he wrote and as he continued to write for her anyway, she had
no motivation to take him as a lover.
If we take the letters to be a fabrication, either by a publisher or another author,
then this still tells us something—it points to the fascination the world of the theatre was
starting to hold for the public towards the end of the seventeenth century. Otway had
been dead for twelve years when this collection was first published, yet he is referred to
in the title as “the most ingenious Mr. Thomas Otway.” Although his plays were very
popular and were still part of the repertoire, his relationship or lack thereof with Mrs.
Barry, not his works was the focus of the letter writer. At the time of publication
Elizabeth Barry’s acting career was flourishing and she was also second-in-command to
Betterton at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. She was both famous and infamous—perhaps the
author and/or publisher hoped to provoke some reaction from her by including the letters,
which would then have increased interest in the book and thus increased sales. If that
were the aim then they must have been disappointed; there is no known response by Mrs.
Barry either to these letters or any other comments on her dealings with Thomas Otway.
46
Whether some part of the reading public was fascinated by this seeming glimpse behind
the curtain we have no way to know, but the publication of these letters does seem to be a
first step towards the kind of celebrity compilations about actors and actresses that Curll
was to produce in the eighteenth century.
Elizabeth Barry was excoriated by a number of satirists of the course of her long
career one such, the embittered failed playwright Robert Gould, describes Mrs. Barry as
“A ten times cast off Drab, in Venus Wars
Who counts her Sins, may as well count the Stars:
………………………………………………….
There never was so base a thing, so proud:
Yet covetous, she’l prostitute with any,
Rather than wave the getting of a penny.”45
Given that Gould attributed his lack of theatrical success to Mrs. Barry, among others, his
cannot be called an impartial judgment but it is supported by other verses and writings of
the time. Tom Brown in his description of the playhouse refers to Mrs. Barry and Thomas
Betterton, who had recently headed the players revolt from the United Company, as
Now for that Majestical man and woman there; stand off, there is no
coming within a hundred yards of their high mightinesses . . . See what
a deference is paid ’em by the rest of the cringing fraternity, from fifty
down to ten shillings a-week; you must needs have a more than ordinary
opinion of their abilities. Should you lie with her all night she would
not know you next morning, unless you had another five pounds at her
service; or if you go to desire a piece of courtesy of him, you must attend
45
From “The Playhouse: A Satyr,” published in 1689.
47
longer than at a secretary’s of state . . . nor will her celebrated modesty
suffer her to speak to a humble servant, without a piece or two to rub
her eyes with and to conceal her blushes; while she sluggishly goes
through a vacation she might take more pains in, did she not grudge a
pennyworth for a penny.46
As with the Gould satire, the ways in which Mrs. Barry and Betterton are satirized is
quite different. Betterton is attacked in terms of his vanity—his personality, parentage
and morals are left alone. The case with Mrs. Barry is quite different; Gould describes
her as a mercenary whore as does Brown, who adds laziness and an inattention to her
stage performances to her list of sins. Brown’s reference to her playing during the
summer season is unsubstantiated. Mrs. Barry certainly had no need for either the extra
money or the experience this would have brought—typically the junior members of a
company were the only ones who worked in the slow summer season; they needed the
money and the opportunity to play some more important roles that were always occupied
by senior company members during the regular season. The implication that she was
unprofessional and ‘sluggish’ is also unfounded; whatever else her detractors said about
her, Mrs. Barry’s abilities on stage were rarely, if ever, questioned. The only reason
Brown could have for including these references would be as an attempt to bolster the
image of Elizabeth Barry as a mercenary creature who cared little for anything else but
money.
Unlike the many fabrications and items of hearsay which surround Mrs. Barry’s
life and career, there are some incidents for which we do have hard evidence. One of the
more spectacular of these is the death of one of her lovers in her dressing room at the
46
Tom Brown Amusements Serious and Comical (London: 1695).
48
theatre. The incident occurred on June 10, 1685 when Captain Henry Goring, Mrs.
Barry’s current lover, was murdered by Mr. Charles Dering, a former lover during a
fight.47 Reports of the coroner’s inquiry, the original being lost, describe, among others,
Mrs. Barry’s testimony
after the play was done, & that she was going up staires to undress
herself, the sd Mr Dering and Mr Goring did both offer themselves
to lead her up, she to prevent them both went back again cross the
Stage & so went up to her undressing room… Mr Dering came up
into the sd room, who she did often desire to go down & told him
if he did not go out of the sd room she could not undress herself,
whereupon she left the room . . . after she heard a noise in the sd room
(but did hear no body go up staires although she had always an eye
upon the staires) whereupon she hastily run up the staires…& that
as soon as she had opend the door & saw them she cryd out murder.48
This testimony was corroborated by that of two other actors, William Mountfort and John
Wiltshire, who were changing out of costume and arrived on the scene of the fight around
the same time as Mrs. Barry. Her reported testimony has a number of interesting points;
at no time does Mrs. Barry make any reference to her relationship with either gentleman;
she seems to place considerable emphasis on her efforts to get rid of them both, also on
the fact that she was with two female friends and her “dressing woman”; by keeping an
eye on the stairs she seems to indicate that she thought trouble might erupt, she knew
they had been drinking, and was trying to prevent it—apparently Goring went up to her
47
See Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume, “Murder in Elizabeth Barry’s Dressing Room” Yale University
Library Gazette, 79 Numbers 3-4 (April 2005), 149-174 for a full account of the affair.
48
Quoted in the Milhous and Hume article p. 155.
49
dressing room by a different route so she did not see him. Although we do not,
unfortunately, have Mrs. Barry’s own words, this testimony seems to indicate a woman
who was not eager to be associated with scandal, at least not this particular one; who was
not flaunting her lovers to the public, nor the fact that they had fought over her and who
was obviously capable of dealing with drunken admirers while going about the business
of the theatre. Nothing appears to have been made of Elizabeth Barry’s part in the affair
in the reports of the day, and we have no comment on the reaction of any of the three
actors who arrived on the scene. As Milhous and Hume point out, judging by the speed
at which Goring bled to death from a neck wound, his carotid artery must have been cut;
this would have resulted in blood spurting across the room, probably over Mountfort,
Wiltshire and Mrs. Barry. These were people used to stage deaths not being covered in
real blood; did they maintain their sang-froid or did hysteria break out? Unfortunately the
dry coroner’s reports tell us nothing and no other records of the incident appear to have
survived.
Although tragedy was her acknowledged forte, Elizabeth Barry had an incredible
range as an actress and continued to play leading comedy roles also. Her skill as an
actress; her great popularity with the audiences; and the force of her personality
combined to give her a level of power within the company never before, and not for some
time afterwards, held by a woman in the English theatre. Elizabeth Barry’s stage career,
and life, were not by any means typical for actresses of this period and while her abilities
should not be denigrated, the part that good fortune— as well as good management—
played in her career must not be ignored. She was lucky that while she was establishing
herself with the Duke’s Company there really was no significant competition for the roles
50
in which she came to excel. When Mrs. Barry began, Mary Betterton was the leading
female player and though by all accounts an excellent actress, she appears to have lacked
ambition and been prepared to play second fiddle to her more famous and flamboyant
husband, Thomas. She was also ageing, and, apparently not gracefully. If Elizabeth Barry
had had some serious competition at the beginning of her career she would probably not
have risen to the virtually unassailable position she assumed from the 1680s onwards;
once she became established no upcoming actress with any sense tried seriously to
challenge her position. The greatest threat to Mrs. Barry’s dominance could have been
Anne Bracegirdle, who began acting with the United Company in 1688, but whose
temperament—both on and off stage—was so different from Mrs. Barry’s that they
complemented each other and became friends rather than rivals.
Another fortunate circumstance for Elizabeth Barry was her lack of children. She
did have one daughter, by the Earl of Rochester, in December 1677 but despite her muchtalked-about promiscuity, no children after that. During that year she seems to have spent
a considerable amount of time with Rochester as there are no roles recorded for her
between July 1677 and April 1678. Her only other significant absence from the stage, that
we are aware of, may also be connected with her child. When playing the lead role in the
premiere of John Crowne’s Darius, April 1688, Mrs. Barry became very ill, was carried
from the stage and made no further appearance that we know of, until the autumn of
1689. There is no record of the date of death of her daughter but it was around this time;
as the Biographical Dictionary points out, the two incidents may be connected but we do
not have enough facts to make any definite claims. Elizabeth Barry may have had other
pregnancies that were not known about—though none of the lampoons or satires on her
51
ever mention the possibility and surely their authors would have delighted in adding such
a juicy piece of gossip if it existed and secrets are very difficult to keep in small world
such as the theatre. Backstreet abortion would have been an option for an unwanted
pregnancy but the chances of serious illness as a result were high and as we have no other
record of a major absence for Mrs. Barry from the stage this seems unlikely. One
possible explanation for Elizabeth Barry’s lack of children is infertility through disease.
As the Earl of Rochester died of syphilis and Mrs. Barry had been his mistress in his later
years, it is very possible that she at least contracted a subsidiary infection which resulted
in her infertility. Whatever the cause, there is little doubt that further children would have
proved a great inconvenience to her acting career. While some actresses did have
children and continue to work, these were not the leading performers—not only would
child bearing and rearing have been difficult to combine with the demands of role after
role, management would not have taken kindly to its star performer decamping for
several months at a time. For a woman, serious stage ambitions and children were not a
good combination.
Mrs. Barry’s roles, prologues and epilogues
In the midst of scandal, incident and numerous relationships, Elizabeth Barry
maintained her position as her company’s leading actress for over thirty years. During
the course of her career she acted at least one hundred and twenty-nine different roles that
we know of, and very probably more than this; one hundred and eighteen of these roles
were in new plays and thus were created by her (see Table 2). At the beginning of her
career Mrs. Barry acted in whatever parts were assigned her, whether in tragedy or
52
comedy, as did all newcomers and minor performers. Her outstanding ability for tragic
roles, which was recognized by all from her 1680 performance in Otway’s The Orphan
onwards, did not mean that she surrendered comic parts—though she did tend to play the
darker roles in comedy as her career progressed. Of the one hundred and twenty-nine
known new roles Mrs. Barry played, there is fairly even division with sixty-seven tragic
roles and sixty-two comedic ones; a year-by-year breakdown of her new roles shows no
overall shift to tragedy occurring but does indicate a greater emphasis on it in later years.
Table 2.
Mrs. Barry’s new roles in tragedy and comedy, by year.
Year
1675
1676
1677
1678
1679
1680
1681
1682
1683
1684
1685
1686
1687
1688
1689
1690
1691
1692
1693
1694
1695
1696
1697
1698
No. of roles in tragedy
1
2
0
1
1
4
1
4
1
1
0
2
0
2
2
3
0
4
0
3
1
1
4
4
No. of roles in comedy
0
5
4
3
3
4
4
3
1
1
1
2
0
0
0
2
3
1
4
1
3
2
5
0
53
1699
1700
1701
1702
1703
1704
1705
1706
1707
1708
Total
5
2
6
0
2
2
1
3
3
1
67
0
2
1
1
2
1
2
1
0
0
62
These roles are of course not the only roles Mrs. Barry performed, she also took part in
various revivals and in new plays with unknown casts, as pointed out above but
unfortunately the documentation for these has not survived. Therefore, while this data
suggests that her stage time was almost equally divided between comedy and tragedy, no
definitive conclusion may be drawn.
The first known role we have for Elizabeth Barry, leaving aside the confusion
about her beginnings on the stage and the Rochester legend, is that of Draxilla in Thomas
Otway’s Alcibiades, his first play, performed in late September 1675. This was a minor
part where Mrs. Barry played the role of sister to the hero and friend/confidant to his
betrothed—these two leads were played by Mr. and Mrs. Betterton.
One of her first comedic roles was in Sir George Etherege’s The Man of Mode
(March 1676), but there is some dispute over which part she actually played at this point
in her career. John Downes lists Mrs. Barry for the role of Mrs. Loveit with Mrs.
Betterton as Bellinda, Mrs. Leigh as Lady Woodvil and Mr. Betterton as the lead
Dorimant. The reason that modern scholars and critics have questioned this role for
Elizabeth Barry at this time is that Mrs. Loveit—one of Dorimant’s former mistresses—is
a complex character who would have been difficult for a young and inexperienced actress
54
to perform creditably. John Harold Wilson suggests that the role may have been created
by Mary Lee in 1676 and was then inherited by Mrs. Barry at a later date.49 Elizabeth
Howe also supports a later date for Mrs. Barry to play Mrs. Loveit, principally because of
the style of roles that she was playing at this time. Howe suggests that Mrs. Barry would
have been far more likely to have taken the role of Harriet, Lady Woodvil’s daughter, at
this point; she also stresses that ‘the discarded mistress’ is not a character type that
Elizabeth Barry was playing at this stage of her career, being invariably cast as a virginal
young girl or young wife.50 However, both Wilson and Howe fail to consider the
practicalities of a working theatre—things do not always go according to plan; arguments
occur and actors storm off or leading players get sick and have to be replaced at the last
minute. Any one of a number of situations could have propelled Elizabeth Barry into a
role for which she would, under normal circumstances, not have been considered. Robert
D. Hume has considered this issue in the context of the plausibility of the rest of the cast
and also the overall reliability of Downes cast-lists.51 He concludes that as the Downes
cast is workable, given the other actors involved and their age/experience at the time,
then Mrs. Barry as Mrs. Loveit, though a seemingly unlikely choice, is probably correct.
Hume also points out that whether or not Elizabeth Barry got this role by accident or
design, her performance in it was probably what began the blossoming of her career in
1676.
49
All The King’s Ladies p. 111.
The first English actresses p.80.
51
“Elizabeth Barry’s First Roles and the Cast of The Man of Mode,” Theatre History Studies, 5 (1985), 1619.
50
55
Table 3.
Elizabeth Barry’s known new roles.
Play titles in bold are tragedies or dramatic plays/operas in which Mrs. Barry had a tragic
role.
♦ indicates role mentioned in The Biographical Dictionary
‡ As has been discussed, there is some dispute over when Mrs. Barry first performed this
role.
‡‡ Although Mrs. Barry continued to act until June 1710 she did not take on any new
roles after this date.
Year
1675
1676
1677
1678
1679
1680
Play
Alcibiades ♦
The Man of Mode ♦ ‍‡
Abdelazer ♦
The Wrangling Lovers ♦
Tom Essence
Madam Fickle ♦
Titus and Berenice ♦
The Cheats of Scapin ♦
The Rover ♦
The Fond Husband ♦
The French Conjurer ♦
The Constant Nymph ♦
The Destruction of Troy ♦
Friendship in Fashion ♦
The Counterfeits ♦
Squire Oldsapp ♦
The Feign'd Curtezans ♦
The Woman Captain ♦
The Virtuous Wife ♦
Caius Marius ♦
The Loving Enemies ♦
The Orphan ♦
The Soldiers Fortune ♦
The Revenge ♦
Theodosius ♦
The Spanish Friar ♦
Playwright
Otway, Thomas
Etherege, Sir George
Behn, Aphra
Ravenscroft, Edward
Rawlins, Thomas (?)
Durfey, Thomas
Otway, Thomas
Otway, Thomas
Behn, Aphra
Durfey, Thomas
Porter, Thomas
Anon
Banks, John
Otway, Thomas
Leanerd, John
Durfey, Thomas
Behn, Aphra
Shadwell, Thomas
Durfey, Thomas
Otway, Thomas
Maidwell, Lewis
Otway, Thomas
Otway, Thomas
Behn, Aphra
Lee, Nathaniel
Dryden, John
Role
Draxilla
Mrs Loveit
Leonora
Elvira
Theodocia
Constantia
Phaenice
Lucia
Hellena
Emilla
Clovinia
Phillisides
Polyxena
Mrs Goodvile
Clara
Sophia
Cornelia
Mrs Gripe
Olivia
Lavinia
Camilla
Monimia
Lady Dunce
Corina
Athenais
Leonora
56
1681
1682
1683
1684
1685
1686
1688
1689
1690
1691
1692
The Princess of Cleve ♦
Lucius Junius Brutus
The Rover, Part II
King Lear ♦
The Lancashire Witches
The London Cuckolds
The Plain Dealer ♦
A King and No King
Venice Preserv'd ♦
Vertue Betray'd
The City Heiress
Rule a Wife and Have a Wife
The Duke of Guise
The Atheist ♦
Constantine the Great
Lucina's Rape ♦
The Northern Lass
Sir Courtly Nice
Mithridates
The Banditti
The Lucky Chance
Mustapha ♦
The Injur'd Lovers
Darius ♦
Don Sebastian
The Massacre of Paris
The Rival Queens ♦
Distress'd Innocence
Amphitryon
King Edward III
The Scowrers
Win Her & Take Her
Greenwich Park
The Wives' Excuse
Lee, Nathaniel
Lee, Nathaniel
Behn, Aphra
Tate, Nahum
Shadwell, Thomas
Ravenscroft, Edward
Wycherley, William
Beaumont & Fletcher
Otway, Thomas
Banks, John
Behn, Aphra
Fletcher, John
Dryden, John
Otway, Thomas
Lee, Nathaniel
Wilmot, John
Brome, Richard
Crowne, John
Lee, Nathaniel
Durfey, Thomas
Behn, Aphra
Boyle, Roger
Mountfort, William
Crowne, John
Dryden, John
Lee, Nathaniel
Lee, Nathaniel
Settle, Elkanah
Dryden, John
Bancroft, John
Shadwell, Thomas
Smyth, John
Mountfort, William
Southerne, Thomas
Richard III ♦
The Marriage Hater Match'd
Shakespeare, William
Durfey, Thomas
Princess
Teraminta
La Nouche
Cordelia
Isabella
Arabella
Olivia
Panthea
Belvidera
Anna Bullen
Lady Galliard
Margueritte
Marmoutier
Porcia
Fausta
Lucina
Mrs. Fitchow
Leonora
Unknown
Laura
Lady Fulbank
Isabella
Oralya
Barzana
Almeyda
Marguerite
Roxana
Orundana
Alcmena
Isabella
Eugenia
Florella
Dorinda
Mrs Friendall
Queen of
England
Lady Subtle
57
1693
1694
1695
1696
1697
1698
1699
Cleomenes ♦
Regulus
Henry II
The Maid's Last Prayer
The Old Batchelor ♦
The Richmond Heiress
Dryden, John
Crowne, John
Bancroft, John
Southerne, Thomas
Congreve, William
Durfey, Thomas
The Double-Dealer ♦
Love Triumphant
The Fatal Marriage ♦
The Ambitious Slave
The Married Beau
Love for Love ♦
She Ventures and He Wins
Cyrus the Great
The She-Gallants
The Country-Wake
The Royal Mischief ♦
Love's a Jest
The City Lady ♦
Congerve, William
Dryden, John
Southerne, Thomas
Settle, Elkanah
Crowne, John
Congreve, William
A Young Lady
Banks, John
Granville, George
Doggett, Thomas
Manley, Delariviere
Motteux, Peter
Dilke, Thomas
The Intrigue at Versailles
The Mourning Bride ♦
The Provok'd Wife ♦
The Novelty: Every Act a
Play. Act IV
The Innocent Mistress
Boadicea ♦
The Deceiver Deceiv'd
Heroick Love
Beauty in Distress
Fatal Friendship
Queen Catharine
Rinaldo & Armida ♦
Xerxes
The Prince of Parma
The False Friend
Friendship Improv'd
Durfey, Thomas
Congreve, William
Vanbrugh, John
Cassandra
Fulvia
Queen Eleanor
Lady Malpert
Laetitia
Sophronia
Lady
Touchwood
Victoria
Isabella
Celestina
Mrs Lovely
Mrs Frail
Urania
Panthea
Lady Dorimen
Lady Testie
Homais
Lady Single
Lady Grumble
Madame de
Vendsome
Zara
Lady Brute
Motteux, Peter
Pix, Mary
Hopkins, Charles
Pix, Mary
Granville, George
Motteux, Peter
Trotter, Catherine
Pix, Mary
Dennis, John
Cibber, Colley
Smith, Henry
Pix, Mary
Hopkins, Charles
Elvira
Bellinda
Boadicea
Olivia
Chruseis
Laura
Lamira
Queen Catharine
Armida
Tamira
Julia
Adellaida
Semanthe
58
1700
1701
170252
1703
1704
1705
1706
1707
52
Iphigenia ♦
The Way of the World ♦
The Fate of Capua
The Beau Defeated
The Ambitious Stepmother
Altemira
Tamerlane
The Double Distress
Antiochus the Great
The Czar Of Muscovy
Dennis, John
Congerve, William
Southerne, Thomas
Pix, Mary
Rowe, Nicholas
Boyle, Roger & Charles
Rowe, Nicholas
Pix, Mary
Wiseman, Jane
Pix, Mary
Love's Victim
The Ladies Visiting Day
The Stolen Heiress
As you find it
The Fair Penitent ♦
The Governor of Cyprus
The Fickle Shepherdess
Liberty Asserted
Zelmane
The Biter
The Confederacy
Ulysses
The Gamester
The Revolution of Sweden
Almyna
Adventures in Madrid
The British Enchanters
Phaedra & Hippolitus
The Royal Convert
Gildon, Charles
Burnaby, William
Centlivre, Susannah
Boyle, Charles
Rowe, Nicholas
Oldmixon, John
Anon
Dennis, John
Anon
Rowe, Nicholas
Vanbrugh, John
Rowe, Nicholas
Centlivre, Susannah
Trotter, Catherine
Manley, Delariviere
Pix, Mary
Granville, George
Smith, Edmund
Rowe, Nicholas
The Lady's Last Stake
Cibber, Colley
Queen of
Scythians
Mrs Marwood
Favonia
Mrs Rich
Artemesia
Altemira
Arpasia
Leamira
Leodice
Zarriana
Queen of
Bayonne
Lady Lovetoy
Lucasia
Eugenia
Calista
Issamanea
Clarinda
Sakia
Zelmane
Mrs Clever
Clarrisa
Penelope
Lady Wealthy
Constantia
Almyna
Clarinda
Archabon
Phaedra
Rodogune
Lady
Wronglove
The dearth of new roles for this year does not necessarily point to a diminution in Mrs. Barry’s
involvement in the theatre; the fact is that we simply do not have many records from this period—there are
no listings for the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Company between January and June 1702. The authors of The
London Stage (2: 15) point out that “Although the theatres produced a great many new plays during this
season, the extant records for the daily offerings are the scantiest for any season in the eighteenth-century.”
Also, the theatres were closed for six weeks due to the death of King William.
59
1708 ‡
‡
Irene
Goring, Charles
Sultana Valide
In the late 1670s, Mrs. Barry played mainly comedic roles, including Hellena in
Aphra Behn’s The Rover (March 24, 1677), coming to specialize in witty but virtuous
young women. However, her break-through role in tragedy came in 1680 with the part of
Monimia in Otway’s The Orphan. Here she played the virtuous young girl, loved by two
brothers one of whom she loves and marries; the rejected suitor manages to trick his
brother and replace him on their wedding night and the play ends with the wicked brother
overcome with remorse and all three committing suicide, overcome with guilt and shame.
Although Momimia’s suffering is not the principal focus of the play, she is the innocent
victim, Mrs. Barry apparently poured such feeling into the delivery of her lines and her
physical actions that she swept the audience along on a tide of emotion. Downes says of
her performance
All the Parts being Admirably done, especially the Part of Monimia:
This, and Belvidera in Venice preserv’d, or a Plot Discover’d;
together with Isabella, in the Fatal Marriage: These three Parts,
gain’d her the Name of Famous Mrs. Barry, both at Court and City;
for when ever She Acted any of those three Parts, she forc’d Tears
from the Eyes of her Auditory, especially those who have any
Sense of Pity for the Distress’t.
These 3 Plays, by their Excellent performances, took above
all the Modern Plays that succeeded.53
53
Downes p. 79.
60
Otway had written Monimia specifically for Mrs. Barry and not only he continued to
write for her, but other playwrights quickly realized the advantage of writing tragic
heroines for such an accomplished actress to play. Indeed, Howe credits Mrs. Barry’s
abilities, at least in part, for the shift in the focus of tragedies being written after The
Orphan away from the male/heroic towards the female/domestic. The lasting impact of
this play and Mrs. Barry’s role in it can be seen in the prologue to Nicholas Rowe’s The
Ambitious Stepmother, first performed in December 1700—twenty years after the
premiere of The Orphan— at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. In this prologue, spoken by Betterton,
the author asks that his audience appreciate the quality of his tragedy as audiences of the
past did with Otway’s:
…Nor let the men, the weeping fair accuse
Those kind protectors of the Tragic Muse,
Whose Tears did moving Otway’s labours crown,
And made the poor Monimia’s Grief their own:
Those Tears, their art, not weakness has confest
And they wept most, because they judg’d the best.
O cou’d this Age’s Writers hope to find
An audience to Compassion thus inclin’d,
The Stage would need no Farce, nor Song, nor Dance,
Nor Capering Monsieur brought from Active France.
(ll. 11-21)
While the complaint against the degeneration of the ‘modern’ stage is a common one, the
fact that Elizabeth Barry’s role as Monimia was considered to have set the standard for
61
tragic acting shows the extent of the lasting effect the combination of Otway’s writing
and her performance had on both writers and audiences.
One of Mrs. Barry’s next tragic roles was in Nahum Tate’s reworking of
Shakespeare’s King Lear (c. March 1681) when she took the part of Cordelia, which was
written for her. In this version however, Cordelia is no longer a minor character and play
in fact becomes the love story of Cordelia and Edgar who not only survive the tragic and
heart-wrenching events but eventually get to live happily ever after.
As well as roles performed, another factor to be taken into consideration when
looking at an acting career is the assignment of prologues and epilogues. These, either
written by the playwright or a friend, were a means for direct communication with the
audience and were usually assigned to the most successful and popular performers—if
the play involved a breeches role then the epilogue was often given to that actress who
would then give her usually saucy speech still in her breeches. The first recorded
epilogue for Elizabeth Barry is to Thomas Otway’s Friendship in Fashion performed on
April 5, 1678 in which she played the role of Mrs. Goodvile. In this speech she asks for
consideration for playwrights ending with
Libels like spurious Brats run up and down,
Which their dull Parents were asham’d to own;
But vented ’em in others names, like Whores
They lay their Bastards down at honest Doors.
For shame leave off this higling way of Wit,
Railing abroad, and roaring in the Pit.
Let Poets live in peace, in quiet write,
62
Else may they all to punish you unite;
Join in one Force, to study to abuse ye,
And teach your Wives and Misses how to use you.
(ll. 17-26)
Since Mrs. Barry was the Earl of Rochester’s acknowledged mistress at this time, and had
given birth to his child some four months previously, Otway seems to be playing on the
audience’s awareness of this with his references to parents and bastards. Unfortunately
we have no record of Elizabeth Barry’s reaction to these comments—perhaps such public
remarks as these contributed to her continued refusal of Otway’s advances.
Mrs. Barry’s first prologue came in September 1679, to Thomas D’Urfey’s The
Virtuous Wife when she played Olivia, a breeches role. This prologue takes an unusual
form in that it begins with Mrs. Barry declaring that this play will never work and that
she doesn’t want to act in it; the actors Anthony Leigh and James Nokes then enter, the
latter dressed as an old woman, and there follows a humorous dialogue in which they
persuade her to continue.
The last recorded prologue or epilogue for Mrs. Barry is on April 7, 1709 when
she acted in, and spoke the epilogue for, a special performance of William Congreve’s
Love For Love which was being performed for what Danchin and others wrongly
describe as Thomas Betterton’s retirement benefit—in fact he never really did retire but
continued performing up to April 13, 1710, fourteen days before his death. The prologue,
a new one for this occasion, was written by Congreve and the new epilogue by Nicholas
Rowe. This was a major theatrical event, a special benefit for one of the great figures of
the London stage. For this Elizabeth Barry returned to the stage after a temporary absence
63
of a year,54 Anne Bracegirdle came out of retirement for this one night only and Thomas
Doggett returned to London. Mrs. Barry’s epilogue makes reference to the relationship
between Betterton, Bracegirdle and herself
So We, to former Leagues of Friendship true,
Have bid once more, our Peaceful Homes Adieu,
To aid old THOMAS, and to pleasure you….
Like Errant Damsels boldly we Engage
Arm’d as you see, for the Defenceless Stage;
Time was, when this Good Man no Help did lack,
And scorn’d that any She, should hold his Back,
But now … so Age and Frailty have ordain’d
By two at once, he’s forc’d to be sustained;
Danchin notes that the 1714 and 1733 printed editions describe all three actors on the
stage for this epilogue, with the two women clasping Betterton around the waist at the
last line of the above passage.55 The epilogue ends with a plea to the audience to
remember the all the years Betterton had given them pleasure on the stage with kindness.
The Tatler of April 12, 1709, in the report from “Will’s Coffee-house, April 8”, described
the event
On Thursday last was acted, for the Benefit of Mr. Betterton, the
Celebrated Comedy, call’d Love for Love. Those Excellent Players,
Mrs. Barry, Mrs. Bracegirdle, and Mr. Dogget, tho’ not at present
concern’d in the House, acted on that Occasion. There has not been
54
55
This temporary retirement is discussed in detail in the next section.
The Prologues and epilogues of the eighteenth century: The First Part 1701-1720, Vol II p. 430.
64
known so great a Concourse of Persons of Distinction as at that Time;
the Stage it self was cover’d with Gentlemen and Ladies, and when the
Curtain was drawn, it discovered even there a very splendid Audience.
This unusual Encouragement which was given to a Play for the
Advantage of so Great an Actor, gives an undeniable Instance, That
the True Relish for Manly Entertainments and Rational Pleasures is not
wholly lost. All the Parts were acted to Perfection; the Actors were careful
of their Carriage, and no one was guilty of the Affectation to insert
Witticisms of his own, but a due Respect was had to the Audience, for
encouraging this accomplish’d Player.
The report continues with a description of some of Betterton’s best known roles and
finishes with a note on an upcoming play by D’Urfey. The fact that the author
commented on how careful the actors were of both their carriage and their lines for this
particular performance would seem to imply that standards had been slipping. This is not
surprising since Drury Lane was, at this time, heading towards a change of management
with the temporary silencing of that theatre in June, 1709.
The circumstances surrounding the temporary closure of Drury Lane in June 1709
by the Lord Chamberlain were very complex, and unique. The manager of the theatre
was Christopher Rich, a business man whose only concern in Drury Lane was making
money—he alienated his actors with various penny-pinching strategies involving benefit
nights and house charges—but he held the patent rights so legally the actors had no
grounds on which to challenge him. Lord Chamberlain Kent interfered, ordered Rich to
change the rules concerning benefit charges and then issued an Order of Silence on June
65
6, 1709 when Rich failed to comply. This extent of government interference in the
running of the theatre was unprecedented and the end result was a genre split which
excluded Rich from theatrical activities—a united company of actors performed plays at
Drury Lane, an opera company occupied the Haymarket and Christopher Rich had no
part in either. 56
Elizabeth Barry’s ‘retirement’ 1708-1709
Why Mrs. Barry retired after her performance as Sophonisba on June 17, 1708 is
not clear. She was in her late forties and still playing most of the roles she had created—
no other actress appears to have been a threat to her. The Biographical Dictionary offers
no explanation, just states that she retired for nearly a year and returned for Betterton’s
benefit. Wilson suggests that the uniting of the two companies in 1708, which occurred
with the first genre-split separating the performance of plays and operas “seems to have
contributed to Mrs. Barry’s decision to retire” (p. 115). The fact that her last
performance was in June would seem to re-enforce this idea since leading actors did not
usually perform in the summer months—Elizabeth Barry typically acted from October to
March every year—therefore, a performance in June may indicate that she was under a
certain amount of pressure.
There are however, some changes that occur with Mrs. Barry’s roles preceding
her ‘retirement’ which are worth noting. The first of these is in Aphra Behn’s The Rover,
which premiered in 1677 with Elizabeth Barry in the role of Hellena—a young and
virginal girl, but one who is vivacious, outspoken and not afraid to pursue the man she
56
This is, necessarily, a very brief summary of the events of 1709-1710, for a full explanation see Judith
Milhous and Robert D. Hume, “The Silencing of Drury Lane in 1709,” Theatre Journal 32:4 (December
1980), 427-447.
66
has set her heart on, Willmore, the “rover” of the title. This play was very popular and
continued to be performed quite regularly;57 unfortunately we do not have any extant cast
lists between the premiere and a performance at the Queen’s Theatre in January 1707.
This latter cast lists gives Hellena played by Anne Bracegirdle and Mrs. Barry now
playing Angelica—a worldly courtesan who nevertheless falls passionately in love with
Willmore only to lose him to Hellena. This change of roles makes sense given the thirty
year gap from when Elizabeth Barry had first played Hellena, and the cordial relationship
which existed between Mrs. Barry and Mrs. Bracegirdle. Although we do not have the
necessary records, the most likely change-over point would seem to be in 1703 as The
Rover had not been performed for the preceding eight years.
Another possibly significant change occurs with the March 1st production of
Otway’s The Orphan at the Queen’s Theatre in 1707. This play, and the role of Monimia,
was the start of Elizabeth Barry’s career as a leading tragic actress in 1680 but at the
above performance the role was played by Anne Oldfield though Mrs. Barry was still
active with the company. As with the role of Hellena, the change makes sense given the
time span but unless she was indisposed, the chances of Elizabeth Barry ceding one of
her greatest roles to a relative newcomer seem rather slim.
Table 4.
Mrs. Barry’s roles and the actresses who performed them in her absence.
Date of
performance
August 1708
September 1708
57
Play
The London Cuckolds
The Lancashire Witches
Mrs. Barry's role
Arabella
Isabella
Succeeding
actress
Mrs. Rogers
Mrs.
After its premiere in 1677, The Rover was performed in 1680, 85, 87, 90, 95 and 1703-18, 1720-43,
1748, 1757-60 and 1790.
67
Amphitryon
The Fatal Marriage
Rule a Wife and Have a
Wife
The Rival Queens
The Indian Emperor
The Spanish Fryar
Alcmena
Isabella
Bradshaw
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Rogers
Margueritte
Roxana
Almeria
Leonora
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
October 1708
Mrs. Knight
Mrs.
Oldfield
Sir Courtly Nice
Leonora
Love for Love
Mrs. Frail
????
Greenwich Park
Dorinda
Mrs. Rogers
The Rover
Angelica
Mrs. Knight
Mrs.
Bradshaw
King Lear *
Cordelia
The Northern Lass
Mrs. Fitchow
Mrs. Knight
December 1708
Greenwich Park
Dorinda
Mrs. Rogers
The Old Batchelor
Laetitia
Mrs. Knight
January 1709
The Careless Husband
Lady Easy
Mrs. Knight
Mrs.
The London Cuckolds
Arabella
Bradshaw
Mrs.
The Man of Mode
Mrs. Loveit
Oldfield
Mrs.
Oldfield
February 1709
Sir Courtly Nice
Leonora
The Fond Husband
Emilia
Mrs. Rogers
The Northern Lass
Mrs. Fitchow
Mrs. Knight
The Indian Emperor
Almeria
Mrs. Knight
March 1709
The Gamester
Lady Wealthy
????
Venice Preserv'd
Belvidera
Mrs. Rogers
The Gamester
Lady Wealthy
Mrs. Porter
April 1709
The Rival Queens
Roxana
Mrs. Porter
* Though The London Stage does not clarify whether or not this was the original
Shakespearean play or Nahum Tate’s reworking, which was designed to showcase Mrs.
Barry’s talents, most critics agree that Shakespeare’s Lear did not make a return to the
London stage until the 1820s.
Of the five actresses who took over Elizabeth Barry’s roles in her absence, Mrs.
Anne Oldfield was the most prominent and also the one about whom the most
68
information survives today.58 Both Jane Rogers and Frances Maria Knight had acted
originally with the United Company but remained with Rich at Drury Lane when
Betterton, Mrs. Barry and the senior actors left the company to set up at Lincoln’s Inn
Fields—both these actresses were struggling to compete for parts with Mrs. Barry and
Mrs. Bracegirdle whilst in the United Company and seem to have made the best career
choice by staying with Rich. However, as we do not have any extant records detailing
the decision making process of who was to stay and who was to leave with the senior
actors, it is possible that Mrs. Rogers and Mrs. Knight were not given the option to move
to Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Given the management roles that Mrs. Barry and Mrs.
Bracegirdle were to assume with the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Company, the logical
assumption is that they would wish to take the best performers possible for the new
company but not those who would prove likely to challenge their dominance in their
chosen roles. This decision, if indeed it were consciously made, although obviously
motivated by a certain amount of self-interest, would also have been in the best interests
of the company as a whole. Given the circumstances that Mrs. Barry, Mrs. Bracegirdle
and Betterton had just experienced with the United Company at Drury Lane, internal
strife and an unhappy group of actors cannot have been a situation which they wished to
replicate, particularly given the less than ideal physical conditions at the Lincoln’s Inn
Fields premises.
Mrs. Knight in particular did very well in Drury Lane and played many of the
roles that Elizabeth Barry had originally created. Mrs. Rogers had a less consistent
career, moving between Drury Lane and Queens/third Lincoln’s Inn Fields from 1707 to
1718 and sustaining a long-running and unpleasant rivalry with Anne Oldfield. Both
58
Mrs. Oldfield falls in the next sample group and her career will be discussed in detail in the next chapter.
69
Mary Porter and Lucretia Bradshaw began their careers with the Lincoln’s Inn Fields
Company and the Biographical Dictionary describes both actresses as protégées of
Elizabeth Barry—between them they acquired a number of Mrs. Barry’s roles after her
permanent retirement in June 1710.
The only one of these actresses who could provide a serious threat to Elizabeth
Barry was Anne Oldfield—whose rivalry with Mrs. Barry’s friend and acting partner,
Anne Bracegirdle, may have contributed to that actress’s decision to retire from the stage
whilst at the height of her career. As can be seen from the following table, Mrs. Oldfield
retained the role of Mrs. Loveit in Etherege’s The Man of Mode (which Mrs. Barry had
originated in 1676) even after Mrs. Barry had returned to the stage in October 1709.
Anne Oldfield had begun playing the role whilst at Drury Lane with Rich and had then
joined the company at the Queen’s Theatre in 1706 along with a number of Rich’s other
senior actors. Whether Mrs. Barry objected to this loss of one of her major roles is not
known.
Table 5.
Mrs. Barry’s roles from the Betterton benefit performance to her retirement in
June 1710.
Note: No entry in the ‘Succeeding actress’ column indicates that Mrs. Barry performed
this role at this time.
Play titles in bold denote tragedies.
Date of
performance
April 1709
Play
Mrs. Barry's role
Love for Love
The London Cuckolds
King Lear
Mrs. Frail
Arabella
Cordelia
The Old Batchelor
The Marriage Hater
Laetitia
Lady Subtle
Succeeding actress
Mrs. Bradshaw
“a young
gentlewoman”
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
70
May 1709
September 1709
October 1709
November 1709
December 1709
January 1710
February 1710
March 1710
April 1710
May 1710
June 1710
Match'd
The Rover
Love for Love
Sir Courtly Nice
The Fatal Marriage
The Spanish Fryar
The Rover
Rule a Wife and Have a
Wife
The Careless Husband
Mackbeth
The Indian Emperor
The Old Batchelor
Mackbeth
The Man of Mode
King Lear
Rule a Wife and Have a
Wife
The Old Batchelor
King Edward III
The Indian Emperor
Mackbeth
Richard III
The Maid's Tragedy
The Spanish Fryar
The Rover
Macbeth
Venice Preserv'd
Richard III
The Fatal Marriage
The Rover
The London Cuckholds
The Careless Husband
Angelica
Mrs. Frail
Leonora
Isabella
Leonora
Angelica
Margueritte
Lady Easy
Lady Mackbeth
Almeria
Laetitia
Lady Mackbeth
Mrs. Loveit
Cordelia
Margueritte
Laetitia
Queen Isabella
Almeria
Lady Mackbeth
Queen
Evadne
Leonora
Angelica
Lady Macbeth
Belvidera
Queen
Isabella
Angelica
Arabella
Lady Easy
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Oldfield
[No cast]
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Rogers
[No cast]
Benefit Mrs. Barry
Mrs. Porter
[No cast]
[No cast]
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Rogers
[No cast]
Mrs. Bicknell
As can be seen from her list of roles, Mrs. Barry did not return to the stage immediately
after her appearance in Love for Love for Thomas Betterton’s benefit but rather came
back six months later which does fit with her usual pattern of performances (October to
April) prior to her temporary retirement. Just as there is no explanation of why she chose
to retire, there is nothing to indicate why she then chose to return at this point. On her
71
return she resumed most, but not all of her roles—she played Leonora in Dryden’s The
Spanish Fryar (a role she had created in 1680) in October, but when that play was
performed in November the role was taken by Mrs. Knight. As has already been
discussed, the role of Mrs. Loveit remained with Anne Oldfield.
Table 6.
Actresses who performed Elizabeth Barry’s roles after her retirement, July 1710 –
June 1711.
Note: There are no entries for August and September 1710 as none of the plays which
were performed at the Queen’s Theatre during these months were ones for which Mrs.
Barry had created a role.
Play titles in bold denote tragedies.
Date of
Performance
July 1710
August 1710
September 1710
October 1710
November 1710
December 1710
January 1711
February 1711
Play
Mrs. Barry's Role
Succeeding actress
The Old Batchelor
Laetitia
Mrs. Oldfield
Love for Love
The Spanish Fryar
The Fatal Marriage
Love for Love
The Northern Lass
Sir Courtly Nice
Macbeth
The Rover
The Old Batchelor
Amphitryon
The Maid's Tragedy
Macbeth
The Indian Emperor
Venice Preserv'd
Rule a Wife and Have a
Wife
Love for Love
The Northern Lass
The Careless Husband
The Man of Mode
The Spanish Fryar
Mrs. Frail
Leonora
Isabella
Mrs. Frail
Mrs. Fitchow
Leonora
Lady Macbeth
Angelica
Laetitia
Alcmena
Evadne
Lady Macbeth
Almeria
Belvidera
Margueritte
[Not listed]
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Rogers
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Rogers
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Frail
Mrs. Fitchow
Lady Easy
Mrs. Loveit
Leonora
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Knight
72
March 1711
April 1711
May 1711
June 1711
The Man of Mode
The Rover
Love for Love
Caius Marius
The Rover
Macbeth
Love for Love
The Indian Emperor
The Man of Mode
Valentinian
The Careless Husband
The Fatal Marriage
The Old Batchelor
Love for Love
Sir Courtly Nice
The Man of Mode
Rule a Wife and Have a
Wife
Mrs. Loveit
Angelica
Mrs. Frail
Lavinia
Angelica
Lady Macbeth
Mrs. Frail
Almeria
Mrs. Loveit
Lucina
Lady Easy
Isabella
Laetitia
Mrs. Frail
Leonora
Mrs. Loveit
Margueritte
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Bradshaw
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Bradshaw
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Bradshaw
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Knight
As can be seen from the tables, the comedic roles which Elizabeth Barry created
maintained a stronger presence in the repertory than her more famous tragic roles, at least
in the year after her retirement. This may have been because her great tragic
performances were relatively fresh in audience and management minds and so closely
associated with her that the management was reluctant to stage those plays without her.
However, considering Mrs. Barry’s year-long absence from the stage for her temporary
retirement and the reduced number of roles she performed on her return this does not
seem particularly likely—especially given the presence of the tragediennes Mary Porter
and Frances Knight in the company. Many of Elizabeth Barry’s greatest roles in tragedy
were in plays from the 1680s and 90s; the possibility that tastes in tragedy had simply
changed needs to be considered.
The principal beneficiary from Elizabeth Barry’s retirement was Frances Knight
(10 roles), with Mary Porter (4 roles), Anne Oldfield (4 roles), Lucretia Bradshaw (3
73
roles) and Jane Rogers (2 roles) also benefitting. Surprisingly, given that Mary Porter
was the actress who eventually assumed Mrs. Barry’s mantle as the principal tragedienne
of the company, the roles which she inherited were all in comedies.
Table 7.
Allocation of Elizabeth Barry’s roles after her retirement.
Note: Play titles in bold denote tragedies.
Play
The Old Batchelor
The Spanish Fryar
The Fatal Marriage
Love for Love
The Northern Lass
Sir Courtly Nice
Macbeth
The Rover
The Old Batchelor
Amphitryon
The Maid's Tragedy
The Indian Emperor
Venice Preserv'd
Rule a Wife and Have a Wife
Love for Love
The Careless Husband
The Man of Mode
The Spanish Fryar
The Man of Mode
Caius Marius
Valentinian
The Fatal Marriage
Sir Courtly Nice
Mrs. Barry's Role
Laetitia
Leonora
Isabella
Mrs. Frail
Mrs. Fitchow
Leonora
Lady Macbeth
Angelica
Laetitia
Alcmena
Evadne
Almeria
Belvidera
Margueritte
Mrs. Frail
Lady Easy
Mrs. Loveit
Leonora
Mrs. Loveit
Lavinia
Lucina
Isabella
Leonora
Succeeding actress
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Rogers
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Rogers
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Porter
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Knight
Mrs. Oldfield
Mrs. Bradshaw
Mrs. Bradshaw
Mrs. Bradshaw
Mrs. Oldfield
The allotment of parts seems to have remained very stable—by in large those who
had acquired Mrs. Barry’s roles during her temporary absence retained them when she
finally did retire. There were two exceptions: one, the role of Isabella in The Fatal
Marriage transferred from Mrs. Rogers, who played it in November 1710, to Mrs.
74
Bradshaw, who assumed the part in the May 1711 production; two, a less straightforward
change, the role of Laetitia in William Congreve’s comedy The Old Batchelor (1693)
which moved between Mrs. Knight and Mrs. Oldfield.
December 1708 – Mrs. Knight
April 1709 – Mrs. Knight
December 1709 – No cast
March 1710 – No cast
July 1710 – Mrs. Oldfield
November 1710 – Mrs. Knight
May 1711 – Mrs. Oldfield
The November 1710 performance by Frances Knight can be explained by Anne
Oldfield’s temporary absence from the stage—she is not advertised for any roles around
this time; this also explains Mary Porter’s temporary assumption of the role of Leonora in
John Crowne’s Sir Courtly Nice (1684) in December 1710, an Elizabeth Barry role which
had fallen to Anne Oldfield. This does not however explain the changeover from Mrs.
Knight to Mrs. Oldfield which occurred somewhere between May 1709 and July 1710.
That five very different actresses assumed the roles that Elizabeth Barry had
created is an impressive testimony to the range of her abilities. Frances Knight was not a
newcomer but had begun her career with the United Company in 1684 at roughly the
same time as Anne Bracegirdle. She played a wide variety of roles in both comedy and
tragedy over the course of her career; she was a dancer and on occasion also sang. Little
is known of her private life but she does seem to have had a dubious reputation. The
Biographical Dictionary cites A Letter to A.H. Esq. from 1698 which says that audiences
75
should not try to conflate actors’ roles with their actual personalities, giving as an
example that one should not be upset by Mrs. Knight playing “a very Modest and Chaste
one.”59 Tom Brown also makes a reference to Mrs. Knight’s reputation in one of his
“letters”— “Peg Hughes’s answer to Nell Gwynn”
should I have placed an esteem upon the riches that was left me,
the world might have supposed it was the greediness of gain that
made me yield my favours; and what had I been better than Madam
Ja—es, or Mrs. Knight of Drury Lane; had I exposed my honour for
the lucre of base coin, and sinned on for the sake only of advantage?60
Although these “letters” are frequently scurrilous, and both “sender” and “recipient” were
kept women—Margaret Hughes was the mistress of Prince Rupert and Nell Gwyn, of
course, was kept by Charles II—the fact that “they” would not stoop to the level of
women such as Mrs. Knight implies both that she had many lovers and was not averse to
taking payment from them. As is always the case with such sources, one cannot
definitively state that such a reputation was just or true, but the fact that Mrs. Knight was
mentioned quite casually in such a context by two separate authors gives some indication
of how she was regarded by the public.
Frances Maria Knight was involved, as a witness, in the trial of Captain Hill and
Lord Mohun for the murder of the actor William Mountfort (December 1692). Mrs.
Knight’s involvement in the matter and her relationship with Anne Bracegirdle is
described thus
About four days before the fatal encounter, Hill told her [Mrs. Knight]
59
Biographical Dictionary 9: 60.
Tom Brown Amusements Serious and Comical (London: 1695), “Letters from the Dead to the Living”
p. 392.
60
76
that he was satisfied Mrs. Bracegirdle hated him. Mrs. Knight replied
that she did not believe she hated anybody or loved anybody. To this
remark Hill answered that she did love somebody, but he had thought
of a way to be even with that person . . . , He begged her to deliver a
letter to Mrs. Bracegirdle, but she refused on the ground that Mrs.
Bracegirdle, because she hated Hill, would not love anybody who
spoke for him, and Mrs. Knight had no desire to create enemies for
herself in the house, since she had some already. Hill demanded,
“What Enemies, Mountfort do you mean?” and then after an oath,
he concluded, “I shall find a way with him speedily.”61
While this description of events has no independent corroboration it does give a limited
picture of relations within the company at the end of 1692. Mrs. Knight’s account seems
to indicate that while outsiders considered her to be friends with Anne Bracegirdle she
did not see their friendship as being strong enough to support “the letter”; or she may
simply have wished to keep out of the whole messy business; a third interpretation could
be that Mrs. Bracegirdle was of an uncertain temperament and likely to turn on even
those who were her friends if they displeased her. Given what is known of Anne
Bracegirdle, the latter does not seem particularly likely. Little else is known of Mrs.
Knight outside the roles that she played. There is a four-year unexplained absence from
the London stage—she is not mentioned in cast lists between spring 1719 and fall 1723.
When Mrs. Knight returned to Lincoln’s Inn Fields she performed only in the 1723-24
season—after her retirement nothing else is known.
61
Albert S. Borgman The Life and Death of William Mountfort (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1935), pp. 125-126.
77
Not only did five different actresses inherit Mrs. Barry’s roles, they were all
actresses who had, or developed, substantial careers. Mary Porter, who gained four of
Elizabeth Barry’s roles, became the leading tragedy actress of the Drury Lane Company
from the 1710’s to the 1730’s. The Biographical Dictionary refers to Mrs. Barry as “her
mentor” but the only evidence for this appears to be the 1741 History of the English Stage
which describes Mrs. Barry and Mrs. Bracegirdle “spotting” her performing at
Bartholomew Fair and being so impressed that they convinced Betterton to accept her
into the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Company.62 How true this account is we have no way to tell.
Mrs. Porter’s first mention in the cast lists comes in 1698 when she spoke the epilogue to
Queen Catherine. Her acting career progressed steadily but not spectacularly with a
variety of roles in both tragedy and comedy at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. In 1705 she was with
Vanbrugh’s new Queen’s Theatre but became dissatisfied with her progress in the
company after two seasons. During this time the management had passed from John
Vanbrugh to Owen Swiney and in a letter to the Lord Chamberlain dated October 22,
1707 Mary Porter outlines her grievances against the company
When several of the Gentlewomen who played Principal Parts, either
neglected or were sick, she at a nights notice study’d and play’d them
perfect the next night and to satisfaction, for which she had hop’d for
encouragement or at least to have had such Parts given her by which
she might have gain’d reputation when there was more time to study
But instead thereof generally those Parts were given to such as were
below her.
That she was postponed in her Benefit Play to all the younger actors,
62
Biographical Dictionary 12: 91.
78
and not admitted to have it till the 2nd of May last when the Town was
almost empty and may Fayre was began.
…………………………………………………………………………
That a little before their beginning to Play this winter a Gentlewoman63
was taken in over her head, which will still be a means to take away
those Parts from her by which she hop’d to advance herself.64
Mary Porter seems not to have received any satisfaction to her complaints as she did not
perform at the Queen’s Theatre in the 1707-8 season—she is mentioned in the Lord
Chamberlain’s order to the managers at Drury Lane instructing that the actors
(Verbruggen, Pack, Mrs. Porter, Mrs. Bradshaw) who had left the Haymarket without a
proper discharge were not to be employed.65 Mrs. Porter, in conjunction with the other
actors who had been dismissed, petitioned the Lord Chamberlain, the Marquis of Kent, in
early January 1708 to be re-admitted to the new acting company at Drury Lane which had
been formed after the genre split mandated by the Order of Union of December 1707.
Humbly Sheweth—That your Petitioners having unhappily fal’n
under your Lordships displeasure, Leaving the Haymarket Play-House,
without your Lordship’s Permission; and your Petitioners being very
Sensible of their fault, humbly Request your Lordship, that out of
your wonted Goodness you wou’d be pleased to Pardon their
Misdemeanor, and Restore them to their Employment, that they
63
The Biographical Dictionary suggests that this gentlewoman may have been Mrs. Rogers but offers no
explanation or evidence for the choice. Mrs. Jane Rogers did join the company at the Queen’s Theatre in
the fall of 1707, making her first appearance on October 18th; she had been a leading player at Drury Lane
prior to this and could well have been brought in over Mary Porter’s head.
64
The Document Register (I: Item 1905) gives the source of this letter as LC 7/3, fols. 102-103.
65
Document Register I: Item 1926.
79
may be Partakers of the Union so happily Accomplish’d by your
Lordship
And your Petitioners as in Duty Bound shall ever Pray etca.66
The lack of justification for their actions on the part of the actors, and the tone of
supplication, indicates that they considered that their reasons for leaving the Haymarket
would not be considered valid by the Lord Chamberlain’s office.
Mrs. Porter’s initial letter of complaint clearly demonstrates both the precarious
nature of the acting profession and the resentments, frustrations, and jockeying for
position that could, and did, arise within a company. However, Mrs. Porter’s fortunes
took a turn for the better with the new company where she began to build on her number
of roles and particularly those in tragedy for which she became best known.
One of the other actresses who signed the petition to be re-admitted to the Drury
Lane Company was Lucretia Bradshaw, who inherited three of Elizabeth Barry’s roles—
Lavinia in Otway’s Caius Marius (1679), Lucina in Rochester’s Valentinian (1684), and
Isabella in Southerne’s The Fatal Marriage (1694)—all of which were parts in tragedies.
The Biographical Dictionary says of Mrs. Bradshaw
She seems to have been a protégée of Elizabeth Barry, and after
Mrs. Barry retired, Lucretia succeeded to some of her major parts. (2: 284)
No evidence is offered for the assumption that Elizabeth Barry acted as a mentor to Mrs.
Bradshaw—further in the entry Anthony Aston’s comments on Lucretia Bradshaw are
refered to (he felt that Mrs. Bradshaw copied, unsuccessfully, Mrs. Barry’s style of
speaking her lines), but this does not seem to warrant the assumption of a close
66
Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume, ed., Vice Chamberlain Coke’s Theatrical Papers 1706-1715
(Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1982), Item 30.
80
relationship. Any junior actress, particularly one who wished to move up the ranks, might
reasonably try to imitate the most successful actress in the company and would have had
the opportunity for constant close observation of that actress’s style whether or not they
were friends or even on speaking terms. Given what is known of Mrs. Barry’s ambition
and temperament, her adoption of a protégée does not seem very likely. Her friendship
with Anne Bracegirdle was commented on and this is borne out by her will in which she
left Mrs. Bracegirdle ₤20, plus ₤200 “to save Mrs. Bracegirdle harmless from any debt of
the Play-House.”67 If Elizabeth Barry had been close to Lucretia Bradshaw then very
likely there would be some mention of the relationship between them somewhere.
Mrs. Bradshaw did not do particularly well when the division of Mrs. Barry’s
roles occurred. As the list in Table 6 shows, Lucretia Bradshaw only inherited three of a
possible twenty-one roles still regularly in the repertory; one of those she gained only
after Jane Rogers had performed it first. While Mrs. Barry is unlikely to have been able
to influence the management’s allocation of her roles after her retirement, if she had been
Mrs. Bradshaw’s mentor, she most likely would have helped her protégée learn and
develop a number of roles so that she would have been an obvious choice for the
management.
Aside from the roles which Lucretia Bradshaw inherited from Mrs. Barry, she was
a successful actress who played in a wide variety of tragedies and comedies. Her career
did not last particularly long—she played major roles from around 1706 but left the stage
to marry Martin Folkes, Esq. after the 1714 spring season. Her husband became a noted
academic who was vice-president of The Royal Society under Newton; she never
67
Biographical Dictionary I: 323.
81
returned to the stage and was confined to a house for lunatics in the late 1720’s having
gone “mad on religion” whilst in Rome with her husband and son.68
Elizabeth Barry, Anne Bracegirdle and Thomas Betterton—‘The Three Ruling B’s’
Although the benefit for the great Thomas Betterton seems to have touched both
the hearts and purse-strings of the theatre-going public, the triumvirate of Betterton,
Barry and Bracegirdle had not always been so favorably regarded. These three leading
performers led the actors’ revolt against the tyranny of Christopher Rich’s management
of the United Company and gained permission to set up a rival company at Lincoln’s Inn
Fields in 1695. In 1705 a vicious “Epistle Dedicatory” to a satiric play The Lunatick,69 by
one Franck Telltroth,70 was published—this was addressed “To the Three Ruling B---S at
the New-House in Lincolns-Inn-Fields” and opened
Most Arbitrary and Most Hermophrodite Conjunction,
Since it has been brought into a Custom to offer the Products
of the Brain to those who generally have the least Pretence to it,
by that Rule the following Play has a peculiar Right to appear
under so Illustrious a Protection as Yours, whose Sense and Honesty
are not less Conspicuous than Your High Birth, and Education.71
“Mr. Telltroth” goes on to criticize their choice of plays for performance and their
mercenary motives, crediting Betterton, Barry and Bracegirdle with having
68
Biographical Dictionary II: 286.
This is a work of three acts in forty pages whose structure and characters seem to indicate that its
purpose was purely satiric and never performance oriented.
70
The Document Register, Item 1801, notes that this play was used by the playwright William Taverner in
his 1713 work The Female Advocate. Perhaps he may also have been the original author.
71
The Lunatick. A Comedy. Dedicated to the Three Ruling B---S at the New-House in Lincolns-Inn-Fields.
London: B. Bragg, 1705.
69
82
brought a Company, in a few Years, from Admiration,
to the Contempt of the Town; a Work beyond the Talent of
most Men,
This style of general slander could be easily dismissed as the bitter ranting of a would-be
playwright, such as Robert Gould, whose work had been dismissed by the Lincoln’s Inn
Fields Management and who was an outsider knowing nothing of the workings of the
theatre. However, Telltroth continues, gloating over the end of their reign—the
approaching genre split between the Haymarket and Drury Lane—and goes into some
very detailed accusations over the running of the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Company.
There will be no more Clandestine Sharing betwixt You without
the rest; no more private Accounts, and Double Books; no more
paying Debts half a score times over out of the Publick Stock,
yet never paying them in reality at all. There will be no more
sinking Three Hundred and fifty Pounds at a time in the Money
re-paid on a famous Singer’s Account, but never accounted for
to the rest of the Sharers; no more stopping all the Pay of the
Under Actors on Subscription-Nights, when you were allow’d
forty or fifty Pound a Night for the House, besides the Benefit
of the Galleries; nor more sinking the Court-Money in-to Your
own Pockets; and letting the Sallary People and Under Sharers
Starve without Pay . . .
“Telltroth” is clearly exaggerating the case, otherwise the company would have
collapsed; however, some of his accusations are very detailed and specific. We do not
83
know precisely to whom he is referring as the “famous Singer,” but a number of different
soloists were employed as entr’acte attractions, usually from France or Italy, on a
temporary contract. These performers were often promised huge sums, way beyond the
salary scale of the company, which often resulted in great financial difficulties. Downes
states that
In the space of the Ten Years past, Mr. Betterton to gratify the desires
and Fancies of the Nobility and Gentry; procur’d from Abroad the
best Dances and Singers, as, Monsieur L’Abbe, Madam Sublini,
Monsieur Balon, Margarita Delpine, Maria Gallia and divers others;
who being Exorbitantly Expensive, produc’d small Profit to him and his
Company; but vast Gain to themselves,72
Ticket prices were usually inflated when such performers appeared, in an attempt to
defray some of the cost.
“Telltroth” sounds like someone who was, or had been, a performer, a playwright
or an investor in the theatre—someone with a very definite axe to grind and who was
obviously party to the gossip and grumblings of the theatre. One unusual aspect of this
‘epistle’ is that it does not differentiate among the three performers. Other satires of the
period tend to attack Betterton for his vanity and Barry for her personal life—Mrs.
Bracegirdle had an exceedingly chaste reputation and as such did not provide an easy
target for the satirist’s pen—but other than the opening reference to the three as a single
hermaphrodite entity the complaints here are all of a professional and financial nature.
72
Downes pp. 96-97.
84
The Barry and Bracegirdle relationship
Some mention of the career of Anne Bracegirdle is necessary at this point—since
her stage career ran from 1680 to 1707 she does not fall within any of the sample groups
for this study, but she was a leading actress who was closely associated with Elizabeth
Barry for the duration of her career. Mrs. Bracegirdle began her theatrical life at an early
age—there is some dispute over her date of birth,73 but she was, at a young age adopted
by the Bettertons and there are several references from the late 1670s onwards to ‘a
young girl’ which may be she. The first mention of her in the Lord Chamberlain’s
accounts is on January 12, 1688 as a member of the United Company when, if the later
birth date is correct, she would have been seventeen years old.74 Her first named role, at
least the first that we have from surviving records, is that of Atelina—an innocent young
girl who is the victim of rape—in William Mountfort’s tragedy The Injur’d Lovers on
February 6, 1688. The only other named female role, Princess Oryala, a darker character,
was played by Elizabeth Barry. This pairing of Mrs. Barry as the more experienced
woman, often with a dark past, with Mrs. Bracegirdle as the virtuous, invariably virginal,
innocent girl was to set a pattern which lasted the duration of their years on the stage
together.
From their first performance in 1688 to their last in 1706 (excepting their
appearance for Betterton’s benefit in 1709)—in Delariviere Manley’s Almyna—Mrs.
73
The Biographical Dictionary discusses the uncertainty of her birth date and concludes that the earlier
date of 1663 is the most likely. However, a letter to the Times Literary Supplement, May 2, 1986, offers
evidence for the correct date of baptism for Anne Bracegirdle as November 15, 1671, at St Giles,
Northampton. If correct, this would mean that she was 77 years old when she died, not 85 as her tombstone
in Westminster Abbey indicates.
74
Given that Anne Bracegirdle was raised in the Betterton household, and the type of role for which she is
first mentioned, the later birth date seems all the more likely. If the earlier were correct, then she would
have been 25 when first mentioned in the Lord Chamberlain’s records, an impossibly late start for a girl
virtually brought up in the theatre.
85
Barry and Mrs. Bracegirdle appeared in fifty-six new plays together. The split between
tragedies and comedies is nearly even, with twenty-nine of the former and twenty-seven
of the latter, as can be seen in the table below.
Table 8: New plays in which Mrs. Barry and Mrs. Bracegirdle appeared together.
Note: Play titles in bold denote tragedies.
DATE
1688
1690
1691
1692
1693
1694
1695
1696
1697
1698
PLAY
The Injur'd Lovers
Distress'd Innocence
King Edward the Third
The Scowrers
The Wives' Excuse
The Marriage-Hater Match'd
Cleomenes
Henry II
The Maid's Last Prayer
The Old Batchelor
The Richmond Heiress
The Double Dealer
Love Triumphant
The Fatal Marriage
The Married Beau
The Ambitious Slave
Love for Love
She Ventures and He Wins
Cyrus the Great
The She-Gallants
The Country-Wake
The Royal Mischief
Love's a Jest
The Intrigues at Versailles
The Innocent Mistress
The Deceiver Deceiv'd
The Mourning Bride
The Provok'd Wife
Boadicea, Queen of Britain
Heroick Love
Beauty in Distress
The Fatal Friendship
PLAYWRIGHT
William Mountfort
Elkanah Settle
John Bancroft
Thomas Shadwell
Thomas Southerne
Thomas Durfey
John Dryden
John Bancroft
Thomas Southerne
William Congreve
Thomas Durfey
William Congreve
John Dryden
Thomas Southerne
John Crowne
Elkanah Settle
William Congreve
A Young Lady
John Banks
George Granville
Thomas Doggett
Delariviere Manley
Peter Motteux
Thomas Durfey
Mary Pix
Mary Pix
William Congreve
John Vanbrugh
Charles Hopkins
George Granville
Peter Motteux
Catherine Trotter
86
1699
1700
1701
1703
1704
1705
1706
Queen Catharine
The Princess of Parma
The False Friend
Friendship Improv'd
Iphigenia
The Way of the World
The Beau Defeated
The Ambitious Stepmother
The Ladies Visiting Day
The Double Distress
Love's Victim
Tamerlane
The Fickle Shepherdess
As You Find It
The Fair Penitent
Liberty Asserted
Zelmane
The Biter
The Gamester
The Confederacy
Ulysses
The British Enchanters
The Adventures in Madrid
Almyna
Mary Pix
Henry Smith
Mary Pix
Charles Hopkins
John Dennis
William Congreve
Mary Pix
Nicholas Rowe
William Burnaby
Mary Pix
Charles Gildon
Nicholas Rowe
Anon.
Charles Boyle
Nicholas Rowe
John Dennis
Anon.
Nicholas Rowe
Susannah Centlivre
John Vanbrugh
Nicholas Rowe
George Granville
Mary Pix
Delariviere Manley
Although Elizabeth Barry had a reputation for being a rather “difficult” person,
she and Anne Bracegirdle appear to have been good friends off-stage as well as acting
partners on-stage. Whether or not this was because Mrs. Bracegirdle assumed a
subordinate role in both areas is impossible to say; they may simply have been friends
whose relationship off-stage had nothing to do with their on-stage roles.
87
Chapter 3:
Case Studies – Sample 2 1710-1715
The actresses in this sample are all those who were active on the London stage
during the 1710-1715 theatrical seasons whether they were at the beginning, peak, or end
of their career’s during this time. There are thirty-one actresses in this sample, compared
to forty-two in the first, with career lengths ranging from one to forty-five years with a
greater number of long careers than in the 1670-1675 sample. The London theatre world
of the 1710s was a very different place from that of the 1670s—many changes in
company structure had occurred and women on the stage were no longer the novelty they
once had been. The most significant change in the theatres which occurred at the
beginning of this sample period was that after a time of considerable theatrical upheaval
including the silencing of Christopher Rich’s Drury Lane in 1709—which left the
Haymarket in sole possession of the field, performing plays four nights a week and
Italian opera the other two—a new genre split was finally agreed upon by the end of the
1710 season.75 This once again separated opera and musical entertainment from straight
theatre with the former performed at the Haymarket under the management of William
Collier and the latter at Drury Lane under Owen Swiney operating with the actors
Doggett, Cibber and Wilks. The fact that there was now only one official acting company
in London meant that fewer actors and actresses were required—thus retirement of older
personnel did not necessarily provide openings for new performers and due to surplus of
cast, the management were less inclined to take risks with new, untried actors. Table 1
lists all the actresses active during the 1710-1715 seasons and includes the dates when
they began and ended their acting careers.
75
This is a very basic explanation of an exceedingly complex situation in which the theatre patents,
personnel and premises were passed between different combinations of management. For a date by date
account see the “Theatre Chronology” on pp. 288-296.
88
Table 1 – Sample 2 Actresses
* Denotes a career with significant gaps in the record of performances; more than can be
explained by a general lack of extant records for particular seasons.
** Denotes a career which was primarily as a dancer with acting as a secondary activity.
‡ Denotes uncertain career length due to confusion over names.
Note: All the dates of first performance listed here refer to a first appearance on the
London stage; a number of actresses began their stage careers either in Dublin or with
smaller provincial companies.
Actress
Baker, Katherine *
Bicknell, Margaret nee Younger
Bradshaw, Lucretia
Clark(e), Mrs. ‡
Cox, Susannah *
Cross, Letitia
Finch, Katherine *
Garnet, Mrs.
Horton, Christiana
Hunt, Mrs.
Kent, Mary, Mrs. Thomas *
Knight, Frances Maria
Mills, Margaret, Mrs. John *
Moore, Henrietta *
Mountfort, Susanna
Oldfield, Anne
Porter, Mary
Powell, Mary, Mrs. George *
Rogers, Jane
Rogers, Jane, Mrs. Christopher
Bullock
Santlow, Hester, Mrs. Barton Booth
Saunders, Margaret
Sherburn, Elizabeth
Smith, Miss **
Spiller, Elizabeth, Mrs. James *
Stockdale, Mrs.
Thurmond, Sarah, Mrs. John
Vincent, Mrs.
Willis, Mary *
Willis, Elizabeth, Mrs. Richard
Career length Year of first
( in years)
performance
29
1699
21
1702
18
1696
28
1695
13
1702
38
1694
23
1695
6
1715
38
1714
15
1704
26
1692
40
1684
21
1696
32
1698
15
1703
31
1699
45
1698
28
1686
26
1692
22
1715
27
14
2
5
31
1
22
1
33
44
1706
1707
1710
1716
1709
1715
1715
1715
1701
1694
Year of last
performance
1728
1723
1714
1723
1715
1732
1718
1721
1752
1719
1718
1724
1717
1730
1718
1730
1743
1714
1718
1737
1733
1721
1712
1721
1740
1715
1737
1716
1734
1738
89
Younger, Elizabeth
23
1711
1734
Of the thirty-one actresses in this second sample, twenty-four were active in 1710
and of those fourteen had at least ten years acting experience with a further five having at
least five years on the stage—the full range of career length is shown in Table 1.
Therefore, when the acting company was consolidated under at Drury Lane the
management had twenty-one very experienced actresses at their disposal, including the
renowned Mrs. Oldfield.
The method for selecting the individual case studies for this sample remains the
same as for the first group—choosing four actresses [Mrs. Clark(e); Mrs. Hunt; Hester
Santlow (later Mrs. Barton Booth); Mrs. Anne Oldfield] whose careers illustrate
respectively the following categories:
1. A very brief involvement with the theatre and little
or nothing known about the actress’s personal life.
2. A career spanning a number of years where there is some
detail on professional activity but little on personal life.
3. A longer career where information on both professional
and personal lives is available, but the actress in question
remained relatively minor.
4. A long career with professional and personal information
extant, where the actress became one the leading players
of her day.
One issue with the extant records concerning these actresses needs to be mentioned—that
while, in general, theatrical records tend to be more complete as the years progress, the
90
records from the early 1700s are very scant. Therefore though a career may appear to
have significant gaps and absences this is possibly due to a lack in the extant records;
unfortunately we cannot know when this is the case.
Mrs. Clark(e)
The entry in the Biographical Dictionary lists five known appearances for Mrs.
Clark which span twenty –eight years and which, as the authors point out, may or may
not all be by the same woman:
1695 Alice in The Mock Marriage at Drury Lane
1703-1705 a Mrs. Clarke occasionally sang and danced at Lincoln’s Inn Fields
1713 Giddy in The Doating Lovers at Lincoln’s Inn Fields
1722 Alicia in Jane Shore at the Haymarket
1723 a Mrs. Clark sang at a concert at Buckingham House
The Mock Marriage and The Doating Lovers are comedies, Jane Shore is a historical
piece and none of the three parts require any particular skills in singing and dancing.
While the possibility remains that these diverse appearances are all by the same woman,
if she did have some sort of career in the theatre for such a long time then surely there
would be some further evidence of her. The last item, the concert at Buckingham House,
seems particularly out of place—if Mrs. Clark had been approximately sixteen years of
age at her first performance in 1695, by this time she would have been forty-four. This is
no great age but minor singers tend to be young and for an older woman to have been
included in a prestigious performance one would expect her to be a performer of some
reputation, which this Mrs. Clark does not appear to have been.
91
This type of career—where there is confusion even over whether or not the
records are describing one person or more—illustrates the problems surrounding the
frequent lack of records and also those which occur with names. The latter covers two
separate issues: one, the situation where there are a number of performers who have the
same surname, who are working in roughly the same time period and about whom
nothing is known, not even their Christian names. The second issue is when there are
several family members who are performing at the same time for the same company and
if they are only referred to by surname can prove impossible to distinguish. This occurs
particularly with actresses since female performers are referred to by the title of “Mrs.”
after about the age of seventeen, whether or not they are married. If then a mother and
daughter are with the same company, as were Elizabeth Willis and her daughter Mary,
and are performing very similar roles, it becomes impossible to say which role belonged
to which actress.
Mrs. Hunt
The only extant records for this actress refer to her performances—we do not
know her Christian name, her dates of birth and death, where she came from or went to
after her stage career finished. The first record of Mrs. Hunt occurs in the cast of
Farquhar’s The Stage Coach when she played the role of Dolly; her last recorded
appearance was fifteen years later, in 1719, when she played Abigail in Beaumont &
Fletcher’s The Scornful Lady. There are several long absences in her performance
record—some of these may be due to the lack of complete casts and some are probably
due to personal reasons such as pregnancy; no definite conclusions are possible. When
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Mrs. Hunt was active in London, she moved between companies, possibly in an attempt
to gain better parts. Her recorded roles show that while she never reached the level of
first, or even second, female lead she did have a line of substantial servant/companion
roles for a time. Table 2 shows both Mrs. Hunt’s company changes and the roles that she
played—repeat roles are listed only when this role was performed in a different company
from the initial performance.
Table 2 – Mrs. Hunt.
Date
1704 Feb.
1705 Feb.
1706 April
1710 March
May
June
1715 Jan.
Company
Queen's (LIF)
Role
Dolly
Favourite
Prudence
Jiltup
Mrs. Security
Nurse
Lucy
Play
The Stage Coach
The Gamester
The Amorous Widow
The Fair Quaker of Deal
The Gamester
Love for Love
The Old Batchelour
Jan.
Jan.
March
May
June
June
June
August
October
October
November
November
1716 March
April
1716 Oct. Drury Lane
December
1717 Jan.
Jiltup
Amlet
Ruth
Ben
Rachel
Jenny
Prate
Jacinta
Teresa
Mrs. Mixum
Widow Blackacre
the Aunt
Mopsa
Lady Greasy
Lady Faddle
Lady Cockwood
Sarsnet
August
Dol Troop
The Fair Quaker of Deal
The Confederacy
The Squire of Alsatia
Love for Love
The City Ramble
Love in a Sack
The Doating Lovers
The False Count
Don Quixote Part II
A Woman's Revenge
The Plain Dealer
The London Cuckholds
Presumptuous Love
The Northern Heiress
The Country Wit
She Wou'd If She Cou'd
Three Hourse After
Marriage
The Old Troop
Drury Lane
New Lincoln's Inn
Field's
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August
1718 April
July
August
1719 Jan
June
October
October
Novmber
Lady Maggot
Nurse
Crowstitch
Mrs. Joyner
Chat
Corsica
the Hostess
the Landlady
Abigail
The Scowrers
Love for Love
Love for Money
Love in a Wood
The Committee
The Bondman
Henry IV Part I
The Chances
The Scornful Lady
Even within Mrs. Hunt’s rather limited range, a certain rise and fall of fortune is
discernable. Her second known role was Favourite in Susannah Centlivre’s The
Gamester in 1705—the serving woman of Angelica, played at this time by Anne
Bracegirdle—when Mrs. Hunt next appeared in this play, in 1710, she performed the role
of Mrs. Security, a pawnbroker. This was still a subsidiary role but a step up from that of
a servant. After her second absence from the stage Mrs. Hunt seems to have returned at
the same level—she played the character of Jiltup in Shadwell’s The Fair Quaker of Deal
for the first time in 1710 and then again in 1715 when she had been absent from the
London stage for approximately five years. She may have been acting elsewhere during
this period and therefore, when she joined a London company again, the management
simply slotted her back in to a role she knew and had been performing elsewhere.
Another possibility is that as an experienced actress she was employable for minor roles
even if she had had a break from the stage.
Another significant change in roles occurs with Mrs. Hunt’s performances in
Congreve’s Love for Love. On her first appearance in this play, in 1710, she performed
the role of the Nurse, a stock character; on her second, in 1715, she played the role of
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Ben for her benefit night on May 10th; by her third recorded performance, in 1719, she
had returned to playing the Nurse. Mrs. Hunt’s choice of role for her benefit is an unusual
one, as the part of Ben, a male character, is one not usually performed by a woman—in
fact it was one of Dogget’s most well-known roles. This choice was probably a gimmick
to attract as large an audience as possible for Mrs. Hunt’s benefit—she had worked
alongside Dogget and would have been familiar with his approach to the part, perhaps
she may have used this to provide an “imitation” that the audience would have
recognized and appreciated. Her choice also gives us a brief glimpse of her as an
individual, a hint of the person behind the minor roles she usually played; Mrs. Hunt
apparently had the wit and nerve to try something new, and also the confidence that she
could carry off this role successfully.
Her gamble appears to paid of as on May 10th 1715 her benefit made £65 7s 6d,
which, as the gross amount was usually that which was entered in the records, would
have given Mrs. Hunt a profit of £20 7s 6d (the house took £45 per benefit at this time).
Unfortunately her downward movement can be noted not only in her change in roles but
also in the difference between the money she made, or lost, for the two benefits for which
we have figures— on April 14th 1716 she received £44 8s 6d, which meant she would
have had to pay the management the deficit of 11s 6d.
Although we have no extant personal details of Mrs. Hunt, she does feature in a
surviving theatrical anecdote, concerning a performance of John Gay’s farce Three Hours
After Marriage (1716) at Drury Lane on January 19th 1717. This incident is recorded in a
letter which is described as “giving an Account of the Origin of the Quarrel between
95
Cibber, Pope, and Gay.”76 According to the comments addressed to the publisher which
preface the letter itself
It is wrote by a person who is still alive, and tho’ a woman,
intimate with the poets of this century, and consequently
with most of the theatrical persons worthy notice; therefore I
have sent you a careful copy from the original, by the gentleman’s
consent it was wote to.
The circuitous route by which this letter reached print—written by a woman to a
gentleman who allowed a third party to copy it, who now presents it to the publisher—is
enough to make one wonder how much faith can be placed in the reliability of its
contents. Also the time gap involved need to be considered—the volume in which the
letter appears was published in 1757; the fourth night’s performance of Three Hours
After Marriage which is referenced took place in 1717, forty years earlier; there is no
mention of exactly when the letter was written though as the author does refer to a letter
written by Cibber to Pope in 1742 this places the date somewhere between 1742 and
1757. In the first paragraph the author refers to her theatrical “credentials”
I have often informed you, my intimacy with Mrs. Oldfield brought me
the freedom of the theatre, as well at rehearsals in the morning, as the
use of her box at night. I accompany’d her almost every morning to the
Three Hours After Marriage. This comedy was the source of that
76
Published in A Supplement to the Works of Alexander Pope, Esq; Containing, Such Papers, Letters, etc.
as are omitted in the Edition published by the Reverend Doctor Warburton: With a Key to the Letters. To
which is added (Not in the London edition) a Key to the Three Hours After Marriage. (Dublin: W.
Whitestone, 1757) p. 216- 222. In this edition the play is followed by the key and then the letter.
96
bitterness and keen-cutting satire that Pope expresses against Cibber in all his
writings.77
If true, this intimate knowledge of the rehearsals, as well as the performances, gives
considerable weight to the author’s account of events. In the case of the incident
involving Mrs. Hunt, its spectacular nature obviously made such an impression that the
length of time between the observation and the telling should not necessarily impact on
the details.
In the production referred to, the fourth night of Three Hours After Marriage,
Mrs. Hunt played the serving maid, Sarsnet, who is on stage with the rival lovers Plotwell
(Colley Cibber) and Underplot (William Pinkethman) when the former is dressed as a
mummy and the latter as a crocodile
Cibber, was the mummy, curiously wrapt and folded with proper
bandages, painted with false Egyptian Hieroglyphics, but however
false the heraldry, his arms were at liberty. The droll facetious
Penkethman, was that ambitious devourer, the crocodile, where the
painter, the tailor, with other artificers had us’d their utmost skill.
The monster’s two foremost legs, were fitted to his arms, and Penky’s
legs serv’d for those of the monster. He made a formidable figure as
he crawled in, with his great head, and long tail; for, tho’ he was
ordered to be carry’d as a stuff’d monster, he would creep, as crocodiles
should do on dry land: When he stood upright, his face peep’d from
the belly of the monster; form’d monstrously to charm indeed! The
case that brought in the mummy-lover, was plac’d in the center of
77
Ibid p. 216.
97
the stage behind, and the door, or, open part, stood facing the audience
upright—While they were employ’d in their courtship, displaying
their charms as lovers; Penkethman, the crocodile, boasting much in
the beauty of his tail, and, traversing the stage, unfortunately made
such a parade with it, that he threw down Sarsnet (the attendant and
confidant of Mrs. Townley) flat upon her back, where she discovered
more linnen than other habitiments, and, more skin and flesh than
linnen, this began the first uproar in the audience. The persons of
the drama upon the stage strove to screen the accident as much as
they could, and the crocodile, Penkethman, (whose face was a farce)
rising from giving his assistance to the fallen maid; unluckily, his
back encountered the case for the mummy, which stood upright,
openmouth’d, to receive him, that case and crocodile fell backward
with such violent noise, that the body of the crocodile lay intirely
inhum’d in the case of the mummy, all absorb’d but the head and
the tail of the monster; and the rapidity of the fall, had so forcibly
jamm’d all that appertain’d to Pinky’s fair form, that all the strength
and skill of twenty people running to the assistance of the monster,
could not disengage him, till Pallas in the likeness of hammers,
saws, chissels, and other implements in the hands of those that knew
their use, releas’d him. This scene took more than half an hour in
the action: with what roar of applause the reader must form in his
own Imagination. Many of the audience the next night, made an
98
interruption of some minutes, to have the scene repeated, which so
much allarmed poor Sarsnet, that she run off the stage extremely
frighted, which provok’d a peal of laughter from the spectators.78
Although Mrs. Hunt is not referred to by name, she was the actress who played the role
of Sarsnet on this occasion. The audience obviously loved the debacle and apparently
Mrs. Hunt dealt with this occurrence with a reasonable amount of sang froid—at least
there is no mention of her being unable to continue her performance, at least not that
night.
The pattern of Mrs. Hunt’s career—a string of minor roles, some improvement,
then return to less significant parts—does not seem to have been unusual. Her career is
interwoven with others of the same rank, particularly with that of Mrs. Richard Willis,
who played many of the same roles, often in the opposing company and at times took
over Mrs. Hunt’s roles when she left if they had been in the same company. The two
actresses seem to have been regarded as virtually interchangeable by the Drury Lane
management in the years 1717-1719. Mrs. Hunt played the role of the Nurse in Love for
Love in April 1717 and Mrs. Willis took the part in October; Mrs. Hunt was Chat in The
Committee in Jan 1719, Mrs. Willis had played that role in August and December 1718;
Mrs Hunt’s final role, Abigail, in The Scornful Lady was taken by Mrs. Willis when the
play was performed in January 1720. There were occasions when both women appeared
together—for example, in August 1718 when Drury Lane put on Wycherley’s Love in a
Wood Mrs. Hunt played Mrs. Joyner and Mrs. Willis, Mrs. Crossbite—but usually if one
is in the cast, the other is not. When Mrs. Hunt departed from the stage permanently in
1719, Mrs. Willis appears to have taken over these roles on a more permanent basis.
78
Ibid p. 221-222.
99
Although Mrs. Hunt’s last recorded performance was on November 14th 1719, the
final mention of her occurs in a note from the Drury Lane management to the treasurer
which also makes reference to Mrs. Willis.
Let Mrs. Willis be enter’d at forty shillings per week from Saturday
28th November 1719: and let Mrs. Hunt be reduced to forty shillings
per week only, from ye same day.79
This seems to imply that the management, though not considering Mrs. Hunt to be of
much value, thought that she was still part of their company; perhaps this reduction in
salary helped her decide finally to abandon a career on the stage.
Mrs. Willis’s career, however, lasted longer than that of Mrs. Hunt—it spanned
forty-four years, 1694-1738, though from 1718 onwards her appearances were primarily
at the Richmond summer theatre and Bartholomew Fair. As well as being an actress,
Mrs. Willis was a singer and dancer and perhaps this versatility may have helped keep
her in employment longer than Mrs. Hunt. We do not know what happened to Mrs. Hunt
when she left the stage; Davies says of Mrs. Willis that “She lived to a great age with its
worst companion, poverty.”80
Hester Santlow (Mrs. Barton Booth)
(c. 1690-1773)
As the third actress in the case study for sample two, Hester Santlow belongs to
the category of actresses who had “a long career where information on both professional
and personal lives is available, but the actress in question remained relatively minor.”
79
Signed by Cibber, Wilks and Booth. Document Register 2: 617 Item 2946
Thomas Davies Dramatic Miscellanies: Consisting of critical observations on several plays of
Shakespeare: a review of his principal characters, and those of various eminent writers, as represented by
Mr. Garrick, and other celebrated comedians 3 vols. (London: Printed for the author, 1783-1784) 1: 423.
80
100
The definition of “relatively minor” is obviously subjective and does not have precise
parameters; in the case of Mrs. Booth, this means that while she was both successful and
popular with audiences she had a rather limited range and only occasionally played what
could be considered as first rank roles81
The extant information about Hester Santlow comes only through her theatrical
life; we do not know where, or even exactly when, she was born and when her connection
with the theatre ended in 1733 nothing further of her life is known except for the will she
made in 1769, four years before her death. Her year of birth is estimated by the
Biographical Dictionary as 1690 from the fact that when she made her first appearance
on stage, in 1706, she was described as “Miss Santlow” which changes to “Mrs. Santlow”
around 1711 indicating “that she had just reached her majority.”82 However, since
actresses were often referred to as “Mrs.” once they reached sixteen or seventeen years of
age she may have been slightly younger than the estimate.83 Also, although she is referred
to primarily as “Miss” in her early appearances, she is listed as “Mrs.” for performances
March 9th and April 13th 1706, perhaps indicating that she was old enough for there to be
some confusion over her title.
Miss Hester Santlow began her stage career as a dancer. Her first performance
was on Thursday, February 28 1706 at Drury Lane where she performed in the dancing
after a production of The Old Batchelour (Act IV only) and Arsinoe, Queen of Cyprus.
Her appearance was listed as
81
Hester Santlow specialized in playing the innocent young girl; for example she played Celia in Volpone
not the stronger role of Lady Would-Be and Alithea in The Country Wife but never the saucy Margery
Pinchwife.
82
Biographical Dictionary 2: 222.
83
Susanna Mountfort, daughter of William and Susanna Percival Mountfort, who was a contemporary and
friend of Miss Santlow was referred to as “Mrs. Mountfort” in productions in 1704 even though she was
only fourteen at the time.
101
DANCING. [New Dances] compos’d by Cherrier, and perform’d
by him and Miss Santlow, his Schollar, being the first time of her
Appearance on the Stage.84
Between her debut and her first benefit, on April 16th 1706, she is mentioned in eight cast
lists but probably appeared more frequently. The performance for her benefit is listed as
VALENTINIAN: With The Rape of Lucina. Valentinian – Wilks;
Lucina – Mrs. Oldfield.
SINGING.
By Hughs, Newberry, and the Boy.
DANCING.
By Cherrier and Miss Santlow.
COMMENT.
Benefit Miss Santlow. Not acted these 12 Years.85
This benefit is worth noting as it indicates her rapid rise in status with the company and
presumably also her popularity with the audiences. Most younger, and lower rank,
players had shared benefits; so for Miss Santlow to receive a solo benefit only two
months after her first appearance was unusual, as was the fact that the cast was led by two
of the leading performers, Robert Wilks and Anne Oldfield.
Hester Santlow continued dancing at Drury Lane until January 1708 when a genre
split forced a union of the two existing acting companies in London—plays were to be
performed at Drury Lane under Christopher Rich and opera at the Queen’s Theatre in the
Haymarket, under John Vanbrugh. With this division, all the dancers moved to the
Queen’s Theatre; however the genre split did not last long and by November 1709 a
combination of plays and music were once again being offered at both theatres. Miss
Santlow stayed with the Queen’s theatre until the summer of 1709 and then moved back
84
85
The London Stage 2: 118.
Ibid p. 123.
102
to Drury Lane—which was by that time had changed management, was being run by
Collier, and had become a second-class company—for the 1709-10 season, where she
remained for the rest of her career. This move back to Drury Lane was the point where
she began her acting career, with her first role being Miss Prue in Congreve’s Love for
Love (1695) on December 3rd 1709. This was a somewhat ironic choice of role as
Dramatis Personæ describes Miss Prue as “a silly, awkward, Country Girl”; as this was
very far removed from the dancer noted for her grace, perhaps the management were
trying for novelty by playing Hester Santlow against the audience expectations or may
perhaps have been just trying her acting skills in a minor part whose principal
requirement was youth.
Whether she moved to Drury Lane because she wanted an opportunity to act
rather than dance—and as most of the senior actors went to the Queen’s she felt that this
would be her chance—or because she had no choice, we do not know. We also cannot be
sure that Miss Santlow’s first advertised role was her first attempt at acting; she may have
played small one or two-line parts that were not mentioned on cast lists prior to this date.
Whatever the reason, once she returned to Drury Lane Miss Santlow still danced but
added acting to her repertoire; although from the 1709-10 season onwards she is listed as
an actress, not a dancer, by The London Stage she did in fact maintain her dancing roles
and for some performances acted in the play and also performed in the dance afterwards.
This change in stage career was unusual—a number of actresses also sang and danced but
for a performer to begin as a dancer, rise quickly in status and popularity and then
become an actress was not the usual route. Miss Santlow’s first more challenging part
was Ophelia on February 14th 1710 and her first, and one of her few, leading roles came
103
on February 25th 1710 when she played Dorcas in Charles Shadwell’s The Fair Quaker of
Deal (1710). Cibber commented favorably on this performance, saying that she was one
whose Person was then in the full Bloom of what Beauty she might
pretend to: Before this, she had only been admired as the most excellent
Dancer; which, perhaps, might not a little contribute to the favourable
Reception, she now met with as an Actress, in this Character, which so
happily suited her Figure, and Capacity: The gentle Softness of her Voice,
the compos’d Innocence of her Aspect, the Modesty of her Dress,
the Reserv’d Decency of her Gesture, and the simplicity of the
Sentiments, that naturally fell from her, made her seem the amiable
Maid she represented.86
This qualified praise of Hester Santlow’s abilities as an actress may also have been rather
ironic in tone as at this time in her career she could not have been described as innocent ,
modest or reserved. In fact she was known for her lack of these qualities and her absence
from the stage for the 1712-13 season was probably because she gave birth to a daughter,
Harriet, by her lover, the upcoming politician James Craggs. Cibber’s comments on the
excellence of her dancing and her gracefulness but limitations as an actress are echoed by
Davies in his description of Hester Santlow’s later performances, when she was Mrs.
Booth, firstly
His [Booth’s] Cordelia was Mrs. Booth; she was well suited, by the
agreeableness of her person, her voice, and manner of speaking, to
several of the soft and gentler females, such as Ophelia in Hamlet,
86
Robert W. Lowe, ed., An Apology for the Life of Colley Cibber. Written by himself. (London: John C.
Nimmo, 1889) 2 vols. II: 95-96.
104
and Selima in Tamerlane: however, I think she was a cold actress
in tragedy; in comedy she displayed a pleasing vivacity and elegant
deportment, that charmed the public long; in the Harriet of Etherege’s
Sir Fopling Flutter she sang some of the London cries very agreeably;
but her chief excellence consisted in a graceful manner of dancing.87
then in a description of her performance as Ophelia
Mrs. Booth’s figure, voice, and deportment, in this part, raised, in
the minds of the spectators, an amiable picture of an innocent,
unhappy, maid: but she went no farther.88
Although Davies was writing forty years after Hester Santlow’s stage career ended, her
dancing, not her acting was what obviously stuck in the audience’s mind.89 The most
fulsome praise for her dancing talent comes from John Essex’s preface to his translation
of Rameau’s The Dancing Master (1728)
We have had a great many Women attempt to be Theatrical Dancers,
but none ever arrived to that Height and Pitch of Applause as the
incomparable Mrs. Booth, in whom Art and Nature are so beautifully
wove together, that the whole Web is of a Piece so exquisitely formed
to Length and Breadth, that the Produce of the many different Characters
87
Thomas Davies Dramatic Micellanies[sic]: consisting of critical observations on several plays of
Shakespeare: with a review of his principal characters, and those of various eminent writers, as
represented by Mr. Garrick, and other celebrated comedians. 3 volumes (London: 1783-84). 2: 275-276.
88
Ibid 3: 126-127.
89
Thomas Davies (c.1712-1785) was a bookseller and minor actor as well as an author. He attended
Edinburgh University from 1728-1729 but the date of his arrival in London is not known. The first record
of Davies presence in London is a performance with Fielding’s company at the Haymarket on May 27th
1736 but he was probably in London for some time before this. Hester Santlow’s last recorded
performance was on February 6th 1733 so Davies may have seen her perform in person. However, in the
last few years of her career her performances were not regular due to the illness of her husband and also
cannot have been her best given her domestic worries—therefore Davies comments are most likely to be
based on information from other actors and spectators rather than personal observations.
105
she represents is the Wonder and Admiration of the present Age, and
will scarce be credited by the Succeeding. I shall beg leave to mention
the Chaconne, Saraband, Menuet, in all which she appears with that
Grace, Softness, and Address none can look on but with Attention,
Pleasure, and Surprise. She far excels all that went before her, and
must be the just Subject of Imitation to all that dare attempt to copy
after her . . . All which shew how many extensive as well as extraordinary
Qualifications must concentre in one Person to form so bright a Genius:
A Subject becoming the most elevated Wit to describe, and the politest
Taste to contemplate.90
Given that all contemporary sources praise Hester Santlow’s dancing above all else, her
determination to pursue an acting career as well seems to indicate a young woman who
had very definite ideas of her own from which she would not be swayed by public
opinion.
In spite of her earlier loose reputation, on August 3rd 1719 Hester Santlow married
one of the leading actors, also one of the managers, of Drury Lane, Barton Booth (1679?1733). She was his second wife—Booth’s first marriage took place sometime in 1704
and ended in 1710 with his wife’s death91—and according to the Biographical Dictionary
he was warned against her by friends, but in spite of this they appear to have had a very
happy and faithful marriage.92 Miss Santlow’s marriage to Booth does not appear to have
influenced the type or number of roles she performed; as the Biographical Dictionary
90
Pierre Rameau The Dancing Master. or, The whole art and mystery of dancing explained…In two parts.
Done from the French of Monsieur Rameau, by J. Essex. 2nd edition. (London: 1731). Preface pp. xiii-xiv.
91
Barton Booth’s first wife was Frances Barkham, daughter of Sir William Barkham of Norfolk, nothing is
known either about her or their relationship.
92
Biographical Dictionary 2: 216.
106
points out, although the couple were financially secure enough to cease performing if
they wished, they both continued as before. The table below gives a “snapshot” of Hester
Santlow’s appearances, at least all those we have on record, for the seasons of 1717-1718
through 1719-1720 and shows an actress whose performances were divided between
dancing and acting—she specialized in young innocent girls, occasionally she performed
major roles such as Cordelia in King Lear, but mainly played the second or third female
part.
Table 2.
All recorded performances for Hester Santlow (Mrs. Booth) Fall 1717-Spring 1720.
Note 1: These listings are taken from The London Stage Vol.2 Pt 2 but there are a
number of plays and dance performances for which there are no extant casts, therefore
gaps in this list do not necessarily indicate that she did not perform at the time.
Note 2: I have retained The London Stage listings for role names therefore with regard to
performances of (a) The Fair Quaker of Deal Miss Santlow is sometimes advertised as
playing “The Fair Quaker” and at others as playing “Dorcas,” these are in fact the same
part, and (b) King Henry IVth she is advertised both as “Hotspur’s Wife” and “Lady
Percy,” again these are the same.
Key
►after a play title indicates that this was an afterpiece where Miss Santlow probably both
danced and acted.
Dance - This indicates that Miss Santlow was advertised for dancing only, not listed for
an acting part.
Dance* - This indicates that while Miss Santlow is advertised as dancing, no cast list is
provided for acting parts, therefore she possibly performed both.
♥ after a role indicates that this performance was a benefit for Miss Santlow.
+ after a role indicates that Miss Santlow is advertised not only for this part but also for
dancing.
Season
1717-1718
Date
28-Sep
9-Oct
10-Oct
12-Oct
16-Oct
Play
Hamlet
Love makes a man
The Country Wife
The Loves of Mars and Venus
(dance)►
The Funeral
Role
Ophelia
Angelina
Alithea
Venus
Harriet
107
1718-1719
24-Oct
30-Oct
1-Nov
13-Nov
22-Nov
25-Nov
27-Nov
7-Jan
14-Jan
21-Jan
28-Jan
29-Jan
3-Feb
10-Feb
14-Feb
1-Mar
4-Mar
18-Mar
25-Mar
25-Apr
2-May
6-May
8-May
13-May
16-May
22-May
6-Jun
The Chances
20-Sep
25-Sep
27-Sep
2-Oct
7-Oct
10-Oct
15-Oct
17-Oct
18-Oct
22-Oct
24-Oct
28-Oct
Hamlet
King Lear
King Henry IV
She wou'd if she cou'd
Love for Love
The Double Gallant
The Fair Quaker of Deal
Tamerlane
King Lear
King Henry the IVth
The Constant Couple
Volpone
2nd Constantia
Danced*
Danced*
Gatty
Danced*
Prue
Silvia
Danced
Danced*
The Fair Quaker
Danced*
Selima
Danced*
Danced
Danced
Cordelia
Danced
Danced*
Danced*
Danced
Danced
Danced
Danced
Danced
Hotspur's Wife
Danced
Danced
Ophelia
Cordelia
Hotspur's wife
Danced
Danced
Angelica
Danced
Celia
Danced*
Danced
Danced
Danced
108
29-Oct
4-Nov
12-Nov
14-Nov
17-Nov
20-Nov
25-Nov
10-Dec
11-Dec
13-Dec
15-Dec
18-Dec
19-Dec
20-Dec
22-Dec
29-Dec
10-Jan
26-Jan
29-Jan
4-Feb
6-Feb
7-Feb
12-Feb
12-Feb
16-Feb
19-Feb
30-Mar
9-Apr
11-Apr
14-Apr
16-Apr
17-Apr
18-Apr
20-Apr
21-Apr
22-Apr
23-Apr
27-Apr
30-Apr
2-May
Tamerlane
The Jovial Crew
King Lear
Othello
The Tempest
The Man of Mode
The Fair Quaker of Deal
Hamlet
Love for Love
King Henry IV
The Constant Couple
The Man of Mode
The Dumb Farce►
Tamerlane
The Tempest & The Dumb Farce
Danced
Selima
Meriel
Danced*
Danced*
Cordelia
Desdemona
Danced
Dorinda
Harriet
Dorcas
Danced
Danced
Ophelia
Prue
Danced
Hotspur's wife
Danced
Danced
Angelica
Harriet
Danced
Angelique
Selima
Danced*
Danced*
No cast list♥
Danced
Danced*
Danced
Danced
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
Danced*
109
1719-1720
4-May
5-May
6-May
7-May
8-May
9-May
11-May
12-May
13-May
14-May
19-May
21-May
30-May
Tamerlane
12-Sep
17-Sep
24-Sep
29-Sep
10-Oct
15-Oct
22-Oct
23-Oct
26-Oct
27-Oct
29-Oct
3-Nov
6-Nov
16-Nov
18-Nov
19-Nov
25-Nov
1-Dec
2-Dec
4-Dec
7-Dec
1-Jan
2-Jan
7-Jan
9-Jan
12-Jan
Hamlet
Othello
King Henry IV
The Constant Couple
The Constant Couple
Othello
King Henry IV
The Double Gallant
Love makes a man
The Jovial Crew
The Busy Body
She wou'd if she cou'd
King Lear
The Constant Couple
The Double Gallant
A Duke and no Duke►
A Duke and no Duke►
The Rover
Hamlet
The Rover
King Lear
Selima
Danced*
Desdemona
Hotspur's wife
Danced
Danced*
Danced
Danced*
Danced
Angelica
Danced
Danced
Danced*
Ophelia
Danced
Angelica
Danced
No role
Danced
Lady Percy
No roles named
Danced*
Angelina
Danced*
Danced
Meriel+
Miranda+
Gatty+
Cordelia
Danced*
Angelica
Silvia
Duchess
Duchess
Hellena
Ophelia
Hellena
Cordelia
Danced
110
14-Jan
18-Jan
19-Jan
1-Feb
3-Feb
5-Feb
10-Feb
12-Feb
29-Feb
1-Mar
14-Mar
15-Mar
19-Mar
22-Mar
24-Mar
28-Mar
31-Mar
2-Apr
4-Apr
5-Apr
7-Apr
18-Apr
19-Apr
21-Apr
25-Apr
26-Apr
30-Apr
2-May
4-May
5-May
6-May
9-May
10-May
11-May
12-May
16-May
17-May
18-May
21-May
23-May
The Rover
The Constant Couple
She wou'd and she wou'd not
The Double Gallant
Love makes a man
Hamlet
Volpone
Volpone
The Rover
Tamerlane
King Lear
Hamlet
The Double Gallant
The Rover
She wou'd and she wou'd not
Danced
Hellena
Angelica
Danced
Danced
Rosara
Danced
Silvia
Danced*
Angelina
Ophelia
Danced
Celia
Celia
Hellena♥
Danced*
Danced
Selima
Danced
Danced
Cordelia
Danced*
Danced*
Danced
Danced
Danced
Ophelia
Silvia
Hellena
Danced
Danced
Danced
Danced
Danced
Danced
Rosara+
Danced
Danced*
Danced
Danced
111
24-May
25-May
Danced
Danced
The pattern of appearances which emerges from these three seasons is as follows:
Table 3.
Total appearances
165
Acting
66 (21 roles)
Dancing
95
Both
4
No cast list
37
Given that there are only four documented instances where Hester Santlow performed
both as an actress and a dancer, the likelihood is that for the thirty-seven appearances for
which we have no cast list her participation was probably limited to dancing. The acting
roles which Hester Santlow performed during these three seasons are quite limited in
both number and range. Taking on only twenty-one different roles over the course of
three seasons is not a heavy load by itself; however, since 58% of her appearances were
in dance, and we have no way of knowing how many of these were new dances, this
alters the perception of her workload considerably.
Of the acting roles which Hester Santlow performed between the beginning of
Autumn 1717 and the end of Spring 1720 there is not much variation in the type of
character which she portrayed. The Shakespearean plays in which she appeared—Hamlet,
King Lear, Henry IV, The Tempest—are all ones which do not have particularly strong
female characters; the male characters dominate both plot and emotion with the females
acting primarily as foils with little or no independent function. For example, Ophelia is
112
young, innocent and generally biddable; though she supposedly loves Hamlet she trusts
her father’s judgment of their relationship more than her own. Throughout Hamlet
Ophelia is seen in terms of her relationships with the men who surround her—brother
Laertes, father Polonius, and Hamlet himself—she has none of the passion and spirit of
Beatrice or Juliet. The range of emotion which Ophelia is required to display is also
limited— girlish love, filial obedience, pathetic madness—nothing which any reasonably
competent young actress should find too difficult.
Miss Santlow’s role of Hellena in The Rover does require more complexity than
than did her Shakespearean parts but again, one of the chief requirements for the role is
youth. For Hellena she would have needed exuberance rather than pathos—she is the
willful young woman who finally captures the heart of Willmore, “the Rover” of the
title—and although she is one of three principal female characters, she is perhaps the
most straightforward of the group. Hellena acts on impulse and displays none of the
thoughtful planning and consideration of her older sister, Florinda, nor does she have the
depth of passion and anguish of the courtesan, Angellica Bianca. It is the latter role
which is by far the most demanding female part in The Rover, the actress who plays
Angellica needs to be able to convey, among other things, a dignity and gravitas which
outweighs her social position and commands both the respect and eventual pity of the
audience.
In the first production of The Rover in which Mrs. Booth appeared (January 1st
1720), the cast was as follows
Willmore – Wilks
Belvil – Mills
Blunt – Johnson
Hellena – Mrs. Booth
Angellica Bianca – Mrs. Porter
Florinda – Mrs. Garnet
113
Sancho – Norris
Valeria – Mrs. Younger
Moretta – Mrs. Saunders
The last performance before this, at Drury Lane, was in 1717 at which time the role of
Hellena had been performed by Susanna Mountfort; the rest of the cast was the same
except that Florinda had been performed by Mrs Horton and the character of Valeria
omitted.
By studying Hester Santlow’s performance record over these three seasons—
during which time she married Barton Booth, one of the actor-managers—one can make
a number of deductions. She must have enjoyed performing since she did not need to
continue on the stage either for financial reasons or in an attempt to attract a potential
husband/protector. She seems to have known her own limitations; once she married
Booth, in August 1719, she would have had the opportunity to lobby for a greater variety
of roles had she wished to do so. While being married to one of the managers was no
guarantee of success once on the stage, her position would most likely have given Hester
Booth a least a trial in more demanding roles if that was what she wanted. As we have no
such roles advertised for Mrs. Booth we can reasonably assume that she was happy to
continue as before.
While Mrs. Booth’s early career clearly favored dance, the usual expectation
would be that this would change as she got older—although the dances performed at the
time would not have been as intensely physical as modern ballet for example—dancing
was an occupation primarily for the young. Not only would physicality have been an
issue, but also audience expectation—young dancers are more attractive than older ones,
especially the women. This move away from dance does not seem to have occurred in
114
Mrs. Booth’s case; a count of her roles as actress and/or dancer for the 1726-1727 season
gives a total of eighty-one appearances, fifty-three of which were in dance.
Table 4.
Hester Booth’s appearances at Drury Lane, September 1726-May 1727.
* indicates a month for which the majority of plays listed have no casts.
Acting appearances Dancing appearances
September
4
0
October
3
1
November
6
3
December
6
8
January
0*
12
February
1
8
March
1
12
April
1
7
May
6
2
Total
28
53
If the Biographical Dictionary is correct in the assumption that Hester
Santlow/Booth was born in 1690, then she would have been thirty-six years old in
1726—if my estimate of her age is correct then she may have been as old as forty-two at
this time. Although she is still dancing more than acting by 1726, there are some
differences between this season and those previously analyzed. The principal difference
is in the type of dance she was performing; in the 1717-1718 through 1719-1720 seasons
most of her performances were simply listed as “Dancing” with a few roles in
Afterpieces, by the 1726-1727 season this situation has been reversed. Only fourteen of
her fifty-three dance performances for 1726-1726 are simply “Dancing,” the other thirtynine appearances are recurring roles in four Afterpieces: Apollo and Daphne, Harlequin
Dr. Faustus, The Miser, and Harlequin’s Triumph. These all involve large casts of
115
performers who either work solely as dancers or who are minor actors who also dance—
Mrs Booth appears to have had major roles in all four Afterpieces.
The other difference between this season and the earlier ones is the influence of
her marriage. As can be seen from the role count, Mrs. Booth had very few performances,
either as actress or dancer, in September and October 1726. This can perhaps be
accounted for by her husband’s illness—the Daily Journal of September 30th 1726 noted
that
Mr Booth, the excellent Tragedian, continues so much indisposed,
that he keeps his Chamber.
Since the Booths appear to have had a happy marriage, Mrs. Booth is not likely to have
been concentrating on her stage career during this and other bouts of her husband’s
severe illness. Mrs. Booth’s last performances on the London stage were in the Spring of
1733, before her husband’s death; her appearances were still divided between acting and
dancing (Table 4) even though she would have been somewhere between forty-three and
forty-nine years of age at the time. This unusually long dancing career seems to indicate
that she was both an excellent exponent of the art and a very popular performer with the
audience.
Table 5. Hester Booth’s appearances at Drury Lane, September 1732 to May 1733.
Note: Numbers in brackets indicate possible further performances for which there are no
extant cast lists but in which Mrs. Booth is likely to have performed.
Acting appearances Dancing appearances
September
1
2
October
3
2
November
10
14
116
December
January
February
March
April
May
1(+1?)
3(+2?)
2?
4
2(+3?)
1?
5(+6?)
3(+9?)
5(+3?)
4(+1?)
2(+10?)
1?
Total
24(+9?)
37(+30?)
As can be see from these figures, there are thirty-nine uncertain roles for Mrs.
Booth during this season. One reason for this level of uncertainty is that The Daily Post,
the newspaper on which many of the listings of The London Stage are based for this
period, is unavailable for a number dates during the 1732-1733 season. I have put a
question mark for performances of plays such as Hamlet on January 5th 1733, where there
is no cast advertised but we know that Mrs. Booth invariably played Ophelia in Drury
Lane productions. One role which Hester Booth does seem to have given up is that of
Harriet in The Man of Mode—this had been one of her early major acting roles, her first
performance being in February 1711, but when Drury Lane performed the work on
January 21st 1733 she was not on the advertised cast nor does she seem to have resumed
the role afterwards. This could be explained by the fact that the part of Harriet is that of a
young girl and therefore Mrs. Booth, or the managers, decided that thirty-two years in the
role was enough. However logical this might seem to a modern audience, Hester Booth’s
other roles at the time need to be taken into consideration—the last known role we have
for her is Cordelia in King Lear (April 30th 1733) another “young girl” and one whom
Mrs. Booth had been portraying equally long. Why surrender one role and not another?
There is no definitive answer that can be provided, only the suggestion that Mrs. Booth
117
was cutting back on her roles and, due to the position both she and her husband held in
the company, she was able to choose her favorites.
The highest level of uncertainty is regarding Mrs. Booth’s dancing
performances—we have thirty-seven definite performances and the possibility of another
thirty, a significant increase as this would almost double the number of her appearances
in dancing roles. Her dance appearances for this season are virtually all in elaborate
Ent’ractes or Afterpieces, such as The Country Revels, Cephalus & Procris, and The
Judgment of Paris all of which have large casts and which were successful enough to
enjoy long runs. These last two factors may help explain why we are lacking definitive
cast lists—if the same piece was to be performed night after night then it would not be
worth the expense of printing the cast over and over again unless significant changes had
been made. In the case of Mrs. Booth, the question marks remain for this season in
particular as she may have had to pull out of a performance at short notice due to her
husband’s ongoing illness; this would not necessarily have been noted in the
advertisements.
Barton Booth died, after many years ill health, on May 10th 1733. The
Biographical Dictionary says of Hester Booth around this time
On 6 February 1733 she played Helen in The Judgment of Paris,
her last recorded role at Drury Lane.93
…………………………………………………………………..
Booth had sold half of his share in Drury Lane in July 1732, and after
93
The Biographical Dictionary fails to mention that this was a dancing role, not an acting one. Indeed, the
entry for Hester Booth gives the impression that she was a dancer turned actress who retained some of her
“dancing chores” (2: 224). A detailed examination of Mrs. Booth’s appearances throughout her career
shows the opposite—that she was a dancer of considerable importance who also acted.
118
his death Mrs. Booth sold the other half to Henry Giffard of the
Goodman’s Fields Theatre, apparently with the odd stipulation
that it not be resold to the actors.94
The first of these statements is incorrect—The London Stage shows performances for
Hester Booth through March and April in both acting and dancing roles, with her last
definite acting role on April 30th 1733, Cordelia in King Lear. There are also two
possible roles for Mrs. Booth in May, one for three days before her husband’s death, the
other for two weeks after. The first of these is a dancing role, in The Country Revels,
performed on May 7th 1733; however, the Daily Post for that day is missing and the
advertisement used by The London Stage is from an advance notice printed in The Daily
Advertiser on May 5th. Mrs. Booth may have danced the role—her husband had been ill
for a long time and they may not have realized how close to the end he was—or she may
have intended to perform and then withdrawn once the seriousness of her husband’s
condition became obvious. There is no way of knowing exactly what happened but
Hester Booth was involved in performance at Drury Lane right up to the time of her
husband’s death.
The second, and more significant, role advertised for Mrs. Booth in May 1733
was that of Miranda in The Busy Body. Again, this comes not from the day of the
performance, May 24th, as that issue of the Daily Post is also missing, but from an
advance notice in The Daily Advertiser of May 17th. Miranda was a role Hester Booth
had played many times before and, unless an error was made with the advertisement and
an earlier cast list sent to the newspaper, her inclusion on this cast list is an indication that
she intended to continue her career on the stage, even after her husband had died.
94
2: 226.
119
Whether or not she performed on May 24th, she does not appear in any casts advertised
after this—why did she change her mind?
One possible answer lies with the authors of Biographical Dictionary’s assertion
that Mrs. Booth’s stipulation regarding the re-selling of her share in Drury Lane was
“odd.” When one looks at the changes in company management and the actors’ rebellion
which occurred around this time, then neither her retirement nor her conditions of sale
seem quite so inexplicable.
The triumvirate of actor/managers—Cibber, Wilks and Booth—who had run
Drury Lane for twenty years were, by the end of May 1733, either retired or deceased.95
Cibber had passed the management of Drury Lane to his son, Theophilus, but not his
share which he sold to John Highmore. On May 29th 1733, the Daily Post reported that
We are assur’d that there will be no more Plays acted this Season
at the Theatre-Royal in Drury Lane. And we hear that there was
Yesterday no Play acted . . . as had been advertiz’d for that Day; the
Occasion we are inform’d was, that at Midnight on Saturday last
several Persons arm’d took Possession of the same, by direction of
some of the Patentees, and lock’d up and barricad’d all the Doors
and Entrances thereunto. 96
This rebellion was led by T. Cibber and supported by a number of the players—the
patentees at this time were: Mary Wilks (widow of Robert Wilks), Hester Booth, John
95
Booth had been admitted to the management under the new license issued for Drury Lane on November
11th 1713. He had convinced the Lord Chamberlain that he should be part of the management—Cibber and
Wilks eventually agreed but Doggett, the third member of the actor/manager triumvirate, refused. There
followed a complicated series of negotiations which dragged on for several years. The end result was that
Doggett agreed to sell his share and retire and Drury Lane began a period of stable management under
Cibber, Wilks and Booth.
96
The Document Register 2: Item 3709.
120
Highmore, and John Ellys. The patentees denied any mistreatment of the actors and
denounced the actors actions in a letter signed by them all and reported by the Daily Post
on June 4th 1733. Given these highly unpleasant circumstances, combined with the recent
death of her husband, Hester Booth’s decision to retire from the stage and her stipulation
that her share in Drury Lane not be resold to the actors no longer seems even slightly
“odd.” 97
Most of what we know about the Booths has to do with the business of the theatre
and unfortunately we have few actual facts about their personal lives. One extant piece
of anecdotal evidence refers to the start of their relationship and is mentioned by the
actress George Anne Bellamy (1731-1788) in her autobiographical Apology.98 In volume
one of this work she mentions the transfer of Barton Booth’s affections from Mrs.
Mountfort, another actress, to Hester Santlow and the disastrous effect this had on Mrs.
Mountfort. According to Mrs. Bellamy, Booth was the acknowledged lover of Mrs.
Mountfort—they had not married because if they did she would lose a ₤300 per annum
allowance left her by a former lover on condition that she remained single. Mrs.
Mountfort introduced Booth to her friend Miss Santlow, they fell in love and planned to
marry, then Mrs. Mountfort proceeded to lose her senses and had to be confined to her
house, but
One day, during a lucid interval, she asked her attendant what play was
to be performed that evening? and was told, that it was Hamlet. In this
piece, whilst she had been on the stage, she had always met with great
97
Mrs. Booth’s sale of her share to Henry Giffard of Goodman’s Field’s was reported in the London
Evening Post of September 18-20 1733 (The Document Register 2: Item 3744).
98
George Anne Bellamy An Apology for the Life of George Anne Bellamy, late of Covent-Garden Theatre.
Written by herself. To which is annexed, her original letter to John Calcraft. 5 vols (London: 1785) 3rd
edition.
121
applause in the character of Ophelia. The recollection struck her; and with
that cunning which is usually allied to insanity, she found means to elude
the care of her servants, and got to the theatre; where concealing herself
till the scene in which Ophelia was to make her appearance in her insane
state, she pushed on the stage before her rival, who played the character
that night, and exhibited a far more perfect representation of madness than
the utmost exertions of mimic art could do. She was, in truth, Ophelia herself,
to the amazement of the performers, as well as of the audience. Nature having
made this last effort, her vital powers failed her. On her going off, she
prophetically exclaimed, “It is all over!”—And, indeed that was soon the case,
for as she was conveying home (to make use of the concluding lines of
another sweet ballad of Gay’s wherein her fate is so truly described)
“She like a lily drooping, then bowed her head and died.”99
This is a wonderfully theatrical anecdote and given some of the occurrences in the
theatres, such as the duel fought in Elizabeth Barry’s dressing room, not perhaps beyond
the bounds of possibility. However, there are a number of problems with this story, the
first of which is the time gap between the described events (c. 1718)—some thirteen
years before the author’s birth— and the writing of this account (1785), a distance of over
sixty years. The next problem is with the details which Mrs. Bellamy provides—for
example she refers to Mrs. Mountfort as the wife of the “promising actor of that name,
who was unfortunately murdered as he was escorting the celebrated Mrs. Bracegirdle
home from the theatre.”100 This is very true except that Mrs. Bellamy is conflating two
99
Ibid Vol 1 pp. 187-188.
Ibid p. 186.
100
122
separate people, mother and daughter, the former was the wife of the murdered actor and
the latter the friend of Miss Santlow—and this is not the only inaccuracy in the account.
Mrs. Bellamy refers to a house at Cowley owned by John Rich and formerly the property
of “Mrs. Montford, now Mrs. Vanbruggen” but there is no record of either mother or
daughter owning such property whereas Barton Booth did have a country house there —
he was buried at Cowley Church on May 17, 1733. Finally, the fact that this anecdote
does not appear anywhere else arouses further suspicion. Mrs. Bellamy says that she was
told of these events by Colley Cibber but seems to have been conscious of the lack of
evidence and adds a note of explanation
The reason that Colley Cibber has taken no notice of so remarkable
a circumstance in his “Apology,” must be owing to his friendship
for Mrs. Booth, who was alive when he wrote it.101
Since Cibber was supposed to have told this story at a house party given by “Lord
Tyrawley” then surely some other account would have crept into print. Taking this in
conjunction with Mrs. Bellamy’s factual errors the likelihood of this story being true
seems exceedingly slight.
The most likely source for Mrs. Bellamy’s account of the Booth/Santlow
relationship and Susanna Mountfort’s subsequent descent into madness is probably some
gossip mentioned by her mother, also an actress, who was contemporary of theirs. Mrs.
Bellamy senior began her career as Miss/Mrs. Seal, was acting with the Drury Lane
company from 1718 to 1730, and would therefore have been aware of the interpersonal
relationships within the company. She died in 1771, fourteen years before the
publication of her daughter’s Apology, so some mention she once made of the transfer of
101
Ibid p. 188.
123
Booth’s affections from Mrs. Mountfort to Miss Santlow could have been expanded into
the dramatic anecdote recounted by George Anne Bellamy. A further family connection
lies in the location where Mrs, Bellamy asserts she heard Cibber tell the story—at Lord
Tyrawley’s. This gentleman was her mother’s lover and is generally accepted to be
George Anne’s father, though her mother was married to a Captain Bellamy at the time of
her birth.102
The only reliable contemporary testimony to Hester Booth’s character comes
from two wills—Mrs. Booth’s own, made in 1769, and that of her husband, made in
1730. These documents are of interest because of the amount of detail given in each and
also the indirect information they provide on their authors. Barton Booth’s will gives
instructions for his burial at Cowley, leaves a bequest of ₤5 to one of his father’s old
servants, and everything else to his “beloved wife, Hester Booth.”103 However, he felt the
exclusion of his brother and sister from this document necessitated some explanation
As I have been a man much known and talked of my not leaving
legayces to my Relations may give occasion to censorious people
to reflect upon my Conduct in this latter Act of my life.
Therefore I think it necessary to assert that I have considered
my Circumstances and finding upon a strict Examination,
that all I am now possessed of, does not amount to two thirds
of the fortune my said Wife brought me on the Day of our Marriage,
together with the yearly Additions and Advantages since arising
102
The Biographical Dictionary states that “. . . she gave birth to a daughter, George Anne Bellamy, whose
paternity was acknowledged by Tyrawley, and Captain Bellamy disappeared, apparently forever.” (2:4).
Unfortunately no sources are given to support this statement.
103
The Last Will and Testament of Barton Booth, Public Record Office of The National Archives, PROB
11/659.
124
from her Laborious Employment upon the Stage during twelve
years past; I thought myself bound by Honesty, Honour, and
Gratitude due to her constant affection not to give away any
Part of the remainder of her Fortune at my death, having already
bestowed in free Gifts upon my Sister Barbara Rogers upwards
of £1300 out of my Wife’s Substance and full £400 of her money
upon my undeserving Brother George Booth (besides the Gifts
they received before my Marriage) and all these Benefits were
conferred on my said Brother and Sister from time to time at the
Earnest Solicitation of my Wife who was perpetually intreating
me to continue the Allowances I gave my Relations before my
Marriage. The Inhuman return that has been made my wife for
these Obligations by my sister I forbear to mention.104
Although this is a legal document using legal terminology, Barton Booth’s personality
does make itself felt; his love and respect for Hester are clear, as is his appreciation and
recognition of her “laborious Employment on the Stage.” He is obviously aware of the
public nature of their profession and thus even their “private” lives and so seems to be
taking steps to guard her reputation and in the process does not hesitate to castigate his
own brother and sister for their behavior. From Barton Booth’s description of his sister’s
continued enmity towards Hester, despite the Booths’ financial generosity, apparently the
years of happy and stable marriage were not enough to outweigh her past. Unfortunately
we know nothing of Mrs. Barbara Rogers, or her situation in life, other than this mention
of the fact that her dislike of her brother’s wife, and possible disdain for Mrs. Booth’s
104
Ibid.
125
profession, did not prevent her from accepting money from such a tainted source.
Hester Booth’s own will, written thirty-six years after her husband’s death, is a
much longer and more detailed document which bequeaths an assortment of personal
items, as well as money, to family and friends. She gives her address as “Great Russell
Street in the parish of St. George Bloomsbury” but asks to be buried with her late
husband, and mother, at Cowley.105 Although she appears to have severed all connections
with the theatre after 1733, Mrs. Booth seems to have chosen to remain living in
London—it is not clear whether or not she sold the house at Cowley prior to her death—
and mentions some of the house contents in her will. To her grandson, Edward Eliot of
Port Eliot, Cornwall she left
all of my pictures except the oval portrait of myself and the portrait
of my said late husband both of which hang in the back parlour of
my house in Great Russell Street and which said portrait pictures I
give to Charles Cooke Esquire who married Elizabeth the daughter of
the Honourable Harriet Hamilton late of Wigmore Street, Cavendish
Square, widow.106
Harriet was Hester Booth’s only child, fathered by James Craggs some seven years
before her mother’s marriage to Barton Booth, who married firstly Richard Eliot and after
his death, John Hamilton. She bore eleven children—seven of whom were alive in 1769
and are mentioned in their grandmother’s will—and died some four years before her
mother, Hester.
105
The Last Will and Testament of Hester Booth, Public Record Office at The National Archive, PROB
11/985.
106
Ibid.
126
The will leaves ten guineas to be divided among the poor widows of Cowley
parish and a number of bequests to servants and friends, such as a diamond ring to the
widow of the dancer Michael Lally, and ₤50 to her servant Ann Evans, for example.
However the bulk of the estate is divided among Mrs. Booth’s grandchildren, though not
in equal shares and she explains why:
and though I have given less to the said Edward Eliot and Mrs.
Cooke than to their said brother and sisters I hope and desire they will
not mistake it to any difference in my affections towards them
since I have an equal regard for all but to their different situations
in life . . . 107
This attention to detail, and concern for the feelings of her beneficiaries, seems to
confirm the impression of Hester Booth that can be gleaned from her years on the stage.
She was, or became, a careful woman who paid attention to detail, lived comfortably but
not extravagantly, enjoyed her work and her retirement. The depth of detail regarding her
grandchildren shows that she had been involved in their lives and was fully aware of the
familial and financial circumstances of each one.
Hester Santlow-Booth provides an interesting case for study, not only for the
details of her life and career, but for the manner in which these have been described in
such works as The London Stage and the Biographical Dictionary. The former
categorizes her as a dancer until she begins to act also, then she is listed as an actress and
finally as a dancer once again for the final season of her career, 1732-1733. Thus they
ignore what the extant records prove: throughout her career, Hester Booth was a dancer
who also maintained a number of straight acting roles. The authors of Biographical
107
Ibid.
127
Dictionary make the same mistake and seem not to realize just how important Mrs. Booth
was, as a dancer, to the success of the Drury Lane company.
Anne Oldfield
Mrs. Anne Oldfield, born c.1683, joined the Drury Lane company in 1699 and
maintained a career on the stage for thirty years—her final performance was on 28 April
1730. During her long career she played at least 102 roles, 68 of which were originals
that she “created,” in tragedy as well as comedy, though she was primarily a comedic
actress. 108 Unlike the careers of the other actresses discussed in this study so far, there is
a significant amount of information extant on Mrs. Oldfield’s life and career; she is the
subject of four biographies, two contemporary—published in 1730 and 1731, shortly
after her death—and two from the twentieth-century, published in 1957 and 1989.109
Although such works are useful in providing insight into her life and work, each comes
with its own particular agenda and therefore should not necessarily be taken at face value.
108
Mrs. Oldfield probably performed a number of other roles but due to the lack of complete cast lists,
particularly for the 1703-1704 season, a definitive list cannot be given.
109
The contemporary biographies are (1) Authentick Memoirs of the Life of that Celebrated Actress, Mrs.
Ann Oldfield, Containing a Genuine Account of Her Transactions from Her Infancy to the Time of Her
Decease (London: no publisher, 1730); (2) William Egerton’s Faithful Memoirs of the Life, Amours and
Performances of that justly Celebrated, and most Eminent Actress of her Time, Mrs. Anne Oldfield.
Interspersed with Several Other Dramatical Memoirs. (London: no publisher, 1731); and the modern
(1) Robert Gore-Browne Gay was the pit: The Life and Times of Anne Oldfield, Actress (1683-1730)
(London: Max Reinhardt, 1957); (2) Joanne Lafler The Celebrated Mrs. Oldfield: The Life and Art of an
Augustan Actress (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1989).
128
Contemporary accounts of Anne Oldfield
The first published account of Anne Oldfield, the Authentick Memoirs, was
rushed into print a few days after her funeral, which took place on 27 October 1730. She
had been seriously ill some months before her death and had finished what was to be her
last season at Drury Lane in April, a month earlier than usual. Her illness was common
knowledge and presumably the author/publisher had prepared this account in the event of
her demise. It is a short work, only forty-five pages compared to the two-hundred and
twelve of the Faithful Memoirs, but was immensely popular and reached six editions by
the end of 1730.110 The Authentick Memoirs begins with a letter to Robert Wilks, one of
the actor/manager triumvirate at Drury Lane and a frequent on-stage partner of Mrs.
Oldfield, in which both he and she are lavished with exceedingly fulsome praise
As no One, Sir, is a better Judge than Yourself of Mrs. Oldfield’s
Excellencies; so, I believe, no One will set a greater Value upon
her Memory , or be more sensible of her loss; since in her You
have lost the only Counterpart who was fit to tread the Stage with
Mr. Wilks. (p.v)
…………………………………………………………………….
How I have seen the crowded Audience hang with Attention upon
her Tongue, and devour her with their Eyes, whenever She appear’d!
How significant was her every Motion and Gesture! How musical
and inchanting her Delivery! Insomuch that I have been inform’d
that several Poets have found new Graces in their own Works, when
pronounc’d by her; and have own’d, that in her Action She surpass’d
110
The fourth edition is the one quoted in this study.
129
all the Instructions they could have given her. (p. vi)
While this seems exaggerated, Mrs. Oldfield’s pairing with Wilks was highly successful
and they were both very popular with audiences. The use of Robert Wilks as
dedicatee is therefore a logical choice but his selection may also have to do with the
author’s wish to establish his work as “authentick,” in which case the references to Wilks
provide an extra connection to theatre. The author seems eager to reassure his audience
that he is not only a frequent theatre-goer but also has a link to the world of the
performers which they lack.
He opens the memoirs proper with a summary of Anne Oldfield’s perfections,
both public and private—her talent for tragedy as well as comedy, her graceful person
and enchanting manners, her generosity and kindness to those in need. However, before
beginning any details of her life and career, the author takes the trouble to warn his
readers against an upcoming rival publication
Just as I prophsey’d, I have now seen and Advertisement, desiring Hints
to be sent to Hurt’s Coffee-house in the Strand to one William Egerton,
who no doubt will pack together a gross Collection of Absurdities, and
Palm them upon the Town for Hints sent by Persons of Credit and
Reputation. This same William Egerton being only a fictious Name,
to cover some wretched blind Author, who is afraid to let his real one,
for fear his Character should damn his Performance.
To shew I am not mistaken in what the Town is to expect from
Mr. Egerton, and to give a Specimen of his Performance, even in his
Advertisement, he has not been able so much as to spell her Name right;
130
. . . She always wrote it Ann without an E, whereof he might have informed
himself, had he but Interest enough to procure the Sight of any one Letter
or Receipt under her Hand. (p. 13)111
This safeguarding of the author’s territory indicates that Mrs. Oldfield was a very
marketable property and one which he did not wish to share. However, since modern
scholars agree that Egerton’s Faithful Memoirs of 1731 are in fact the work of the hack
publisher Edmund Curll, there is another possible motivation for this declaration. The
Authentick Memoirs are anonymous and may therefore also have been written by one of
Curll’s writers, in which case this seeming outrage is merely a form of advance publicity
for the Faithful Memoirs which appeared in print a few months later. Whichever is true,
what cannot be disputed is the public’s interest in Anne Oldfield, on stage and off.
The question of who published both these biographies deserves some
consideration since these memoirs are the only contemporary accounts we have of Anne
Oldfield’s life and thus are the source for many accepted “facts’ about her. The only
detailed study of Curll is Ralph Strauss, The Unspeakable Curll: Being some account of
Edmund Curll, bookseller, to which is added a full list of his books (London: Chapman
& Hall, 1927) which traces his career from his arrival on the London publishing scene in
1706 to his death in 1747. Of the Authentick Memoirs Strauss makes no mention; of the
Faithful Memoirs he says:
During that time [1731] he invented yet another biographer, by name
William Egerton, who produced the Faithful Memoirs of the celebrated
and deservedly popular Anne Oldfield, and I see no reason to doubt that
111
Whatever the basis of the claims this author had for the correct spelling of her name, in her will (PROB
11/641) Mrs. Oldfield writes her name as “Anne” and so this is the form of her name used in this study.
131
Mr. Egerton and Mr. Curll were one and the same. So much, indeed,
was clearly implied by the writer who fourteen years later was attacking
Curll’s Memoirs of Pope. (p. 145)
Unfortunately, Strauss does not explain why he sees no reason to doubt this attribution.
Not only is this acceptance repeated by modern scholars, but in the electronic database
Eighteenth Century Collections Online an author search for William Egerton produces no
results—the Faithful Memoirs are catalogued with Curll as the sole author. As can be
seen from the copy of the original title page, there is no mention of Edmund Curll, though
no other publisher is listed either.112 The case for Curll as publisher seems to be (1) no
trace of William Egerton appears to have been found; (2) this is the only work which
bears his name; (3) this is the style of Life in which Curll specialized; (4) no publisher is
given on the work. Against this judgment are the facts that (1) there are many people,
including authors, for whom no details have survived; (2) Egerton may have written just
this one memoir or he may the pseudonym of another author; (3) Curll was not the only
Grub Street publisher; (4) Curll usually did put his name on the title page even when the
author he was claiming had not written the work—i.e. his 1741 publication of The
History of the English Stage by Thomas Betterton. The only exception to this seems to
be The Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Alexander Pope, published 1745. Two other
theatrical memoirs, those of Robert Wilks and John Gay, both published in 1733, do bear
the name of Curll as publisher. Considering the evidence for and against Curll in this
instance there is not enough proof to make a decision one way or another.
112
This title page is from the only edition of the Memoirs and is copied from the Eighteenth Century
Collections Online database.
132
133
Could Curll have written, or commissioned one of his authors to write, the Faithful
Memoirs? Yes. Did he? We don’t know.
The Authentick Memoirs gives a relatively detailed account of Mrs. Oldfield’s
antecedents. According to the author, her paternal grandfather was the owner of the
George Tavern in Pall Mall and such an astute businessman that, on his death, he left
three houses to his youngest son, Mrs. Oldfield’s father, who was not so successful and
sold the property to his elder brother. Mr. Oldfield then joined the Horse-Guards and
died leaving a young family in straightened circumstances. Mrs. Oldfield’s uncle took
pity on his brother’s widow and family, supported them and also sent Anne to school but
soon
she discovered such an invincible Inclination to become an Actress
upon the Stage, that no Persuasions, Admonitions, or even Threatnings
of her Mother and friends (who were all to the last Degree averse to
her engaging in such a Profession) cou’d deter her from it. (p. 16)
Unfortunately we have no extant evidence either to support or deny any of these claims,
though the author’s account of Mrs. Oldfield’s sudden discovery of an overpowering, and
completely unexplained, desire to become an actress does seem rather too tidy and
convenient.
Table 6 lists the contents of both of the contemporary memoirs and shows the
difference between a publication rushed out immediately after the subject’s death, and
one where the author has had time to gather material for a more complete account.
134
Table 6.
The contents of the Authentick Memoirs and the Faithful Memoirs
Authentick Memoirs
• To the reader p. i-ii
• Dedication to Mr. Robert Wilks p.iiiviii
• Drawing of Mrs. Oldfield "In the
character of Rosamond"
• The Memoirs p. 9-38
• The letter from T.H. "just arrived p.3940
• A poem to the Memory of Mrs.
Oldfield p. 41-46
Faithful Memoirs
• Dedication to Mrs. Saunders
• The preface p. i-iv
• The Contents p. i-v
• The Memoirs p.1-154
• Ophelia or The Lover's Day p.155-165
• An Hymn to sleep p.166-167
• A collection of epilogues spoken by Mrs. Oldfield p.168-184
• Dr. Reynardson's The Stage p.183-204
• List of plays in which Mrs. Oldfield appeared, provided by "Mr. Pervil,
Property-Man, of the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane." p. 205-208
• An "inventory of some of her nicest Curiosities" p.209-212
• Appendix I - the Will of Arthur Mainwaring
• Appendix II - the Will of Anne Oldfield
• Appendix III - a codicil to that Will
• Appendix IV - an "Epistle to Mrs. Oldfield By Mr. Savage" on her performance
as Cleopatra in All for Love.
• Appendix V- Verses on Mrs. Oldfield's death
Although the contents of both these memoirs are suspect due the anonymity of
one and the controversy surrounding the publication of the other, the manner in which
135
they deal with their subject is worth consideration. Unlike many other extant works
concerning the early eighteenth-century theatre, both memoirs were published within a
year of Mrs. Oldfield’s death. Therefore, events surrounding her life and career would
have been relatively fresh in the minds of colleagues, friends and family, making any
large amount of fabrication less likely than if the memoirs had been published years or
decades later. Table 7 shows a side-by-side comparison of the two memoirs but some
further explanation of the detail included is necessary.
Table 7.
Comparison of the contents of the Authentick Memoirs and the Faithful Memoirs.
Notes: A blank row on the column for the Faithful Memoirs indicates that there is no
corresponding information in this account.
The names and terms used are those of the original texts, therefore certain anomalies are
present e.g. Sir John Vanbrugh had not yet been knighted in 1697 when he introduced
Anne Oldfield to Drury Lane, but this is how he is referred to by the author.
The Known Dates column I have added, as neither memoir tends to include the dates for
the events described.
♦ Indicates a comment on this piece of information at end of this table.
Authentick Memoirs
Grandfather owned and ran the George
tavern
Left 3 houses, worth £60-£70 p.a., to
youngest son
Mr. Oldfield Jnr did not do well, sold
the property to his brother
That property now in the possession of
Mrs. Oldfield's cousin—Mr. George
Oldfield of St James Street
Her father bought into the HorseGuards and died soon after
Mrs. Oldfield's uncle paid for her
schooling
She wanted to leave and go on the
stage; her mother and family were
Known
Dates
Faithful Memoirs
Her grandfather was a
Vintner but on her mother's
side she was welldescended
Same
136
against this
Mrs. Oldfield apprenticed
to Mrs. Wotton, a
"semptress", in King St,
Westminster
Mrs. Oldfield then went to work in her
uncle's tavern
Here she met a "Gentleman" and went
to live with him
Anne's mother lived for a
time with her sister, Mrs.
Voss who kept the Mitre
Tavern in St James Market,
and then married again,
Ann Oldfield's mother earned her
living as a Mantua-maker
When Ann went began acting, her
mother was her dresser
As soon as Ann's fortune improved her
mother was able to retire on the
allowance her daughter provided
Mrs. Oldfield's mother now living in
Cambridge St. near Broad St. Golden
Square, with her sister
Ann Oldfield's first appeared on the
Drury Lane stage in 1697 ♦
Her first role was Candiope in The
Maiden Queen, performed for Mrs.
Kent's benefit
She was introduced into the company
by Sir John Vanbrugh
Mrs. Oldfield improved her acting by
copying Mrs. Barry and Mrs.
Bracegirdle
Some years after her debut a "great
difference happen'd" between Rich and
Swiney
Mrs. Oldfield persuaded to go with
Swiney
As her acting abilities, and popularity,
continued to grow, there began the
dispute with Mrs. Bracegirdle. A
contest between the two was agreed
upon—on two consecutive nights the
company would perform The Amorous
Widow with Mrs. Bracegirdle in the
title role first, then Mrs. Oldfield the
next night. Each actress had her
champions in the audience; Mrs.
Oldfield was "universally adjudged"
1699-1700
season
Same
Same role given, mention
that it had belonged to Mrs.
Cross
Same
1706
1706
1707
137
the winner; Mrs. Bracegirdle quit the
theatre.
Mr. Rich persuaded Mrs. Oldfield to
return to Drury Lane
1708
Much greater detail on roles
with excerpts from some
plays included
Roles commented on:
Letitia in The Old Batchelour
Constantia in The Chances
Angelica in Love for Love
Lady Brute in The Provok'd Wife
Explains that Mrs. Oldfield
suceeded to this role on the
death of Mrs. Verbruggen
Lady Lurewell in The Constant Couple
Andromache
Jane Shore
Calsita in The Fair Penitent
Some years after Mrs. Oldfield began
her stage career she became the
"Bosom Companion" of Mr.
Mainwaring
They had a son together
On his death, Mr. Mainwaring made
Mrs. Oldfield the sole executrix of his
will
1703
c.1709
1712
His estate was left to her in trust for
their son
In her will, Mrs. Oldfield has left her
son the interest of £5000 to revert to his
younger brother when he dies
Several years after Mainwaring's death,
Mrs. Oldfield captivated a "General
Officer in the Army" ♦♦
By this gentleman Mrs. Oldfield also
had a son, at the time of her death he
was about nine years old
Much more detail, both on
Mainwaring and on their
relationship
1730
1712/13
b. 1720
Several pages on
Mainwaring's last illness,
including the false rumour
that he died of venereal
disease. To disprove this,
Mrs. Oldfield had an
autopsy performed
Same but more detail on
Mainwaring's financial
circumstances
No mention
Churchill only mentioned in
passing
138
An appendix with a
transcript of the will is
included, but it is not
discussed in the text.
Details of her will
Account of an incident which reflects
no credit on Mrs. Oldfield: That she
encouraged the attentions of a Mr. F---,
who had a "very considerable Place in
his Majesty's Customs." He left his
wife and children for Mrs. Oldfield
who, after a short while, left him for
Mr. Mainwaring. To her credit she did
encourage Mr. F--- to go back to his
family.
Some months after Mainwaring's death,
Mrs. Oldfield spoke the epilogue to
The Distress'd Mother, and referred
with two lines to her son who was on
stage with her
When Sir Richard Steele died, the King
gave his patent rights to Mrs. Oldfield
♦♦♦
Mrs. Oldfield's salary: £150 p.a. when
she was first at Drury Lane. Increased
to £500 p.a. some years before her
death, "never before given to any one."
In addition, her articles stated that she
never had to act after April 30th unless
she wanted to. Also, on her benefit
nights she did not have to pay the
house charges (around £50) that the
other actors incurred.
Mrs. Oldfield's last benefit was on
Thursday March 19th, 1729-30; she
played Calista in The Fair Penitent
Her last performance was Lady Brute
in Vanbrugh's The Provok'd Wife on
April 28th
Not long after this she became ill; on
doctor's advice she moved to
Hampstead for the air
Her condition worsened so she moved
back to her house in Grosvenor Square
Mrs. Oldfield knew she was dying and
so put her affairs in order
Steele died
1729.
Same
139
She died on Friday October 23rd 1730,
at about 2 am, aged 47
On Monday the 26th her corpse was
removed from her house to the
Jerusalem Chamber in Westminster
Abbey
Same
Same
♦ Comments:
♦ The surviving records of performances and casts for the late 1690s are
far from complete; Dryden’s Secret Love or, The Maiden Queen (1667) seems to have
been revived in the early autumn of both 1697 and 1699. However, there is no record of
Mrs. Oldfield until February 19 1700, when she played Sylvia in John Oldmixon’s The
Grove, and while a new performer would very likely have only played bit parts, not
worthy of mentioning on the advertisement, for the first few months, that this situation
would have continued for two years is highly unlikely. Therefore, the season of 16991700 appears to be the most logical starting point for Mrs. Oldfield’s career.
♦♦ Mr. Arthur Mainwaring died on November 13th, 1712 and the date
when Anne Oldfield’s relationship with Charles Churchill began is not clear. Both men
moved in Whig circles and Colonel Churchill appears to have moved permanently to
London sometime in 1713.
♦♦♦ Where the idea that Anne Oldfield inherited a share in Drury Lane
from Sir Richard Steele came from is not clear and there are no extant records to support
such a claim. Steele became involved in the Drury Lane management in 1714 and on his
death on September 1st 1729, his two surviving daughters inherited his rights in the
theatre. One daughter died a few months later, so her share passed to her sister and the
managers of Drury Lane fulfilled the terms of an agreement drawn up in 1721, and paid
Steele’s surviving heir £1,200 for the rights in the property.113
The Faithful Memoirs appears to be by far the longer work—and indeed it covers
two-hundred and twelve pages, with the Authentick Memoirs occupying only forty-six—
but much of this is taken up by the inclusion of scenes from plays, epilogues and
prologues quoted in full, and digressions such as the section on William Wycherley, so
that the actual information provided on its subject is not that much greater than its
predecessor. Of the content which actually deals with Anne Oldfield, there are a number
of differences from the Authentick Memoirs but the author makes no reference to the
previous work. This seems rather odd—the author of the Authentick Memoirs scathingly
113
For further details of the arrangement see John Loftis Steele at Drury Lane (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1952) pp. 229-230.
140
mentions the efforts of “one William Egerton” to gather information on Mrs. Oldfield, so
surely “Egerton” would have read the earlier publication, but there is no attempt to refute
the information provided in the first work. The Faithful Memoirs is written as though
there was no other account in existence.
The Authentick Memoirs goes into more detail on Anne Oldfield’s antecedents
than the Faithful Memoirs but the first major divergence between the two occurs with the
account of how she came to be on the stage. The former says only that she developed a
desire to perform on the stage, much to the dismay of her mother and relatives, and that
she was introduced to the Drury Lane company by Vanbrugh, with no indication of how
she made his acquaintance. The latter, however, recounts in detail a meeting between
Mrs. Oldfield and the playwright George Farquhar—whilst at her aunt’s tavern he
overhears her reading a play “with so proper an emphasis” that he recommends her to
Vanbrugh (p. 76). While such an encounter is possible, the result claimed does not seem
particularly likely. Unfortunately we do not have exact dates for either Anne Oldfield’s
first performance, or George Farquhar’s arrival in London but her first performance at
Drury Lane seems to have been Candiope in Dryden’s The Maiden Queen, in the season
of 1699-1700 and that Farquhar arrived in the capital some time in 1698.114 He was
introduced to the London theatre scene by his friend Robert Wilks, with whom he had
worked at Smock Alley in Dublin. George Farquhar may have overheard Anne Oldfield
reading aloud at her uncle’s tavern but is unlikely to have been sufficiently well
established at Drury Lane to have gone directly to Vanbrugh and persuaded him employ
her. If Farquhar had been overwhelmed by Anne Oldfield’s reading, the more likely route
114
This role had belonged to Letitia Cross but she ran off to France in the spring of 1698 leaving a gap that
Anne Oldfield filled.
141
would have been for him to go to Wilks, who would then have approached Vanbrugh—
but this does make her start on the stage seem rather more prosaic and considerably less
romantic than the young playwright dashing off to insist that she be given a chance with
the company.
The differing accounts of how Anne Oldfield got her start on the London stage are
not particularly significant, but what is of greater interest is the different approach that
the two authors take, and how this is reflected in the structure of their works. The
Authentick Memoirs is told more or less in chronological order and uses a basic narrative
structure—the author tells us the story of Mrs. Oldfield’s life and career along with his
judgments and opinions—with the inclusion of one letter at the end of the account that
coming too late to be inserted in its proper Place, we hope
it will not be unacceptable to entertain our Readers with at the
latter end of these Memoirs. (p. 39)
This is the only such letter in these memoirs and tells a story of Mrs. Oldfield’s career
when she was at The Haymarket for the 1706-07 season, and concerns “a certain late
Noble Duke [who] took a great fancy to her.” (p. 39) This episode is not one which
reflects particularly well on Anne Oldfield, and the tone does not fit with the rest of the
work, which is very reverential towards her—perhaps this is why it is included in the
form of the letter which “just” arrived. Such a format allows the author to include some
juicy scandal while at the same time not detracting from, or spoiling, the overall effect of
the account.
The Faithful Memoirs are designed in a completely different fashion; the author
uses copious quotations from plays, includes the full text of letters he has received, and
142
though he begins his account in a chronological manner, this is not maintained. On page
two, Mrs. Oldfield’s introduction to the stage is given only a single sentence—as with the
Authentick Memoirs she is introduced to Drury Lane by Vanbrugh—but when the reader
reaches page seventy-six, the author provides a letter describing the encounter with
Farquhar which comes from “Mr. Taylor, formerly a Servant to Mr. Rich.” 115This is
placed after a transcription of the epilogue to The Tragedy of Jane Shore and before a
series of letters written to Mrs. Oldfield
written a few Years ago, when she lived in the Hay-Market,
relating to the History of the Stage, etc. (p.77)
Each one is signed “William Egerton” and all are discourses on drama and the arts of the
stage, very similar to the Betterton/Curll History of the English Stage. Perhaps this is one
of the reasons why many scholars have assumed that the Faithful Memoirs were the
product of Curll, though the comments are of such a general nature that they could belong
to any stock theatre history of the time.
The way in which the two memoirs deal with Mrs. Oldfield’s personal
relationships is also of interest. Although she had two long-term relationships, and bore
one son from each, she never married; both accounts deal with these relationships and
hint at other affairs, but neither condemns her for this behavior. Anne Oldfield’s first
public relationship was with Arthur Mainwaring—a Commissioner of Customs who was
a well-known figure in politics and society—they began living together in 1703, their son
115
The Biographical Dictionary (14:372) has an entry on “Mr. Taylor fl.1728-1743, gallery keeper,
boxkeeper” who worked at Drury Lane—but these dates give only a two year overlap with Anne Oldfield’s
career, and Drury Lane was not Rich’s company at this point. However, since there is little extant
information on this Mr. Taylor, he may have been working at Drury Lane earlier than the dates given or,
since backstage work often ran in families, the reference could be to an older relative about whom we know
nothing.
143
was born in 1709, and they remained together until Mainwaring’s death in 1712. Both
memoirs mention Mainwaring’s name in full and discuss his career, and contribution to
public life, in some detail. This is not the case with her second long-term relationship
which was with Brigadier General Charles Churchill, the illegitimate son of General
Charles Churchill and more important, the nephew of the Duke of Marlborough—one of
the most powerful, and well connected, families in the country. In the Authentick
Memoirs he is not mentioned by name, but described as
a General Officer in the Army, nearly ally’d to one of the
most Illustrious Families in Europe, and universally allowed
to be a Person of as great Accomplishments as any of his Rank. (p. 28)
The Faithful Memoirs mentions him directly in the contents—“Her regard for Brigadier
Churchill, p.121” (p. iv)—but in the text, when one turns to the page, it says
But to point out the Persons who shared the esteem of her
private Friendship, is not the intent of these Papers as I have
publickly declared. The Gentleman who has Lived with her since
the Death of Mr. Maynwaring made it his sole Business and Delight
to place her in the same rank of Reputation, (to which her own natural
Deportment greatly contributed,) with Persons of the best Condition,
and the mention she has made of him, in her Will, sufficiently confirms
her just Value for him. (pp.120-121)
This contradiction between the directness of the table of contents and the coyness of the
text is most likely explained by some interference before the work went to the press. The
original intention may have been to mention Charles Churchill by name and to discuss
144
the relationship between him and Mrs. Oldfield, in same way as her earlier relationship
with Arthur Mainwaring was covered, but the publisher may have been wary of
displeasing the Marlboroughs, and so removed the material. If this were the case then
either the table of contents had already been printed and the publisher did not want to
incur the extra cost of re-printing, or, it was simply overlooked.
Given the questions which arise over the authorship of both sets of memoirs, and
therefore also the validity of the material they present, perhaps the most reliable
contemporary description of Anne Oldfield comes from Colley Cibber in his Apology.
Although Cibber cannot be described as an unbiased source for the theatrical goings-on
of the eighteenth-century, his biases are usually based on self-interest; since he was
writing ten years after Mrs. Oldfield’s death, he had nothing to gain by slanting his
opinion of her one way or another.116 Although Cibber mentions Anne Oldfield’s
background and beginnings at Drury Lane he only does so very briefly; naturally his
interest in her lay in her ability as a performer and what she could, and did, do for Drury
Lane. Cibber admits that he did no think much of Anne Oldfield when she began—she
was pretty but too diffident, and her voice was not strong. He states that she “seem’d to
come but slowly forward ‘till the Year 1703” (I, 306), but as the Biographical Dictionary
points out, Anne Oldfield was granted her first sole benefit on July 6th 1700 and spoke
her first prologue—to Susannah Centlivre’s The Perjur’d Husband— in October 1700.
Although having a benefit in the summer months was unlikely to have been very
profitable, most junior performers had to share benefit nights irrespective of when they
took place; therefore the indication is hardly that of a struggling actress at the bottom of
116
Cibber’s dating of earlier incidents is however not entirely trustworthy, which is not surprising given
that he was writing of events that had occurred forty years previously.
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the theatrical heap. Cibber attributes the change in Mrs. Oldfield’s fortunes, and his
opinion of her, to her inheritance of the role of Leonora in Sir Courtly Nice from Mrs.
Verbruggen.117
It was in this Part Mrs. Oldfield surpris’d into an Opinion of her having
all the innate Powers of a good Actress, though they were yet but in the
Bloom of what they promis’d. Before she had acted this Part I had so cold
an Expectation from her Abilities, that she could scarce prevail with me
to rehearse with her the Scenes she was chiefly concern’d in with Sir Courtly,
which I then acted. However, we ran them over with a mutual Inadvertency
of one another. I seem’d careless, as concluding that any Assistance I
could give her would be little or no purpose; and she muter’d out her
Words in a sort of mifty manner at my low opinion of her. But when the
Play came to be acted, she had a just Occasion to triumph over the Error
of my Judgment, by the (almost) Amazement that her unexpected
Performance awak’d me to; so forward and sudden a Step into Nature
I had never seen; and what made her performance more Valuable was,
that I knew it all proceeded from her own Understanding, untaught
and unassisted by any one more experience’d Actor.
(I, 306-307)
This is a very generous account of Anne Oldfield’s impact in the role of Leonora and as
Lowe points out
Cibber is pleasantly candid in allowing that he had no share in
Mrs. Oldfield’s success. The temptation to assume some credit for
117
Mrs. Verbruggen was the company’s principal comedienne but was ill when they moved to Bath for the
summer of 1703, and so remained behind in London. Cibber says that there was such a scramble for her
parts that Mrs. Oldfield, due to her junior status, managed to get only one.
146
teaching her something must have been great. (I, 306 n. 2)
Had Cibber decided to give in to this temptation and claim that it was his rehearsal with,
and preparation of, Anne Oldfield that enabled her to triumph there would have been no
one to gainsay him by 1740, when this was published. The fact that he gives her the
credit seems to point to a genuine respect and admiration for Anne Oldfield’s acting
abilities. This impression is strengthened by his comments a few pages later, on Mrs.
Oldfield’s professional approach throughout her career
She had one Mark of good Sense, rarely known in any Actor of either
Sex but herself. I have observ’d several, with promising Dispositions,
very desirous of Instruction at their first setting out; but no sooner had
they found their least Account in it, than were as desirous of being
left to their own Capacity, which they then thought would be disgrac’d
by their seeming to want farther Assistance. But this was not Mrs. Oldfield’s
way of thinking; for, to the last Year of her Life, she never undertook
any Part she lik’d without being importunately desirous of having all
the Helps in it that another could possibly give her. By knowing so
much herself, she found how much more there was of Nature yet
needful to be known. Yet it was a hard matter to give her any Hint
that she was not able to take or improve. (I, 310)
The picture that Cibber paints here is one of an actress who was not only highly
competent, but who dealt very intelligently with her senior company members and
management.
147
Contemporary attacks on Anne Oldfield
The description of Anne Oldfield provided by The Authentick Memoirs, The
Faithful Memoirs, and Cibber’s Apology, is very flattering—she was a great actress, both
talented and hard working; she was generous to those less fortunate; and although she
never married, her two long term relationships were with distinguished gentlemen. All
this praise raises the question, was Anne Oldfield really as universally admired as these
works imply, or did others have a more negative view of the star actress of Drury Lane?
The short answer to this question is yes—there are three printed documents,
which are interrelated and date from 1711-1712, that offer a very different view of Mrs.
Oldfield from that previously described. The Letter to Sir John Stanley, A Justification of
the Letter to Sir John Stanley, relating to his Management of the Playhouse in Drury
Lane, and The Memorial of Jane Rogers, all cast a very unflattering light on Anne
Oldfield’s behavior during the first full season of the triumvirate’s management of Drury
Lane.118
The Letter to John Stanley, which Milhous and Hume have dated to the winter of
1711-1712, is an attack on the management of Drury Lane masquerading as a piece of
friendly advice from its author.119 Anne Oldfield is obviously not the primary target here,
but she is mentioned, in the course of the author’s diatribe against the mismanagement of
the theatre and the mistreatment of its personnel, as being proud, intemperate, and
infected with venereal disease.
118
The triumvirate of actors which managed Drury Lane was composed of Robert Wilks, Thomas Doggett
and Colley Cibber—as has already been discussed, Booth was added and Doggett stormed out in 17131714—this was the beginning of a very stable period of management for Drury Lane, which lasted until
1732. Sir John Stanley was, and had been, secretary to a series of Lord Chamberlains from c.1697.
119
For the details surrounding the letter, and a full transcription, see Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume,
“A Letter to Sir John Stanley: A New Theatrical Document of 1712,” Theatre Notebook 43: 2 (1989): 7180.
148
And now no Petitions or Complaints against them are regarded, tho’
of the most notorious Cheats and Impositions; of Articles under their own
Hands and Seals which they utterly refuse to keep; of Sallaries stopp’d,
and just Debts not paid; of People turned out of their Offices to starve
with their Families, for no other Misdemeanor than that of omitting the
Title of your Honour to any one of them, or of your Ladyship to Madam
O—field, who publickly declares they are indebted to her Interest from
being kept from starving, and indeed I think it very well for Sw—ey,
and the Rest of them, who I dare say are equally concerned, if they are
mot oblig’d to her for something else that will stick by them longer
than their License.120
Impugning the character of an actress by referring to her loose sexual behavior and
contamination with venereal disease was a common practice—as has been discussed in
the case study of Elizabeth Barry—therefore such a claim carries little weight. However,
the accusation that Mrs. Oldfield behaved with arrogant superiority towards her fellow
performers, while putting on a public face of generosity, seems more personal. At this
point in her career, she was the leading actress with the company and would have been
given an official role in management had not Doggett objected—if these allegations are
true, then either she could have been trying to impose her authority to compensate for
this, or, she felt secure enough in her position to let her “true” nature appear.121 The truth
of the matter cannot be determined from the evidence that survives.
120
Ibid p. 73. Since there is only one extant copy of this Letter, located at the Bodleian Library, all
quotations are taken from the Milhous and Hume transcript.
121
The attempt to include Anne Oldfield in the management is discussed on pp. 177-78.
149
The disparagement of Anne Oldfield is continued, and expanded upon, in A
Justification of the Letter to Sir John Stanley which is a much more detailed and
theatrically aware document than that which it supports.122 The author describes how the
management of Drury Lane has mistreated Mrs. Cross, Mrs. Rogers, and Mrs. Bradshaw,
cheating them of both money and roles, and implicates Mrs. Oldfield in these decisions.
only to gratify the pride of Mrs. Oldfield, who cannot bear any one should
shine above her. Is he [Sir John], and equal sharer with the Three Managers
in her too, as he is in the play-house? (pp. 420-421)
He then proceeds to validate his claims about Anne Oldfield’s character by claiming a
past, and intimate relationship with her—since there is, unfortunately, no indication of
who the author of this letter might be, such a claim is impossible to prove or disprove.
The slanders which he levels at Anne Oldfield are personal rather than professional—she
is guilty of the indiscriminate dispensing of her favors and is unable to rid herself of
venereal disease. This vilification of Mrs. Oldfield takes up the second half of the letter,
and provides a sharp contrast with the first half which lists the theatrical grievances,
including financial details. He ends with a very nasty comment on her sale of tickets for
her upcoming benefit night
Now to prevent the trouble Mrs. Oldfield is at, in making and disposing of
her Tickets it would be much easier for her to require, of everyone she grants
the same favour to (at such of them as are able to pay a Crown) that they
would come to her benefit play, by which means, if the house were a deal
122
As with the Letter to John Stanley this document exists only in a unique copy (New York Public Library
Drexel MS 1986 (Folio 106 and unnumbered folio following), therefore all quotations from and references
to the Justification are taken from Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume’s “Theatrical Politics at Drury
Lane: New Light on Letitia Cross, Jane Rogers, and Anne Oldfield,” Bulletin of Research in the
Humanities (Winter 1982): 412-429.
150
larger than it is, she would always be sure of its being full: Nay I am apt
to think, tho’ she took the hint but from this time. she would engage a very
good Audience, by the latter end of the week.
……………………………………………………………………………..
P.S. I suppose Mrs. Oldfield will find sufficient hints in this paper,
to know the Author of it; but least she should be a stranger to his lodgings,
which by the bye, she does not use to be, when he had been twenty-four
hours in Town: He is to be spoke with, every-day from twelve to two, at
St. James’s Coffee-House, where advertisements relating to her, and the
rest of the Managers of the Play-house, are taken in Gratis.
This is a very specific attack on Anne Oldfield; not only saying that her lovers are
too numerous to count, but that many of them belong to a class that could not afford the
crown for the benefit ticket. The postscript seems to be both a taunt and a challenge—he
is daring her to dispute his claims while implying that she is the sort of woman who
happily comes to the all-male coffee-house, or openly pursues a lover at his lodgings.
Although the author would have his readers believe that he had had a long-standing
liaison with Mrs. Oldfield, the tone of the writing sounds more like the sour grapes of a
rejected would-be lover who failed to make the grade. Of course, this could all simply be
a device to blacken Anne Oldfield’s name and devalue her standing with public, written
by a supporter of one of the actresses who lost roles to her. However, if this were the
case, then a more detailed and theatrically orientated attack would seem more likely than
this general smear. Lafler suggests that this attack on Anne Oldfield was in fact an attack
on Arthur Mainwaring—if she were a diseased whore, then what would that make the
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man with whom she lived?123 This is a plausible suggestion, especially considering the
autopsy that was carried out on Mainwaring. If it were indeed intended to prove that he
had not died of venereal disease, then this would suggest that such rumors and attacks
had been frequent and were viewed by Mrs. Oldfield as potentially damaging.124
Whoever the author was, and whatever his intentions were, we cannot now
determine. The Justification of the Letter to Sir John Stanley is an odd piece and its
publication is in itself a curiosity—the days of printing bawdy satires decrying actress’s
personal lives were long gone—unfortunately the circumstances surrounding the
publication of this “letter” remain as mysterious as the author.
The most public conflict of Anne Oldfield’s career occurred in February 1712
with a dispute between herself and Jane Rogers, over the role of Andromache in Ambrose
Philips new play The Distrest Mother.125 Mrs. Oldfield won the dispute, and the role, but
Mrs. Rogers—for whom this was the final blow in a long standing feud with the Drury
Lane management—published a two page statement of her side of the case, appealing to
the public for support. In The Memorial of Jane Rogers Humbly Submitted to the
Town126she describes how she has been mistreated by the management at Drury Lane
with regard to her salary and roles, laying most of the blame for the latter on Anne
Oldfield’s shoulders
123
Joanne Lafler The Celebrated Mrs. Oldfield: The Life and Art of an Augustan Actress (Carbondale:
Southern Illinois University Press, 1989) pp. 95-96.
124
The autopsy is mentioned in the Faithful Memoirs (p. 39) and by Lafler p. 102.
125
As has already been mentioned, according to the Authentick Memoirs Anne Oldfield had bested Anne
Bracegirdle in an acting “competition” in 1707. There is no evidence to suggest that such a contest ever
took place and Mrs. Bracegirdle’s retirement would seem to be the graceful withdrawal of an experienced
actress who realized she could not compete on equal terms with a younger rival, rather than the retreat of a
beaten foe as the memoirs would have us believe.
126
The only extant copy of this document is in the Harvard Theatre Collection but it is transcribed in full in
Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume’s “Theatrical Politics at Drury Lane: New Light on Letitia Cross, Jane
Rogers, and Anne Oldfield,” Bulletin of Research in the Humanities (Winter 1982): 412-429. All
references here are to the transcription provided in that article.
152
made it their Study to throw dayly Slights upon me, by taking from me
several of my principal Parts, still lessening me to gratify the Ambition of
Mrs. Oldfield, who when there were Two Houses had equal Salary with me,
but now for what publick or private Merit, they best know, has Two Hundred
Pounds, per Annum certain, and a Benefit Play without Charge.
A new Tragedy being lately brought to the House Mr. Wilks sent
for me to the first publick Reading of it, and the Author seeing me home
from the House, was pleas’d to compliment me, with telling me, he
design’d the Part of Andromache for me. About Three Days after, Mr. Wilks
with a great deal of seeming Civility came to me into the green Room, and
told me, that he and the Author were both asham’d to see me, for having
sent me to the Reading of the Play; for they design’d me the Part of
Andromache, which they though would become me, and was more in my
way than any Part I had played in a long time. But that as Mrs. Oldfield
had declared, she would not play unless she had that Part, they must oblige
her with it.
This, soon after, occasion’d a Dispute betwixt Mrs. Oldfield and
me, in which she told me, I shou’d be turned out of the House, for daring
to contend with her: Whereupon Mr. Wilks was pleas’d so violently to
espouse her side, as to tell me (binding it with Oaths) in these express Terms.
That had I ten times the Merit I fancy’d I had, I should never set foot on
that Stage again for affronting Mrs. Oldfield. For he would make it his
Business, to go to the morrow to my Lord Chamberlane to get me my
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Discharge: And therefore advised me quietly to quit, as Mrs. Bracegirdle
did, for depend upon it, I should not receive one farthing more. (p. 416)
Mrs. Rogers continues to decry the management and thank her supporters, and finishes
with a postscript which refers again to Anne Bracegirdle. She says that she has less merit
that did Mrs. Bracegirdle, whom Swiney forced out to please Mrs. Oldfield, and unlike
Anne Bracegirdle she has not the financial wherewithal to retire.
There are no records to show that Wilks ever carried out his threat of getting the
Lord Chamberlain to dismiss Jane Rogers and while she does disappear from the
advertised casts for a few months, she re-appears in May 1712 and has a benefit
performance on the ninth of that month. The fact that Jane Rogers had this piece
published would seem to indicate that she took Wilks’ threat seriously; if she thought that
this situation would just blow over then she would hardly have mounted a public attack
on the management who controlled her career. Mrs. Rogers does, however, hedge her
bets to a certain extent by making Anne Oldfield the principal author of her problems
with the company. She points out that Wilks supported her for the role until Mrs.
Oldfield became involved, and the inclusion of the Anne Bracegirdle story also shifts
blame away from the triumvirate as they were not involved in the management of that
company. If Jane Rogers had entertained any hope of returning to the Drury Lane stage
after the publication of this complaint, then she clearly felt that she could cope with the
wrath of Anne Oldfield as the lesser of two evils.
Different accounts of this dispute are to be found in other contemporary writings.
In the Faithful Memoirs, Mrs. Oldfield’s side in this affair is naturally taken, and
“Egerton” tells us that while the part of Andromache was originally destined for Jane
154
Rogers, the author and the managers soon realized that Mrs. Oldfield would be far
superior in the role and so it was given to her. He then describes how Mrs. Rogers and
her supporters tried to start a riot on the opening night of The Distrest Mother but they
were removed from the theatre and the play went ahead to great acclaim. In his Apology
Cibber makes only one rather oblique reference to the whole business, though he differs
from “Egerton” in saying that the performance was prevented
we had been forced to dismiss an Audience of a hundred and fifty
Pounds, from a Disturbance spirited up by obscure People, who never
gave any better Reason for it, than it was their Fancy to support the
idle Complaint of one rival Actress against another, in their several
Pretensions to the chief Part in a new Tragedy. (II: 166)
Although Cibber is writing about events that had occurred twenty-eight years previously,
the loss of the money is obviously what rankled with him—the dispute between the
actresses seems barely to have registered.
How Anne Oldfield herself viewed this dispute we do not know. By the winter of
1712, when The Distrest Mother premiered, she had been on the stage for thirteen years
and had coped with several changes in the company structure. Her specialty was comedy
and the tragic roles she did play were not similar to those usually performed by Jane
Rogers—who was a tragic actress in the mold of Elizabeth Barry, all fire and passion.
Mrs. Oldfield’s line in tragedy tended towards the stately and the noble, such as
Semandra in Lee’s Mithridates (1678)—a role originated by Elizabeth Boutell. While of
course possible, the likelihood of Anne Oldfield finding Jane Rogers enough of a threat
to try and have her removed from the company, does not seem very high. This incident
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may well have begun as just the usual backstage bickering over a role, which the
management then used to try to edge out an older actress who had been giving them
trouble for some time—but the situation blew up in a fashion they did not anticipate.
Anne Oldfield’s roles
In the course of her thirty year career, Anne Oldfield created 68 roles in new plays but,
although she was a highly competent and successful actress, not all of these plays were a
success. As Table 3 demonstrates, 29 of these new roles were in plays which failed to
survive past the opening run of three, or in some cases only one, performance. While a
certain number of failures are to be expected—particularly early in a career when a
performer would have had no say in the plays in which he or she appeared—one would
not have expected quite so many in the latter stages of the career of a performer of Anne
Oldfield’s stature. In the second half of her career, from 1715 to 1730, she created 22
new roles and 9 of these were in plays that failed; of course these were only a portion of
her repertoire, she continued to perform both other roles she had created and parts in
revived works. However, this failure rate does demonstrate that the participation of
popular, and highly effective, performers was not enough alone to carry a new work with
the audience. This table also shows that only a small proportion of playwrights had works
which survived in the repertory—just 23 of the plays listed below lasted and seven of
those were by Cibber. His high success rate with plays starring Anne Oldfield could be
attributed to the fact that as an actor and manager, as well as a playwright, Cibber was
ideally situated to judge not only what type of role would suit her best but also what
would be most pleasing to the audience. As one of the three managers of Drury Lane,
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from 1709 to 1733, Cibber naturally had a certain degree of control over the length of a
run; but he was also a businessman concerned with profit, who would not have kept a
play on the stage had it ceased to draw an audience, even if it were one of his own works.
Table 8.
Roles created by Anne Oldfield.
Note: ** denotes a season when she was performing but did not create any new roles.
Play titles in bold denote works which lasted in the repertory more than ten years.
Plays in the column Play (failed) are those which did not survive beyond the
opening run.
Season
16991700
Play
Play (failed)
The Grove
The Pilgrim
John Vanbrugh
Alinda
(Fletcher)
The Perjur'd Husband Susannah Centlivre Aurelia
17001701
Playwright
John Oldmixon
Love at a Loss
Catherine Trotter
The Unhappy Penitent Catherine Trotter
The Humour of the Age Thomas Baker
17011702
The Funeral
The Virgin Prophetess Elkannah Settle
Richard Steele
The Generous
Conqueror
The Modish Husband
The False Friend
17021703
Love's Contrivance
17031704
17041705
Bevil Higgons
Willaim Burnaby
John Vanbrugh
The Old Mode and the Thomas Durfey
New
The Fair Example
Richard Estcourt
Susannah Centlivre
The Lying Lover
Richard Steele
The Careless
Husband
Colley Cibber
Farewell Folly
Peter Motteux
Role
Silvia
Lucilia
Ann of
Britanie
Miranda
Helen
Lady
Sharlot
Cimene
Camilla
Jacinta
Lucia
Lucia
Belliza
Victoria
Lady
Betty
Modish
Mariana
157
The Tender Husband
17051706
Richard Steele
Biddy
Tipkin
Hampstead Heath
Thomas Baker
Arabell
a
The Basset Table
Susannah Centlivre Lady
Reveller
Perolla and Izadora
Colley Cibber
Izadora
The Fashionable Lover Unknown
Viletta
The Recruiting
Officer
17061707
17071708
17081709
17091710
17101711
17111712
George Farquhar
The Platonick Lady
Susannah Centlivre Isabella
The Beaux'
Stratagem
Phaedra &
Hippolytus
The Double Gallant
George Farquhar
The Royal Convert
Nicholas Rowe
The Lady's Last
Stake
Colley Cibber
The Fine Lady's Airs
Thomas Baker
The Rival Fools
Colley Cibber
(Fletcher)
Susannah Centlivre Belinda
Edmund Smith
Colley Cibber
The Man's Bewitched
Hob, or, The Country
Wake
Injur'd Love
Colley Cibber
The Wife's Relief
The Distrest Mother
Ximena
The Humours of the
Army
Mrs.
Sullen
Ismena
Lady
Dainty
Ethelind
a
Mrs.
Conque
st
Lady
Rodom
ont
Lucinda
Flora
Unknown
The Perplex'd Lovers
17121713
Silvia
OgleFidelia
Charles Johnson
Arabell
a
Susannah Centlivre Camilla
Ambrose Philips
Androm
ache
Colley Cibber
Ximena
Charles Shadwell
Victoria
158
Cinna's Conspiracy
Cato
17131714
The Victim
Unknown
Joseph Addison
Charles Johnson
Emilia
Marcia
Eriphile
The Tragedy of Jane
Shore
The Wonder: A
Woman Keeps a
Secret
Nicholas Rowe
Jane
Shore
Susannah Centlivre Violant
e
17141715
17151716
The Tragedy of Lad
y Jane Gray
The Drummer
Nicholas Rowe
17161717
The Cruel Gift
Jane
Gray
Joseph Addison
Lady
Truema
n
Susannah Centlivre Leonora
Three Hours After
Marriage
Gay, Pope,
Arbuthnot
The Sultaness
Lucius, The First
Christian King of
Britain
17171718
17181719
The Non-Juror
Colley Cibber
The Masquerade
Chit Chat
Busiris, King of Egypt
17191720
17201721
17211722
17221723
Mrs.
Townle
y
Charles Johnson
Atalind
a
Delariviere Manley Rosalin
da
The Spartan Dame
The Refusal
Maria
Charles Johnson
Sophron
ia
Thomas Killigrew Florinda
Edward Young
Mandan
e
Thomas Southerne Celonia
Colley Cibber
Sophron
ia
**
The Artifice
Susannah Centlivre Mrs.
Watchit
Richard Steele
Indiana
The Conscious
Lovers
Humfrey, Duke of
Gloster
Ambrose Philips
Queen
Margare
t
159
17231724
17241725
17251726
17261727
17271728
King Henry V
Aaron Hill
The Captives
Caesar in Egypt
John Gay
Colley Cibber
The Rival Modes
James Smythe
**
The Provok'd
Husband
Love in Several
Masques
17281729
17291730
Princess
Catheri
ne
Cylene
Cleopat
ra
Amoret
Cibber & Vanbrugh Lady
Townle
y
Henry Fielding
Lady
Matchle
ss
**
The Humours of
Oxford
Sophonisba
James Miller
James Thompson
Clarind
a
Sophoni
sba
As can be seen here, another playwright who wrote a considerable amount of material for
Anne Oldfield was Susannah Centlivre. There are nine of Centlivre’s plays in this list,
more than any other playwright except Cibber, but only three of these were a success.
Table 4 illustrates the success/failure rate of some of the major playwrights in whose
work Mrs. Oldfield appeared. While these authors wrote other plays which did not
include Anne Oldfield in their casts, this table does show that even successful authors
could, and did, have total failures. Also, few, if any, authors were prolific enough to
make a living from playwriting alone.
160
Table 9.
Anne Oldfield’s major authors – success and failure.
Note: Plays classed as mediocre are those which had a limited success beyond their
opening run, but did not last in the repertory.
PLAYWRIGHT
Addison
Centlivre
Cibber
Farquhar
Rowe
Steele
Vanbrugh
Total
SUCCESS
2
3
7
2
3
2
2
21
FAILURE MEDIOCRE
0
0
4
2
2
2
0
0
0
0
1
1
0
0
7
5
While Table 8 shows the roles created by Anne Oldfield during her thirty year
career, it does not give any indication of her workload on a yearly basis. Table 10 gives a
list of all her known performances for the 1711-1712 season—by this time she had been
on the London stage for twelve years and was well established as the leading actress of
the Drury Lane company, specializing in comic roles. I have chosen this season because
the records of performance are complete—although as is indicated, we do not have cast
lists for all the plays—also, this season shows Anne Oldfield mid-career at a time when
Drury Lane was under stable management, and her personal life was equally
untroubled.127 This table shows not only the number of roles a leading actress had to
perform on a monthly basis but also demonstrates the vast—at least by modern
standards—number of plays that were being performed by the Drury Lane company
week-in week-out.
127
Anne Oldfield had been living with Arthur Mainwaring for approximately eight years by this time, their
son was about two years old, and although Mainwaring was ill and would be dead by the end of 1712, his
illness was not serious enough to interfere with her stage appearances at this point.
161
Table 10.
All known roles performed by Anne Oldfield at Drury Lane in the 1711-1712
season.
Note: A blank in the role column indicates that Mrs. Oldfield was not listed for a part
in this play performed at Drury Lane.
A ? next to the number of nights in a run indicates that no play was listed for the
following night, but there is no indication that the theatre was closed so therefore
the play in question probably ran for more than one night.
* * * indicates a play for which there is no cast list.
‡ indicates a play in which Mrs. Oldfield usually had a role, but did not perform
on this occasion.
DATE
RUN
PLAY
ROLE
September
1711
Sat 22
Tues 25
Thurs 27
Sat 29
October
Tues 2
Thurs 4
Sat 6
Mon 8
Tues 9
Wed. 10
Thurs 11
Fri. 12
Sat. 13
Tues. 16
Wed. 17
Thurs. 18
Fri. 19
Sat. 20
Mon 22
Tues. 23
Wed. 24
Thurs 25
Fri 26
Sat 27
1?
2?
2?
2
The Amorous Widow
The Recruiting Officer
Love for Love
Madam Fickle
2?
2?
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
The Unhappy Favourite
Love Makes a Man
The Chances
Oroonoko
The Spanish Fryar
The Strategm
The Scornful Lady
The Lancashire Witches
Philaster
The Fair Quaker of Deal
The Rover
The Albion Queens
The Busie Body
Mackbeth
The Volunteers
The Careless Husband
The Old Batchelor
Philaster
The Rehearsal
Hamlet
Wanton
wife
Silvia
Angelica
Constantia
Elvira
Mrs. Sullen
The Lady
Hellena
Queen Mary
Lady Betty
Laetitia
162
Mon 29
Tues 30
1
1
The Libertine Destroy'd
Timon of Athens
Thurs 31
November
1
Rule a Wfie and Have a
Wife
Thurs 1
Fri 2
Sat 3
Mon 5
Tues 6
Wed 7
Thurs 8
Fri 9
Sat 10
Mon 12
Thurs 22
Fri 23
Sat 24
Mon 26
Tues 27
Thurs 29
Fri 30
December
Sat 1
Mon 3
Thurs 6
Fri 7
Sat 8
Mon 10
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
7
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
The Silent Woman
The Relapse
The Indian Emperor
The Pilgrim
Henry IV
The Confederacy
The Funeral
She wou'd if she cou'd
King Lear
The Wife's Relief
Philaster
The Squire of Alsatia
Aurengzebe
Sir Courtly Nice
Othello
The Man of Mode
Philaster
1
2
1
1
1
1
The Wife's Relief
Vertue Betray'd
Love for Love
Aurengzebe
The Alchymist
The Committee
Tues 11
Thurs 13
Fri 14
Sat 15
Mon 17
Tues 18
Thurs 20
Fri 21
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
The Amorous Widow
Mithridates
The Wife's Relief
Mithridates
Love Makes a Man
The Tender Husband
Mithridates
The Feign'd Innocence
Estifania
Silent
Woman
Berinthia
Lady Harriet
Arabella
Teresa
Leonora
Mrs. Loveit
Arabella
Anna Bullen
Angelica
Ruth
Wanton
wife
Semandra
Arabella
Semandra
Biddy
Semandra
163
Sat 22
Thurs 27
Fri 28
Sat 29
Mon 31
January 1712
Tues 1
Thurs 3
Fri 4
Sat 5
Mon 7
Sat 12
Mon 14
Tues 15
Fri 18
Sat 19
Thurs 24
Fri 25
Sat 26
Mon 28
Tues 29
Thurs 31
February
Fri 1
Sat 2
Mon 4
Tues 5
Wed 6
Thurs 7
Fri 8
Sat 9
Mon 11
Thurs 14
Fri 15
Sat 16
Mon 18
Tues 19
1
1
1
1
1
Mackbeth
Vertue Betray'd
The Libertine Destroy'd
The Wife's Relief
The Northern Lass
1
1
1
The Chances‡
The Careless Husband
The Scornful Lady
4
1
1
2
Rule a Wfie and Have a
Wife
The Tempest
The Spanish Fryar
The Funeral
The Tempest
1
3
1
1
1
1
1
1
The Amorous Widow
The Perplex'd Lovers
The Tempest
The Royal Merchant
Philaster
The Strategm
The Pilgrim
Love for Love
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
The Tempest
The Recruiting Officer
The Wife's Relief
The Fatal Marriage
The Taming of the Shrew
The Unhappy Favourite
Love's Last Shift
She wou'd if she cou'd
The Humorous Lieutenant
Aesop
The Tempest
The Humorous Lieutenant
Amphitryon
The Alchymist
Anna Bullen
Arabella
Lady Betty
The Lady
Estifania
***
Elvira
Lady Harriet
***
Wanton
wife
Camilla
***
***
Mrs. Sullen
Angelica
***
Slivia
Arabella
***
***
***
Caelia
***
***
Caelia
***
164
Thurs 21
Sat 23
Mon 25
Tues 26
Thurs 28
March
Thurs 6
Sat 8
Mon 10
Tues 11
Thurs 13
Sat 15
Mon 17
Mon 31
April
2
1
1
1
1
The Comical Revenge
Epsom Wells
The Rehearsal
King Lear
The Humorous Lieutenant
1
1
1
1
2?
1
9
1
Mackbeth
The Mourning Bride
The Fair Quaker of Deal
The Libertine Destroy'd
The Orphan
The Tempest
The Distrest Mother
Philaster
Tues 1
Thurs 3
Sat 5
Mon 7
Tues 8
Thurs 10
Sat 12
1
1
1
1
1
2?
1
The Silent Woman
The Humorous Lieutenant
Julius Caesar
Henry IV
Julius Caesar
The Spanish Fryar
The Committee
14-19 Passion
Week
Mon 21
Tues 22
Thurs 24
Fri 25
1
1
1
1
The Tempest
Love for Love
Julius Caesar
Hamlet
Sat 26
1
Rule a Wfie and Have a
Wife
Mon 28
Tues 29
May
Thurs 1
Fri 2
Sat 3
Mon 5
1
1
The Amorous Widow
Volpone
1
1
1
1
The Rival Queens
The Strategm
The Rover‡
Love Makes a Man
***
***
Caelia
***
***
***
Andromache
Silent
Woman
Caelia
***
***
Elvira
Ruth
***
Angelica
***
Estifania
Wanton
wife
***
Mrs. Sullen
165
Tues 6
Thurs 8
Fri 9
Sat 10
Mon 12
Tues 13
Thurs 15
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
The Constant Couple
The Mourning Bride
Venice Preserv'd
The Tempest
Caius Marius
The Old Batchelor‡
The Spanish Fryar ‡
Lady
Lurewell
***
Anne Oldfield’s finances
Although unfortunately we do not have a record of Anne Oldfield’s salary throughout her
career, there are some documents which give an indication of her earnings at certain
points. A document from the Lord Chamberlain’s records entitled “An Establishment for
ye Company” (PRO LC 7/3) lists salaries for a company of performers. This is undated
and was initially thought by scholars to be from 1708—it includes actors from both
Lincoln’s Inn Fields and Drury Lane and therefore was assumed to refer to the union of
the companies—but Judith Milhous has proven from internal evidence that it is most
likely a projection of what a united company would cost dating from1703.128 In this
document, Anne Oldfield is ranked well below both Elizabeth Barry and Anne
Bracegirdle—her proposed salary is given as £80 per annum whereas they would receive
£150 per annum each. However, Mrs. Oldfield is ranked above both Jane Rogers (£60
p.a.) and Mary Porter (£40 p.a.).129 Milhous points out that this proposed salary would
have been rather low for Anne Oldfield, even in 1703, since she had signed a contract at
128
Judith Milhous “The Date and Import of the Financial Plan for a United Theatre Company in P.R.O. LC
7/3,” Maske und Kothurn, 21 (1975), 81-88.
129
PRO LC 7/3 is reproduced in full in Allardyce Nicoll’s A History of English Drama, 1660-1900 6 vols.
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1952-1959), II, pp. 276-278.
166
Drury Lane in March of that year which gave her 50 shillings a week, and suggests that
this may have been because of her allegiance to the Drury Lane company (p.85).
The next information on Anne Oldfield’s salary comes from the 1708-09 season,
when the theatres were in a considerable state of unrest culminating in the silencing of
Drury Lane, under Christopher Rich, in June of 1709. Two documents extant in the Lord
Chamberlain’s papers (PRO LC 7/3, fol. 104 and 175) are “Mrs. Oldfield’s complaint
against Christopher Rich,” March 1709, and “The Answer of Mr. Rich, the Patentees &
Adventurers, to a Paper intitled Mrs. Oldfields Complaint,” no definite date.130 In her
complaint, Mrs. Oldfield says that while at the Haymarket she had an agreement for £4
per week, with a benefit for which the house charges would be £40; she left the
Haymarket and returned to Drury Lane on the understanding that she would receive the
same terms but for her benefit on March 3rd Rich deduced £71.131 Rich’s reply argues
that her salary of £4 weekly was paid, that it was higher than that of any other woman,
and that the agreement for her benefit was that she would pay £40 house charges and then
receive two-thirds of the balance for herself which amounted to £62.7.8. The reply does
not say why an extra one-third of the profits should now be kept by the house in addition
to the standard house charges or explain why Mrs. Oldfield would have agreed to accept
only two-thirds of the receipts after house charges. Given the circumstances in the
company at the time, and the subsequent support of the actors by the Lord Chamberlain’s
office, there is a strong possibility that “Mrs. Oldfield’s complaint” was a test case used
by the actors to gauge Rich’s likely response and/or provoke him into taking a public
130
Document Register I, items 2000 and 2001, p. 436.
The return to Drury Lane which Mrs. Oldfield mentions would have been at the time of the union of the
companies in 1708, and she would not have had any choice in the move if she wished to continue acting in
London.
131
167
position on the issue of benefits, which could later be used against him. Of course there
is also the possibility that Anne Oldfield, given her seniority in the company, was simply
the first performer to run into Rich’s new benefit terms, and took umbrage accordingly.
Following the silencing of Drury Lane in June 1709, a document entitled
Advertisement Concerning the Poor ACTORS, who under Pretence of hard Usage from
the PATENTEES, are about to desert their Service was published by Zachary Baggs, the
treasurer of the Theatre-Royal at Drury Lane. The Biographical Dictionary (1: 210-211)
points out that this was probably printed in collusion with Rich and not just in support of
his management—Baggs had been the treasurer since at least 1701 and the extent of his
influence in management decisions is not clear. This document gives the salaries for
Wilks, Betterton, Escourt, Cibber, Mills, and Mrs. Oldfield, and denies that they were
underpaid by the management; instead Baggs claims that given the number of weeks the
theatre was forced to close, that these performers received exactly the wages to which
they were entitled. He explains that
The whole Company began to Act, on the 12th of Oct. 1708. and left off
on the 26th of the same Month, by reason of Prince George’s Illness and
Death; and begun again the 14th of December following, and left off upon
the Lord Chamberlain's Order on the 4th of June last 1709. So Acted,
during that time, in all 135 Days which is 22 Weeks and 3 Days,
accounting Six Acting Days to a Week.
Then there follows a breakdown, and explanation, of monies received by each of the
named performers. There are four payments entered for Anne Oldfield, totaling
£132.06.1 with the following details
168
To Mrs. Oldfield at 4 l. a Week Salary, which for 14 Weeks and
one Day; she leaving off Acting presently after her Benefit, (viz.)
on the 17th of March last 1708. tho’ the Benefit was intended for
her whole 9 Months Acting, and she refused to assist others in their
Benefits; her salary for these 14 Weeks and one day came to,
and she was paid.
£56.13.04
In January she required, and was paid Ten Guineas, to wear on the
Stage in some Plays, during the whole Season, a Mantua and Petticoat
that was given her for the Stage, and tho’ she left off 3 Months before
she should, yet she hath not returned any part of the Ten Guineas.
£10.15.00
And she had for wearing in some Plays a Suit of Boys Cloaths on
on the Stage, paid.
£2.10.09
By a Benefit Play, paid.
£62.07.08
In a separate column, Baggs lists what he estimates each performer received for their
benefits above and beyond the normal ticket price, and then sums up the earnings of the
six performers as follows:
Acted 100 Times
Mr.Wilks certain,
and more by Guess
Acted 16 Times
Mr. Betterton,
certain
l.
259
40
188
s.
d.
Both
01
00
05
00 299.01.05
14
05
169
Acted 52 Times
Acted 71 Times
Acted
Times132
Acted 39 Times
and more by Guess
450
00
00 638.14.05
Mr. Estcourt,
certain
and more by Guess
163
18
06
200
00
00 363.18.06
Mr. Cibber,certain
and more by Guess
162
50
10
00
10
00 212.10.10
Mr. Mills, certain
and more by Guess
170
20
11
00
04
00 190.12.04
Mrs.
Oldfield,certain
and more by Guess
132
06
07
120
00
00 252.06.07
How accurate his estimates are is difficult to say—he does include a note explaining the
vast sum he credits Betterton with receiving; explaining that no person was admitted for
that performance who did not have one of Betterton’s own tickets, the lowest of which
was priced at half a Guinea. Baggs also claims that many people gave Betterton well over
the ticket price, with one lady paying twenty Guineas. The benefit in question was the
special one on April 7th 1709, a performance of Congreve’s Love for Love, for which
Anne Bracegirdle temporarily came out of retirement; given Betterton’s standing, and
popularity, a huge profit from this benefit would have been very possible.
Looking just at the figures given for certain income, in relation to number of
performances, Anne Oldfield was doing very well. Cibber, who granted was not as
senior a performer, was acting nearly twice as much as she was yet received only £30
more; Wilks, with whom Mrs. Oldfield was frequently partnered, was performing two
and a half times more often but his salary was only £127 greater than hers.
132
There is no record of the number of times that Mr. Mills acted given here.
170
In this document, Anne Oldfield is the only performer singled out for any
personal comment—the jibe about her refusal to play in other people’s benefits—the
money received by the actors is simply broken down into weekly salary and benefits.
The only other comments Baggs makes are on the wives of Betterton and Mills; he
includes in Betterton’s salary 1l. per week for Mrs. Betterton “although she does not
Act”, and 1l. per week for Mills’ wife “for little, or nothing”. Mary Betterton had retired
from acting circa 1694 but continued to work with the younger performers; Margaret
Mills was both an actress and singer who was a useful stock performer—why Baggs
should resent them is unclear.
The next record of salary that survives for Anne Oldfield comes from Cibber in
his Apology and refers to the 1710-1711 season when the management of Drury Lane was
transferred to a group of actor-managers. According to Cibber, she was initially
supposed to be part of the management, but Dogget objected and she was compensated
accordingly:
When Mrs. Oldfield was nominated as a joint Sharer in our new
Agreement to be made with Swiney, Dogget who had no Objection
to her Merit, insisted that our Affairs could never be upon a secure
Foundation if there was more than one Sex admitted to the Menagement
of them. He therefore hop’d that if we offer’d Mrs. Oldfield a Carte
Blanche instead of a Share, she would not think herself slighted. This
was instantly agreed to, and Mrs. Oldfield receiv’d it rather as a Favour
than a Disobligation: Her demands therefore were Two Hundred Pounds
a Year certain, and a Benefit clear of all Charges, which were readily
171
sign’d to. Her Easiness on this Occasion, some Years after, when our
Establishment was in Prosperity, made us with less Reluctancy advance
her Two Hundred Pounds to Three Hundred Guineas per Annum,
with her usual Benefit, which, upon an Average, for several Years
at least doubled that Sum.
(2: 70-71)
Cibber’s claim that Anne Oldfield did not object to being excluded from management
seems entirely reasonable. She had been acting on the London stage for eleven years by
this time, had worked under various managements, and had recently been through the
debacle involving Rich and Drury Lane—nothing in these experiences would necessarily
have tempted her to get involved in management herself. From what we can learn of her
character, though the information is admittedly not very detailed, she does not appear to
have been particularly ambitious beyond the scope of her roles—she was a leading
actress who had a life and family beyond the theatre and no reason to wish for a greater
involvement in the running of the company.
The final comment on Anne Oldfield’s finances comes from herself—her will
was made on June 27th 1730, and a codicil added on September 15th; she died on October
23rd of that year. The contents of the will can be summarized as follows:
To her son, Charles Churchill—her house in Grosvenor Street;
To her son, Arthur Mainwaring—the interest on £5000 until he reached
the age of thirty, then the principal was to be his;
To her mother, Anne Oldfield—10 guineas immediately, and a £60 annuity;
To her aunt, Jane Gourlaw—£10 immediately, a £10 annuity during the
life of Anne Oldfield Snr. and £30 annuity after that;
172
To her friend, the actress Margaret Saunders—a £10 annuity.
The remainder of her estate was to be divided into three equal parts,
two parts for her son Arthur Mainwaring and one for her other son,
Charles Churchill. Brigadier Charles Churchill was the residual legatee
for all her estate.133
The bequests listed above seem clear and straightforward but the detail in which the will
is written is far from simple—every possible contingency seems to have been thought of
and planned for, down to the last detail. Mrs. Oldfield not only includes details of what
should happen to the money or property if one of her legatees should die before
inheriting, but also includes details of when all the annuities should be paid.
Item, I give and bequeath unto Mrs. Margaret Saunders, the Yearly
Sum or Annuity of Ten Pounds per Annum, to be paid her during her
Life, by Four Quarterly Payments; the first Payment thereof to be made
on the Quarter-Day next following the Day of my Death.
Although we cannot know the amount of legal advice Anne Oldfield received on the
making of this will, the precision and attention to detail is not something found in all
wills of this period.
133
For a full transcript of Anne Oldfield’s will, see Appendix C.
173
Chapter 4:
Case Studies Sample Group 3, 1750-1755.
The two principal actresses discussed in the last sample group—Hester
Santlow/Booth and Anne Oldfield—both had careers which ended at the beginning of the
1730’s, the time at which the stable management of Drury Lane under the triumvirate
also came to an end. While the 1730’s saw a boom in the number of theatres operating in
London, and in the amount of new material they offered, all this came to a rather abrupt
end with the introduction of the Licensing Act in June 1737. This Act had a detrimental
and long lasting effect on the London theatre scene; it had the effect of reducing the
number of legal theatres to the two patent houses, and gave control over all material
performed on stage to the office of the Lord Chamberlain. The reason for jumping ahead
to the 1750’s for the next sample is that although the Licensing Act was still, and would
remain, law, the theatres had by this time recovered from the most immediate ill-effects,
and theatrical entertainment had settled into a “new” pattern.
Before beginning the case studies for this third sample group, some explanation of
the circumstances which led to the Licensing Act, and the ramifications which followed,
is in order. Before the Licensing Act came into effect, there were a large number of
theatres operating in London—the introduction to The London Stage 1729-1747134 lists
eight theatres for this period, not counting those which had opened in Richmond, or the
various fairs at which theatrical entertainments were performed. The two major houses
were still Drury Lane and, from 1732, Covent Garden, with the King’s Opera House in
the Haymarket performing only operas, but Lincoln’s Inn Fields was in decline and
134
Vol. 3, pp. xix-xli.
174
would close in 1744. The principal competition for the patent companies came from the
Goodman’s Fields Theatre, which was opened by an Irish actor, Thomas Odell, at
converted premises in Ayliffe Street in 1729. Odell encountered considerable opposition
to his venture and the theatre did not really become a success until the actor Henry
Giffard joined the management. Under Giffard, the Goodman’s Fields company
expanded and he oversaw the construction of a new purpose-built theatre which opened,
still in Ayliffe Street, on October 2nd 1732. In 1733 Giffard purchased Barton Booth’s
share in the Drury Lane company from his widow, Hester Santlow/Booth but continued
to manage, and act with, the Goodman’s Fields company. Giffard’s company moved to
Lincoln’s Inn Fields in 1736 and proposed a new subscription plan to increase the profits
of that theatre, and on May 3rd 1737 he put the Goodman’s Fields theatre up for sale.
However, little over a month later the Licensing Act was passed and Giffard was left with
a theatre in which he could not legally perform. Both the Biographical Dictionary (6:
186-195) and The London Stage (III: I, pp. lxxx-lxxxv) agree that Giffard’s talents as an
actor were average, although he played and maintained some major roles, but that his real
abilities lay in management. Giffard ran a very efficient company—he kept adding to his
roster of performers with both newcomers and established actors from other companies,
and was not afraid to move actors around in different parts until he achieved the “right”
combination; he insisted on a regular rehearsal schedule for all the company; and was one
of the first to use newspaper advertising to puff forthcoming performances and employ
more sensational language to attract the public’s attention. The rigorous training that
Giffard’s actors received paid off; many of them went on to long-term successful careers
at the patent companies. The most famous of these was David Garrick—who, as Scouten
175
(p. lxxxi) points out, would probably have gone on to great things irrespective of where
he trained—but there were many “middle rank” players, such as William Havard, Mrs.
Dunstall, and Miss Bradshaw who would be unlikely to have had the long careers they
did without the training they received from Giffard.
Henry Giffard’s part in the event which seems to have precipitated the
introduction of the Licensing Act to parliament in June 1737, centers on Sir Robert
Walpole and a play called The Golden Rump. Walpole was the butt of many satirical
attacks, both on stage and off, particularly from Henry Fielding at the New Haymarket,
and had made previous attempts to curb theatrical activities—a bill he had introduced to
the Commons in conjunction with Sir John Barnard had been defeated in April 1735.
According to The London Stage:
In May 1737, occurred the strange episode of The Golden Rump. The
standard version of the story is that a play by this title, containing obscene
allusions to, and scurrilous attacks upon, Walpole, was offered to Giffard.
Instead of producing it he offered it to Walpole, who, with great indignation,
read passages of it on the floor of the House of Commons. (p. l)
The House was outraged and the end result was the Licensing Act. However, a more
devious reading of the situation was offered in the Apology for the Life of Mr. T---C---:
Suppose, Sir, some Golden Rump Farce was wrote by a certain Great
Man’s [Walpole] Own direction, and as much Scurrility and Treason larded in it
as possible . . . Suppose Giffard had a private Hint how to act in this
affair, and was promised Great Things . . . Suppose he was promised
176
a separate License. 135
Whether or not the latter is true is impossible to say for certain; Giffard did not receive a
“separate license” but was nevertheless back in business in London for the 1740-41
season, and does seem to have received “special consideration” from the authorities. The
author of this Apology, and thus the source for this suggestion is also a matter for
conjecture. The Biographical Dictionary entry for Henry Giffard includes the quote
above, saying
Henry Fielding, whose satirical jabs at Walpole had appeared on
the stage of the Haymarket Theatre, wrote in An Apology for the
life of Mr. T . . . C . . . in 1740, . . .
(6:191)
however, the authorship of this “autobiography” is completely unclear. The contents of
the work indicate that it was written by a theatrical insider, and while Henry Fielding is
certainly a possible candidate, to say definitively that it was written by Henry Fielding is
impossible to prove.
The Licensing Act of 1737 was an amendment to an earlier one dating from the
reign of Queen Anne (1702-1714) which included actors in the same group as beggars
and vagrants, for the purposes of the law. In the Document Register, Milhous and Hume
give the following entry for June 6 1737
“An Act to explain and amend so much of an Act made in the Twelfth
Year of the Reign of Queen Anne Intituled An Act for reducing the
Laws relating to Rogues Vagabonds Sturdy Beggars and Vagrants and
Sending them whither they ought to be sent as relates to Common
135
An Apology for the Life of Mr. T---C---, Comedian. Being a Proper Sequel to the Apology for the Life of
Mr. Colley Cibber, Comedian. with An Historical View of the Stage to the Present Year. Supposed to be
written by Himself. In the Stile and Manner of The Poet Laureat. (London: J. Mechell, 1740) p. 94.
177
Players of Interludes.” Forbids theatrical performances without Royal
patent or license from the Lord Chamberlain and forbids theatres to
present “any new Interlude Tragedy Comedy Opera play ffarce or other
Entertainment of the Stage or any new Prologue or Epilogue unless
a true Copy thereof be sent to the Lord Chamberlain of the Kings
Household for the being fourteen days at least before the acting
representing or performing thereof.” Anyone performing anything
not allowed by the Lord Chamberlain’s office to forfeit £50 and the
authority to perform. (2: Item 4139)
Strictly speaking, there should not have been any companies performing, other than the
two holding the royal patents, at this date but the authorities tended to turn a blind eye
unless there were serious public objections. The Licensing Act however, clearly states
from and after the twenty fourth day of June One Thousand
seven hundred and thirty seven every person who shall for hire
Gain or Reward act represent or perform or cause to be acted
represented or performed any Interlude Tragedy Comedy opera
Play ffarce or other Entertainment of the Stage or any part or
parts therein in case such person shall not have any Legal Settlement
in the place where the same shall be acted represented or performed
without authority by vertue of Letters Patent from His Majesty His Heirs
Successors or Predecessors or without Licence from the Lord Chamberlain
of His Majestys Household for the time being shall be deemed to be
a Rogue and a Vagabond within the intent and meaning of the said
178
recited act and shall be liable and subject to all such penalties and
punishments and by such methods of conviction as are inflicted on
or appointed by the said act for the punishment of Rogues and
Vagabonds . . .
136
This limiting to just two playhouses meant that from here on there would be no real
competition between theatres; the city of London had enough of a theatre-going
population to support more than the two patent houses, they had no need to compete for
the audience by producing lots of new works, or experimenting with new types of plays
or modes of production. The overall result was long-term stagnation—the patent houses
were large and expensive to run, they had a monopoly and therefore no reason to take
risks; the managements of both theatres were well pleased and resisted all efforts to
change the situation.
Walpole’s real goal, which he achieved, was the imposition of censorship on all
plays to be performed, including prologues and epilogues—since even if the material of a
play were innocent enough, the addition of a new prologue or epilogue could direct the
audience attention in a new way and/or add a range of new comments which could
contain topical allusions giving new significance to the material about to be seen.
However, the most immediate effect was the reduction of employment for actors in
London—with just two theatres operating not only were there fewer actors needed at any
given time but the opportunities for newcomers to gain experience, and a place in a
company, were drastically reduced.
136
Vincent J. Liesenfeld, ed. , The Stage and the Licensing Act 1729-1737 (New York: Garland , 1981)
“The Licensing Act of 1737.”
179
The passing of the Licensing Act was not something that went unnoticed; it
occasioned considerable debate among politicians, as well as other citizens, many of
whom were concerned by the level of censorship it imposed. A speech made by the Earl
of Chesterfield in the House of Lords, early June 1737, stated that the Act
seems designed not only as a Restraint on the Licentiousness of the
Stage, but it will prove a most arbitrary Restraint on the Liberty of the
Stage; and , I fear, it looks yet farther, I fear, it tends towards a Restraint
on the Liberty of the Press, which will be a long Stride towards the
Destruction of Liberty itself.
Unfortunately, despite this, and other objections, the Act was passed; Lord Chesterfield’s
fears for the liberty of the stage were to prove true, the power of the Lord Chamberlain’s
office to censor plays and refuse performance rights remained in effect until the repeal of
the Act in 1968, which was precipitated by the Royal Court Theatre’s performances of
the controversial plays of Edward Bond.137
Sample Group 3 – 1750-1755
The method for selecting the individual case studies for this sample remains the
same as for the first two groups, except for a modification of the second category—four
actresses [Sarah Toogood; the Misses Davis; Jane Hippsley (later Mrs. Henry Green;
Catherine (Kitty) Clive] whose careers illustrate respectively the following categories:
1. A very brief involvement with the theatre and little
137
This is necessarily just a brief summary of the Licensing Act of 1737, and some of the circumstances
which surrounded its passing, in order to provide a backdrop for the London theatre scene which existed in
the seventeen-fifties; for a full and comprehensive account of the Licensing Act, see Vincent J. Liesenfeld’s
The Licensing Act of 1737 (Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 1984)
180
or nothing known about the actress’s personal life.
2. The original criteria for this category were “A career
spanning a number of years where there is some detail
on professional activity but little on personal life” but
for this sample group the extant records, at least on
professional activities, are more detailed for performers
who had careers lasting beyond a season or two. For this
sample group therefore, the case study is of a number of
actresses with the same name whose short careers and
similar lines illustrate the difficulties of trying to disentangle
even those records that are more complete.
3. A longer career where information on both professional
and personal lives is available, but the actress in question
remained relatively minor.
4. A long career with professional and personal information
extant, where the actress became one the leading players
of her day.
181
Table 1
All actresses active in the years 1750-1755
Notes:
Name in bold indicates that this actress became a leading performer on the London stage;
those who played “second lead” roles are not included in this category, and neither are
those who played lead roles in Ireland, or the provinces, that did not maintain their status
when they transferred to London.
‡ after name indicates that this actress also sang or danced in addition to her straight
acting roles.
♦ after name indicates that this actress spent part of her career in Ireland.
Y in the “Family Connections” column stands for “Yes” this actress had a connection to
the theatre either by blood or by marriage.
**There are question marks under all columns for “Miss Davis” since, as will be
discussed, there were several actresses of this name who are virtually indistinguishable
from each other.
Actresses are listed alphabetically by the surname under which they spent most of their
professional lives; maiden names are included if a career began before marriage or the
actress belonged to a theatrical family, and married names if the career continued after
marriage.
Actress
Ann Allen
Susanna Mara Arne
(Mrs. T. Cibber II) ‡ ♦
Mrs. Baker ‡
Ann Barrington (neé
Halam) ♦
George Anne Bellamy ♦
Elizabeth Bennet ‡
Esther Bland (Mrs. John
Hamilton) ♦ ‡
Mary Bradshaw
Elizabeth Chambers ‡
Jane Cibber (Mrs. T.
Cibber I)
Kitty Clive ♦ ‡
Mary Cokayne
Elizabeth Copin ‡
Mrs. Cowper ♦
Frances Cross (neé
Shireburn) ‡
Mrs. John Cushing ‡
Family
connection
Career
length
(in years)
27
Y
Y
33
11
1732
1749 (?)
1765
1760
Y
Y
Y
40
26
33
1733
1744
1733
1773
1770
1766
Y
Y
31
35
7
1741
1743
1751
1772
1778
1758
Y
10
41
22
28
9
1741
1728
1753
1745
1748
1751
1769
1775
1773
1757
54
8
1727
1743
1781
1751
Y
Y
Y
Year of first Year of last
performance performance
1742
1769
182
Susannah Davies (neé
Yarrow) ♦
Miss Davis **
Mary Dunstall ‡
Harriet Dyer (neé
Bullock) ‡ ♦
Mary Elmy (neé Morse)
♦
Mrs Ferguson
Jane Ferguson
Elizabeth Fitzhenry (neé
Flanagan) ♦
Ann Glen ♦
Mary Ann Graham
(Mrs. Richard Yates II)
‡♦
Jane Green (neé
Hippisley) ‡
Mrs. (Urusla?) Griffith
Isabella Hallam (Mrs.
George Mattocks) ‡
Hannah Haughton ‡
Elizabeth Havard
(formerly Mrs. Kilby) ‡
Susanna Helme ‡
Elizabeth Hippisley ‡
Christiana Horton
Mrs. Harris James ‡
Elizabeth Jefferson (neé
May) ♦
Miss Kennedy (Elizabeth
Griffith) ♦
Isabella Lampe (neé
Young) ‡ ♦
Ann Macklin (the first
Mrs. Charles) ‡ ♦
Maria Macklin ‡
Elizabeth Mills (neé
Holliday) ‡
Sybilla Minors (or
Myners) (Mrs. John
Walker) ‡ ♦
Anna Maria Morrison
(Mrs. Thomas Hull) ‡
Y
Y
15
?
18
1749
?
1740
1764
?
1758
Y
45
1728
1773
Y
Y
29
15
38
1733
1735
1735
1762
1750
1773
20
11
1754
1755
1774
1766
Y
30
1753
1783
Y
Y
45
3
1735
1752
1780
1755
Y
52
30
1746
1734
1808
1764
Y
Y
34
22
27
38
18
1728
1752
1742
1714
1736
1762
1774
1769
1752
1754
Y
13
1753
1766
Y
8
1749
1757
Y
57
1733
1790
Y
Y
37
35
1721
1742
1758
1777
Y
32
1723
1755
Y
26
1741
1767
Y
38
1737
1775
Y
183
Susanna Mullart (Mrs.
Evans)
Maria Isabella Nossiter
♦
Ann Pitt ‡ ♦
Miss Popling ‡
Mrs. Price (Mrs. William
Parsons I) ‡
Hannah Pritchard (neé
Vaughan) ‡
Mary Ridout (neé
Woodman) ‡
Ninetta de Rossenaw ‡
Elizabeth Simpson
Miss Thomas ‡ ♦
Sarah Toogood ‡
Catherine de Vallois ‡
Jane Vernon ( neé Poitier,
later Thompson) ‡ ♦
Elizabeth Vincent (neé
Bincks) ♦
Sarah Ward (neé
Achurch) ♦
Ann Willoughby (Mrs.
James Lacy II)
Peg Woffington ‡ ♦
Mrs. Wright ‡
Miss Yates ‡
Mrs. Thomas Yeates ‡
Ester Young (Mrs.
Charles Jones) ‡ ♦
Y
34
1740
1774
6
47
7
1753
1745
1749
1759
1792
1756
Y
25
1751
1776
Y
36
1732
1768
Y
Y
14
1
30
23
8
28
1739
1754
1744
1753
1747
1728
1753
1755
1774
1776
1755
1756
Y
40
1736
1785
Y
44
1729
1773
Y
25
1745
1770
Y
Y
Y
4
26
22
9
10
1748
1731
1728
1744
1745
1752
1757
1750
1753
1755
Y
40
1736
1776
Y
As this table illustrates, the range of career length for actresses during this period
extends from one year to fifty-seven, however, there are only three actresses whose
careers lasted for under five years, whereas there are forty-two women who had careers
of over twenty years. Although many actresses spent varying proportions of their careers
in the provincial, Irish, or Scottish theatres, this pattern represents a considerable change
from the earlier sample groups, as Table 2 shows.
184
Table 2.
Sample 1, 2, and 3—career length comparison.
Total number
Major
Minor
Career span
Careers >5 years
Careers <20
years
Sample 1
(16701675)
42
6
36
1-36 years
13
Sample 2
(17101715)
31
7
24
1-45 years
4
Sample 3
(17501755)
64
14
50
1-57 years
3
11
10
20
These figures show not only a steady increase in the length of actresses’ careers, but also
a diminution in the number of women who spent just a short time in the profession. In
the first sample group, 33% of all actresses had careers which lasted less than five years;
in the second group that number drops to 13%; by the time of the third group it has
diminished to a negligible 5%. However, the other end of the spectrum—careers
exceeding twenty years—does not demonstrate such a drastic change; 26% of actresses in
sample one had careers which lasted for twenty years or more; this increases slightly with
sample two to 32%; but decreases marginally to 31% for sample three.
The change from 33% of actresses, who were active 1670-1675, having careers of
less than five years, to 5% of actresses who were active 1750-1755, indicates that a
serious stabilization of the profession took place over this eighty-five year time span,
primarily in the earlier years. The high percentage of actresses who had only short
careers in the first sample group is to be expected—acting was, for women, still a
relatively new profession and the closure of the public theatres during the interregnum
185
meant that there was no family tradition of theatrical involvement to follow. However,
the continuing decrease, from 13% (1710-1715) to 5% (1750-1755), is more surprising
since working conditions in the theatre companies were not that different. The change
may be, at least in part, accounted for by the large percentage of actresses in the third
group who had family connections in the theatre—which would suggest, for those born
into theatrical families, that they had firsthand experience of the pitfalls as well as the
advantages of their chosen profession and would therefore be less likely to enter into it on
a whim; and those who married fellow actors, or others employed in the theatrical world,
then had a vested interest in remaining in situ. This trend towards more stable careers
would have been of great benefit to the theatre companies; a solid base of reliable
performers, even if they are not great actors, is essential to the effective running of any
repertory company.
While there is a logical explanation for the decrease in the numbers of actresses
with very short careers, the fact that the percentage of those with careers of over twenty
years holds steady around 30%, between 1670 and 1755, is less easy to explain. One
possibility is that the number of older actresses needed by a company at any given time
remains fairly static—the age distribution of casts does not particularly change; there are
invariably more young roles than middle-aged, or older. Therefore, if an actress began
her career on stage at age seventeen, after twenty years in the business she would be
thirty-seven and beyond the age of playing the young marriageable girl (only a few senior
and favorite actresses would have been acceptable to audiences, and therefore
management, playing roles well beyond the age range). If this were the case, then
actresses who lasted beyond the twenty year mark would have a more limited number of
186
roles available to them and the number of these actresses required by a company would
not really change significantly over time.
The numbers of actresses in sample three who had family connections is shown in
Table 3, below, which gives the figures and percentages for the whole sample and also
shows the differences, if any, between the major and minor players.
Table 3.
Sample Group 3 Breakdown
Note:
As above, those actresses classified as “Major” are only those who played lead roles on
the London stage.
Total
Major
Minor
No. of
actresses
64
14
50
Family
connections Sang/danced Ireland
43 (67%)
31 (48%)
25 (39%)
10 (71%)
8 (57%)
9 (64%)
33 (66%)
23 (46%)
16 (32%)
Although a very high percentage of these actresses had a family connection to the
theatre, either by blood or through marriage, this connection does not appear to have been
of particular advantage in gaining success within a company—71% of actresses classified
as “major” had family connections, as did 66% of those who remained “minor”. From
the point of view of a company’s management, hiring, or trying out, new actors from
theatrical families made sense; these new recruits already knew how the company and
how theatre itself worked, if they had grown up watching family members on-stage then
they would need considerably less training than someone off the street, and they would
probably be more loyal to the company if they had family already employed there.
However, these statistics seem to show that, beyond the initial “break,” these connections
187
have little effect; virtually equal proportions of the actresses with family in the business
remain minor, as those who go on to be major stars.
Another interesting facet of this sample group is the proportion of actresses who
spent at least part of their career in Ireland—nearly 40% overall. Quite a number of these
women, such as Peg Woffington, began their careers in Ireland and then transferred to
London, while others started in London and then moved to Dublin in later years. A
number of actresses who had considerable success at Smock Alley did not manage to
translate that success to the London stage, but most remained in London and played
“second woman” roles rather than return to Ireland—either out of pride, or, because new
young actresses had risen to fill their place, or, because they considered second billing at
a top venue was better than first at a lesser one. Those who moved from London to
Dublin usually did so because they, or a spouse, were unable to maintain the roles they
wanted, or, they had a dispute with the London management over money. However,
many performers did not make the change, in either direction, a permanent one and one
of the characteristics of this sample group is a much greater mobility between theatres
and between countries.
Sarah Toogood
Although Mrs. Toogood had a career that lasted eight years, there are few extant
details available on her personal life, and only a small number of known roles for her.
We do not know when, or where, she was born, only that she first appears in the Drury
Lane records on May 5th, 1747 when she shared a benefit with other performers. As the
Biographical Dictionary (15:27) says, she must have been performing roles that were too
188
minor to be advertized prior to this. The next record of her is of performances with the
Richmond-Twickenham company in the summer of 1750; the troupe also had a Miss
Toogood, aged five, listed who was probably her daughter. From 1750-1755 Sarah
Toogood was at Drury Lane, acting minor roles and also dancing—she died on 19th
September 1755 and was buried at St. George, Bloomsbury two days later. Her death is
mentioned by the prompter Richard Cross, in his diary, but he does not say how she died
or what happened to her daughter. Sarah Toogood does not appear to have had any
family connection with the theatre—her surname is unusual enough that such a
connection would be relatively easy to trace if it existed—and her daughter does not
appear to have continued on the stage beyond the summer performances of 1750.
The roles that she played were all minor, mostly attendants and servants such as
Mincing in Congreve’s The Way of the World and Dainty Fidget in Wycherley’s The
Country Wife. In her years at Drury Lane she never moved up the ranks but the fact that
she was continuously employed would seem to indicate that she was at the very least
competent at what she did. While any company needs performers with talent and
ambition who will move up to starring roles, it also needs a proportion of foot-soldiers
who will continue to perform the same minor parts year-in and year-out—Sarah Toogood
appears to have been such a foot-soldier. Her last recorded performance at Drury Lane
was on May 8th 1755 and the Biographical Dictionary states that she seems to have left
the stage at this time. Since this was four months before her death, she may have been ill
or perhaps pregnant—her daughter, if still alive, would have been ten years old at this
time so Sarah Toogood was probably still a young woman—childbirth, or complications
afterwards, was a common cause of death for women. However, since we do not have a
189
date of birth for Mrs. Toogood, or a cause of death, I can offer this speculation only as a
possibility.
Miss (or The Misses?) Davis
The reason for including this actress in the case study for sample three is because
she, or possibly they, illustrates the confusion that exists over minor players with
common surnames even half way though the eighteenth-century. Although by the 1750s
the number and detail of extant records increase dramatically from those available from
the Restoration period, there are still considerable gaps particularly when dealing with the
lower ranks of performers. The Biographical Dictionary (4: 215-233) has entries on
forty-eight performers with the surname Davis who were active in the theatre from 1660
to 1800; for twenty-one of these individuals, we do not have a known Christian name.
When the entries for Davies are included (4: 197- 214), since the spelling of these two
names was frequently interchangeable during this period, an additional eighteen
performers can be added to the list—five of whom have no known Christian names.
Many of the Davis/Davies entries can be separated by the dates when the individuals
were active, but when there are a number of performers working at roughly the same time
with similar lines in roles, then trying to establish whether one is looking at one or a
number of different careers becomes very difficult indeed.
Such is the case with the Biographical Dictionary entry for “Davis, Miss [fl.
1739-1762?], actress, dancer, singer?” (4: 215-216) which opens by stating that
between the years 1739 and 1762 a number of similar roles—the ingénue, the pert
maidservant, Columbine in pantomime—are advertised as performed by a Miss Davis.
190
The authors then explain that these roles could not have been performed by other
actresses named Davis who were active at this time and the conclusion at which they
arrive is that:
The likelihood that an actress would not only remain unmarried but
would retain parts of this youthful cast for long was not great, but neither
was such a retention, of name or of roles, unknown. The (by no means
confident) assumption of the following account is that only one Miss Davis,
an actress, dancer, and singer of satisfactory middling talents, is
concerned in all of the roles cited.
(4: 218)
Unfortunately they do not explain why these roles cannot belong to any of the other
Davises, nor do they offer any examples of actresses of this rank who retained the title
“Miss,” and the accompanying roles, beyond the usual sixteen or seventeen years of age.
The following are the known periods of activity for this “Miss Davis”:
Table 4 – Known performances of Miss Davis 1739-1762.
Dates
Type of
role
City
Venue
1739-40
Chorus
singer
London
Covent
Garden
1740-42
Actress &
singer
London
Covent
Garden
1742
1743
Actress &
singer
Actress
London
London
Bartholomew
Fair
Southwark
1743-46
Actress &
singer
Dublin
Aungier
Street &
Smock Alley
1749-50
Actress &
singer
London
The
Haymarket
191
1750-51
Actress &
singer
1751-52
Actress &
singer
London
1755
Actress
London
Richmond &
Twickenham
The
Haymarket
1761-62
Actress &
singer
London
Covent
Garden
London
Covent
Garden
The types of roles Miss Davis played in these assorted venues are of a similar
type—young girls, nymphs and sprites; sometimes the roles are repeated, for example she
played Rose in Farquhar’s The Recruiting Officer at Covent Garden 1741 and also at The
Haymarket in 1750. This particular role is a comedic stock part, the “Country Wench,”
which was played by Mrs. Mountfort in the opening production in 1706. Rose is the
archetypal “wench”—saucy, promiscuous, and young—whose broad comedy acts as a
foil for the more sophisticated ways of the heroine. The role is one that any reasonably
competent comedy actress should be able to perform with little difficulty, but the
principal requirement, as with many of the other roles listed, is youth.
If we accept the Biographical Dictionary’s assessment that all these roles belong
to the same actress, and assume that she was sixteen/seventeen years old when she began
her career in 1739, then she would have been around thirty-nine years of age 1762.
While many actresses continued performing well beyond this age, they usually did so in
more age-appropriate roles with the exception of some of the major stars, and even an
actress such as Elizabeth Barry merely retained the “young” roles she had created many
years before and did not take on new parts in this vein in her later career. Considering
that all theatre companies have a number of young, pretty, and reasonably competent
actresses on their books at any given time, allocating the “young” roles to a thirty-nine
192
year old does not make sense when there are eighteen year olds available who would be
far more pleasing to the audience. There are, of course, always exceptions but these tend
to be based on a particular talent, for example many exceptional singers maintain roles
that are not age-appropriate; however there is no evidence that “Miss Davis” had a great
vocal talent, all the roles the Biographical Dictionary list for her, either singing or
straight acting, are minor.
The next issue is her name—there is no logical explanation for why a thirty-nine
year old would still be advertised as “Miss,” when, as has already been discussed,
actresses are usually given the title “Mrs.” from about the age of sixteen onwards. Again,
the only exception might be a star performer who used the form of address as a
distinguishing “trademark” but this was clearly not the case with Miss Davis.
The final point which could indicate that this “Miss Davis” is in fact several
different actresses of the same name is a combination of the dates of activity and the
locations, as laid out in Table 4. While performers do demonstrate much greater mobility
than ever before between both companies and countries during this time, the fact that
“Miss Davis” changes location so much and has several gaps where there is no record of
her leads me to believe that this is not the record of a single individual. I suggest that
Table 4 in fact shows the careers of possibly three different performers—one who began
her career with Covent Garden in 1739, worked at Bartholomew Fair in the summer of
1742, tried the new theatre at Southwark in 1743 and still failing to move up the ladder in
London, moved to Dublin soon after; the second Miss Davis began her London career in
1749 and continued until 1752; and the third had a brief career which only lasted from
1761 to 1762.
193
Of course all this is supposition, but the evidence of Miss Davis’s documented
career, combined with what we know of theatrical company policy, leads me to disagree
with the conclusion reached by the authors of the Biographical Dictionary. While we
can never be certain that the “Miss Davis” who was active from 1739 to 1762 was one
actress or several, this case demonstrates the range of possibilities that have to be
considered when looking at the careers of minor performers, particularly those with
common surnames.
Mrs. Henry Green, née Jane Hippisley (1719-1791)
Jane Hippisley was born into a theatrical family—her father, John, was a famous
and very popular “low” comedian at Covent Garden—her two sisters and half-brother
also followed their father onto the stage, and she married a fellow actor, Henry Green, in
1747. Her first appearance on the London stage seems to have been at the age of sixteen
on March 1st 1735, on the occasion of her father’s benefit, when she played the role of
Cherry in The Stratagem, and her final one was on May 26th 1780, as Mrs. Hardcastle in
Goldsmith’s She Stoops to Conquer. Over the course of her forty-five year career, Jane
Hippisley played at least 83 different roles in the principal theatres of London and
Dublin, as well as summers seasons spent in the provinces—over the years she played
frequently at Bristol and Bath, with some appearances at Ipswich earlier on in her career.
The reason that there is some doubt over the date of her first performance is that
the actress who played Cherry at John Hippisley’s benefit of March 1735 is advertised
simply as “Hippisley’s daughter”; Jane did have two sisters, who also became actresses,
but as she was the eldest, the assumption is that this notice refers to her. There is also
194
some confusion over which one of John Hippisley’s daughters acted which roles during
the 1741-42 season since both Jane and her sister Elizabeth belonged to the Goodman’s
Fields company at this time and they had very similar lines; however after this season
Elizabeth moved to Covent Garden while Jane stayed with Henry Giffard’s company.
The third of Hippisley’s daughters, who became a Mrs. Fitzmaurice, does not appear ever
to have acted in London, but worked in Bath, York and Edinburgh; there is no known
record of her first name. As can be seen in Table 5 below, Jane Hippisley moved
between a number of different theatres over the course of her forty-five year career.
Table 5.
Jane Green – known employment.
Year
Theatre
1735 -36
1740
Covent
Garden
Drury Lane
1740-41
Goodman’s
Fields
Henry
Giffard
London
1741-42
Goodman's
Fields
Henry
Giffard
London
1742-43
Linclon's
Inn Fields
Henry
Giffard
London
1745-46
Goodman's
Fields
Henry
Giffard
London
1747-51
Drury Lane
1751
Orchard St.
Theatre
Manager
City
Summer
season
Stage debut,
aged 16.
London
London
David
Garrick
London
Bath
Personal
Ipswich
Jacob's Wells,
Bristol
Jacob's Wells,
Bristol
June 1747,
marries
Henry
Green.
February
1748, her
father dies.
195
1752-54
1754-80
1791
Smock
Alley
Covent
Garden
Dublin
London
Jacob's Wells,
Bristol - until
1766; then at
King's Street
until 1772.
Retires
from the
stage May
26th 1780,
aged 61.
Dies in
Bristol on
st
August 21 ,
aged 72.
Some of Mrs. Green’s movements between venues can be explained by family
connections and others by her own decisions. In addition to working on stage in London,
John Hippisley also owned and ran a theatre at Jacob’s Wells in Bristol from 1729 until
his death in 1748—he bequeathed this, and most of the rest of his property, to his long
term mistress, Mary Charley, even though his legal wife was still living. Jane Hippisley
seems to have got on well with her father, his will refers to her as “my dear Jane,” and
she spent many summer seasons working at his theatre in Bristol.138 When she married
fellow actor Henry Green in June of 1747 the Bristol connection continued—he
performed with the Drury Lane Company in London, but only in minor roles, and worked
the summers in Hippisley’s Jacob’s Wells theatre from 1741 onwards. The likelihood is
that Jane Hippisley and Henry Green became acquainted during the Bristol summer
seasons.
Mrs. Green joined David Garrick’s company at Drury Lane in 1747 and remained
there until then end of the 1750-51 season but did not return for the 1751-52 season; the
decision not to continue with Drury Lane beyond this date appears to have been her own.
138
This quotation from John Hippisley’s will is taken from the Biographical Dictionary 6:331.
196
The Biographical Dictionary quotes an entry from the diary of prompter Richard Cross
for September 26th 1751
Mrs. Green went to Bath to play & left us—O fool.
(6: 330)
Unfortunately, Cross offers no indication as to why Mrs. Green would so choose; the
Biographical Dictionary (6: 330) suggests that Mrs. Green’s move to Bath and then to
Smock Alley in 1752 appears to be connected to her husband’s career rather than her
own. This seems quite likely as Henry Green’s career seems to have been more and more
in the provinces from 1745 onwards, and while the distance between London and Bristol
is not great, once he made the decision to try Dublin maintaining the marriage would
have been much more difficult. Jane Green returned to London, to the Covent Garden
Company, in 1754 but whether her husband was with her is not known—he does not
appear again in any extant cast lists after the seasons at Smock Alley.
Few personal details of Jane Green survive—we know nothing of her relationship
with her husband; she did have three sons Charles, John Hippisley, and Henry who are
mentioned in her will, and possibly a daughter who predeceased her, but we have no
dates of birth for her children or any account of them other than a mention of the eldest
son in her obituary in the Bristol Journal. An anonymous Theatrical Biography,
published in 1772, suggested that Mrs. Green had a relationship with David Garrick that
resulted in the birth of a son but proof of this allegation has never been found.139 This
gossipy work states that
Mrs. Green, difficult as it may be believed at present, from the
139
Theatrical biography: or, memoirs of the principal performers of the three Theatres Royal ... Together
with critical and impartial remarks on their respective professional merits. ... (London printed; and Dublin
re-printed for H. Saunders, E. Lynch, W. Sleater, D. Chamberlaine, J. Potts, J. Williams, W. Wilson, R.
Moncrieffe, T. Walker, L. Flin, and C. Jenkin 1772). 2: 19-21.
197
unwieldiness of her figure, and want of personal charms, captivated
the heart of her theatrical sovereign: who then could be obdurate when
Rocius made love? . . . —a chopping boy bore witness to their
loves,—whose death is since to be lamented, both on a private and
public account . . .
This union, however, has been long since dissolved, nor has even the
scandalous chronicle ever spoke of any other on the part of the lady:
ill nature might say she carries her protection about her . . . (p. 20)
There were rumors that the young actor Samuel Cautherley (d. 1805) was in fact
Garrick’s illegitimate son but this seems to be the only source which suggests that Jane
Green might have been his mother.
Although there are few reliable comments extant on Jane Green’s personal life,
we do have a certain amount of detail on the roles she played, particularly those from her
London years. As can been seen from Table 6, she specialized in comedy, playing
mainly roles that were companions or confidants to the leading lady.
Table 6.
Jane Green’s known new roles, by year.
First year
of role
1735
1736
1740-41
Role
Cherry
Rose
Prue
Jenny
Ann Page
Lucy
Cleone
Situp
Play
The Strategem
The Recruiting Officer
Love for Love
The Provok'd Husband
The Merry Wives of Windsor
The Virgin Unmask'd
The Distrest Mother
The Double Gallant
198
1741-42
1742-43
1747-51
Ophelia
Penelope
Hoyden
Hamlet
Tunbridge Wells
The Relapse
Follower of Hymen
Perdita
Mrs. Vixen
Angelina
Beatrice
Mathilda
Colombine
Diana
Harriet
Cloe
Lucy
Lappet
Inis
Maria
Patch
Edging
Prince Edward
Serina
Jane
Kitty Pry
Lavinia
Sylvia
Foible
Arante
Lucilla
Wheedle
Mrs. Pincushion
Armelina
Florella
Lucetta
Mrs. Slammekin
Dorinda
Lettice
Corinna
The Imprisonment, Release, Adventures,
and Marriage of Harlequin
The Winter's Tale
The Beggar's Opera
Love Makes a Man
The Anatomist
King Arthur
Harlequin Student
All's Well that Ends Well
The Miser
Timon of Athens
Lethe
The Miser
The Wonder
George Barnwell
The Busy Body
The Careless Husband
Richard III
The Orphan
Pamela
The Lying Valet
The Fair Penitent
The Old Batchelor
The Way of the World
King Lear
The Fair Penitent
The Miser
The Mock Doctor
Albumazar
The Orphan
The Suspicious Husband
The Beggar's Opera
The Tempest
The School Boy
The Confederacy
199
1754-80
Flora
Peggy
Margaret
Mopsophil
Mrs. Fardingale
Mrs. Tatoo
Ismene
Lucy
Dorcas
Maria
Lady Dove
Mrs. Cross
Flippanta
Mrs. Cadwallader
Ursula
Old Lady Lambert
Lucinda
Mrs. Heidelberg
Filagree
Johayma
Mrs. Grub
Lady Wrangle
Lady Froth
Lady Strangeways
Miss Harlow
Tag
Margery
Dorcas
Mrs. Sneak
the Mother
Mrs. Malaprop
The Duenna
Mrs. Hardcastle
Mrs. Garnet
Mrs. Markam
Mrs. Western
Catherine Rouge
Lady Bauble
She Wou'd and She Wou'd Not
The Miller of Mansfield
A New Way to Pay Old Debts
The Emperour of the Moon
The Funeral
Lethe
Merope
The London Merchant
The Mock Doctor
Twelfth Night
The Brothers
Man and Wife
The Confederacy
The Author
The Padlock
The Hypocrite
The Englishman Returned from Paris
The Clandestine Marriage
A Trip to Scotland
Don Sebastian, King of Portugal
Cross Purposes
The Refusal
The Double Dealer
The Romance of an Hour
The Old Maid
Miss in her Teens
Love in a Village
Thomas and Sally
The Mayor of Garratt
The Chances
The Rivals
The Duenna
She Stoops to Conquer
The Good-Natured Man
A Wife in the Right
Tom Jones
The Invasion
The Duellist
200
As an indication of Mrs. Green’s workload, Table 7 provides a list of her known
performances for the 1757-1758 season.
Table 7.
Jane Green’s known performances 1757-1758.
Date
Role
1757
September
14
21
26
28
Play
Foible
The Way of
the World
Jenny
The
Provok'd
Husband
Afterpiece
Plays in which
Mrs. Green
did not
perform
Afterpieces
with no
known cast
14th - The
Country Lasses
The Committee
The Funeral
The Merchant
of Venice
30
October
The Earl of
Essex
Loves of
Pluto and
Persephone
8
Hamlet
10
As you like it
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
The Beggar's
Opera
The Twin
Rivals
Oroonoko
Harlequin
3
5
7
12
13
14
15
Henry IV
Sherry
Prue
The
Stratagem
Love for
Love
201
Wit without
Money
17
19
20
21
The Rover
The Double
Gallant
Fine Lady
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Lethe
23
She Wou'd
and She wou'd
not
The Merry
Wives of
Windsor
24
She wou'd and
she wou'd not
Orpheus &
Eurydice
25
She wou'd and
she wou'd not
Harlequin
Sorcerer
22
26
Jenny
The
Provok'd
Husband
27
28
The NonJuror
The Inconstant
29
Hamlet
31
The Refusal
The Beggar's
Opera
November
2
Rose
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
The Beggar's
Opera
4
5
8
9
Orpheus &
Eurydice
The
Recruiting
Officer
3
7
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Fine Lady
Lethe
Tamerlane
Henry V
Love Makes a
Man
The Merry
Wives of
Windsor
The London
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Harlequin
202
Cuckholds
The Twin
Rivals
Richard III
Wit without
money
The Concious
Lovers
10
11
12
14
15
16
Foible
Fine Lady
The Way of
the World
Lethe
22
23
Fine Lady
Lappet
Lethe
King Henry IV
Oronooko
The Orphan
Henry V
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Harlequin
Sorcerer
She wou'd and
she wou'd not
The Country
Lasses
29
30
December
1
Fine Lady
Lethe
3
6
7
The Rover
The Committee
The Earl of
Essex
The Miser
26
28
5
Orpheus &
Eurydice
The
Suspicious
Husband
24
25
2
Othello
Henry IV Pt 1
Nell
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
17
18
19
21
Sorcerer
Lucy
The Virgin
Unmask'd
The Spanish
Fryar
The Mourning
Bride
The Spanish
Fryar
King Lear
The Merchant
of Venice
Romeo and
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
203
Juliet
The Twin
Rivals
The Distressed
Mother
Macbeth
Othello
8
9
10
12
13
14
15
Fine Lady
Lethe
17
Lappet
19
Prue
The Miser
Love for
Love
The Inconstant
Theodosius
The Conscious
Lovers
Romeo and
Juliet
The Rival
Queens
20
21
Nell
22
Fine Lady
23
Sherry +
Lucy
24
27
28
1758
January
The
Suspicious
Husband
Lethe
The
Stratagem
The Rival
Queens
The Virgin
Unmask'd
The Beggar's
Opera
Romeo and
Juliet
Henry V
9
10
The Rival
Queens
The Merry
Wives of
Windsor
The Spanush
Fryar
King Lear
11
Alzira
6
7
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
204
12
13
14
16
Henry Iv, Pt 1
Alzira
Jenny
Fine Lady
The
Provok'd
Husband
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Lethe
The Earl of
Essex
She wou'd and
she wou'd not
Love makes a
man
17
18
19
20
21
The Refusal
Hamlet
As You Like It
23
24
The Orphan
The Rehersal
Fine Lady
25
26
27
28
31
February
1
2
3
4
6
7
9
10
11
13
14
Lethe
The Committee
Catherine
Catherine &
Petruchio
Oronooko
Mariamne
Mariamne
Mariamne
The Prophetess
Mariamne
The Prophetess
The Prophetess
The Prophetess
Catherine
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Catherine &
The Prophetess
Petruchio
The Prophetess
The Triumph of
time and truth
Mariamne
The Prophetess
Romeo and
Juliet
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
205
15
16
18
20
21
22
23
24
25
27
28
March
1
2
Fine Lady
Lethe
Jeptha
The Prophetess
Judas
Maccabeus
Mariamne
The Prophetess
Macbeth
Judas
Maccabeus
All for Love
The Messiah
3
4
6
7
8
9
10
11
13
14
15
16
29
30
The Triumph of
time and truth
The Prophetess
King Lear
The Prophetess
Othello
Belshazzar
The Prophetess
Israel in Egypt
The Rival
Queens
The Prophetess
Hamlet
Damaris
Fine Lady
Not
named
The
Amorous
Widow
Lethe
Richard III
Coriolanus
The Messiah
Douglas
The Messiah
Theodosius
Romeo and
Juliet
The Rival
Queens
The
The Siege of
Anniversary Damascus
The Beggar's
Harlequin
Sorcerer
206
Opera
31
April
The Prophetess
1
3
4
The Rover
Betty
Fine Lady
A bold
stroke for a
wife
Lethe
Jenny
6
7
8
10
11
Betty
12
13
14
Fine Lady
Lethe
15
Betty
A bold
stroke for a
wife
17
Catherine
Betty
Harlequin
Sorcerer
King Lear
The Stratagem
Anna Bullen
Henry IV Pt II
The Fair
Penitent
Henry V
Julius Caesar
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Catherine &
King John
Petruchio
A bold
stroke for a
wife
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Alzira
Coriolanus
Fardingale The Funeral
The Merry
Wives of
Windsor
Hamlet
22
24
25
26
Othello
The
Provok'd
Husband
A bold
stroke for a
wife
5
18
19
20
21
Philis
Harlequin
Sorcerer
The
Conscious
Lovers
The Prophetess
207
27
Fine Lady
28
Damaris
29
May
1
Catherine
Lethe
The
Amorous
Widow
Catherine & The Spanish
Petruchio
Fryar
2
3
Fine Lady
Lethe
4
5
6
8
9
10
Betty
Lappet
Macbeth
The Double
Gallant
The Earl of
Essex
The Siege of
Damascus
The Country
Lasses
A bold
stroke for a
wife
The Miser
Love for Love
Theodosius
Wit without
money
The Committee
11
12
15
Love makes a
man
Betty
A bold
stroke for a
wife
16
Henry IV Pt I
18
Hamlet
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
Harlequin
Sorcerer
208
Kitty Clive (née Raftor) (1711-1785)
Born in London, to an Irish father and English mother, Catherine Raftor began her
theatrical career on the stage of Drury Lane in 1728, at the age of seventeen. Her last
performance was on April 24th, 1769—other than two seasons at Covent Garden, and a
summer in Dublin, she spent the rest of her forty-one year career at Drury Lane. Over
this time she played one hundred and eighty different roles, both acting and singing, and
rose to be one of London’s most celebrated comic actresses and best-known personages.
Miss Raftor became Mrs. Clive in October 1733, when she married George Clive
who was of a wealthy and well-connected family.140 The marriage did not however last
very long; the couple appears to have separated after a year or two, though they never
divorced and Catherine kept the name Clive. Other significant men in her life were the
playwright Henry Fielding, manager/actor/playwright David Garrick, and the author
Horace Walpole. Mrs. Clive worked closely with Fielding and Garrick, and as far as can
be judged, her relationship with both was entirely professional, but her personal, though
apparently purely platonic, relationship with Walpole is less easy to explain. According
to the Biographical Dictionary (3: 354) their mutual attraction had begun perhaps as
early as 1738 and Walpole mentions Mrs. Clive in a letter to Lord Lincoln in 1741. She
appears to have set up a residence at Marble Hill in Twickenham, near Walpole’s home at
Strawberry Hill, circa 1749—though she maintained lodgings in town near her work—
and in 1754 she moved to a cottage called “Little Strawberry Hill” on his property. After
Mrs. Clive’s retirement from the stage in 1769 she lived at “Clive-den”, as Walpole
christened the house, until her death in 1785. Horace Walpole was known for his
140
His father, also George, was appointed Cursitor Baron of the Exchequer in 1735 and his cousin Robert
would become the 1st Baron Clive, the famous “Clive of India” renowned for his defeat of the Nawab of
Bengal at the Battle of Plassey in 1757 which helped establish British authority in India.
209
snobbery and elitist views, while Kitty Clive was renowned not only for her talents as
actress and singer on the London stage—neither a particularly respectable profession—
but for her temper and her loud personality; the basis of the connection between these
two was never an obvious one but their relationship was long lasting and obviously
satisfying to both. Unlike many of her fellow actresses, Kitty Clive’s personal reputation
was rarely, if ever, attacked—other than her marriage to George Clive and her platonic
relationship with Horace Walpole her name does not appear ever to have been linked
with that of another man.
Although Mrs. Clive did not perform a particularly wide range of roles, she was
one of the most influential actresses of her time, and a “personality” who occasioned
considerable comment from contemporary writers and newspapers. Her forte was
comedy, though she did make occasional forays into tragedy, usually with less than
pleasing results; her style of playing, combined with her excellent singing voice made her
perfect for many leading roles in the afterpieces which formed a significant part of her
repertoire.
Contemporary accounts
The only contemporary account which deals with Mrs. Clive’s personal
background is that by W.R. Chetwood, published in 1749.141 He devotes three pages of
his history to Mrs. Clive and since the work was published when she not only alive, but
exceedingly successful, then we may reasonably assume that Chetwood’s account is
141
William Rufus Chetwood A general history of the stage, from its origin in Greece down to the present
time. … Collected and digested by W.R. Chetwood (London: W. Owen, 1749). The discussion of Mrs.
Clive is on pp. 126-128.
210
either the truth or the truth she wished to be told—unfortunately, there is no way of
knowing whether or which.
According to Chetwood, Miss Raftor’s father, William, was a lawyer from a
wealthy family in Kilkenny, Ireland who lost his “Paternal estate” due to his allegiance to
King James II—her brother, James Raftor, tried unsuccessfully to reclaim the family’s
property in Ireland. William Raftor gained a pardon after the Battle of the Boyne in 1690
and came to live in London where he married a well-to-do woman, one Mrs. Daniel of
Fishstreet Hill. From these beginnings, a future career in the theatre does not seem an
obvious choice for Catherine Raftor, and Chetwood provides no real explanation of how
this came about. He says only that she told him how she and her friend Miss Johnson—
who would later become the first Mrs. Theophilus Cibber—would “tag after the
celebrated Mr. Wilks” in the street. Then without any description of how Miss Raftor
actually came to be introduced to the management at Drury Lane, Chetwood tells us that
Miss Raftor had a facetious Turn of Humour, and infinite Spirits,
with a Voice and Manner in singing Songs of Pleasantry peculiar
to herself. Those Talents Mr. Theo. Cibber and I (we all at that Time
living together in one House) thought a sufficient Pasport to the
Theatre. We recommended her to the Laureat, whose infallible
Judgment soon found out her Excellencies; and the Moment he
heard her sing, out her down in the List of Performers at twenty
Shillings per week. But never any Person of her Age flew to
Perfection with such Rapidity; and the old discerning Managers
always distiinguish’d Merit by Reward. (p. 127)
211
He goes on to give her first role as Ismenes, a page dressed in “Boy’s Cloaths”, in
Mithridates, King of Pontius, in which she sang and was received “with extraordinary
applause”. Chetwood does not give a date for this performance, but Mithridates was
performed only once in 1728, on April 13, and the playbill does not mention Miss
Raftor—this does not necessarily mean that she did not perform at this time. Since she
was new and in a very minor part she was probably omitted from the cast list.142 She
does, however, appear on the Drury Lane roster for the 1728-29 season onwards, where,
as Chetwood says
But after this, like a Bullet in the Air, there was no distinguishing
the Track, till it came to its utmost Execution. (p.127)
He was correct; Miss Raftor rose rapidly through the ranks at Drury Lane and then
remained at the top of her profession for several decades.143
The only other role of hers that Chetwood discusses is that of Phillida in Colley
Cibber’s pastoral opera Love in a Riddle, which premiered on January 7th 1729.
According to Chetwood, Miss Raftor’s appearance saved the house from a riot; her
popularity with audiences was assured but she was unable to save the play as it received
only that one performance. He closes with the information that Miss Raftor married Mr.
G. Clive in 1732—though this date is unlikely to be correct since she was advertised as
“Miss Raftor” up to the beginning of October 1733—and gives only one comment on her
marriage
142
There is also a possibility that Chetwood is describing the reaction to Miss Raftor’s first performance in
the light of her subsequent success rather than giving a precise memory of the occasion; he was writing in
1749, when Mrs. Clive had been on the stage for twenty-one years and was one of London’s leading
actresses.
143
Kitty Clive’s position at Drury Lane was not always maintained easily or without conflict, her
interactions with fellow actors and management are discussed in detail later in this chapter, on pages 225228 and 232-234.
212
I shall be silent in conjugal Affairs; but in all my long
Acquaintance with her, I could never imagine she deserved
ill Usage. (p. 128)
Although this statement implies Mrs. Clive’s ill-treatment by her husband there is no
extant account of their relationship, nor any suggestion as to why the marriage failed so
swiftly. According to the Biographical Dictionary (3:345) circa 1769 Mrs. Clive’s
reaction to news of her husband from David Garrick was that
You are very much mistaken if you imagine that I shall be sorry
to hear Mr. Clive is well; I thank God I have no malice or hatred
to anybody; besides it is so long ago since I thought he used me ill,
that I quiet forgot it. I am very glad he is well and happy.
The impression here is one of a successful and self-assured woman who has moved on,
possibly mellowed, and is both willing and able to leave her past behind her.
Although Chetwood is the only contemporary author to give any details of Mrs.
Clive’s personal family life, there are a number of other theatrical accounts and
biographies which do discuss her professional activities and relationships with other
performers. One of these is a life of the comedian James Quin, published in 1766, which
devotes a chapter to Quin’s relationship with the other leading players of his time—Mr.
Barry, Mrs. Cibber, Mrs. Woffington, Mrs. Pritchard, and Mrs. Clive.144 The author of
this work tells that Mrs. Clive “displayed a very early inclination and genius for the
stage;” that her first appearance was as a page in Mithridates, King of Pontius where she
sang only one song but received “great applause;” and that she was the only good part of
144
The Life of Mr. James Quin, comedian. With the history of the stage from his commencing actor to his
retreat to Bath (London: printed for S. Bladon, 1766).
213
Cibber’s Love in a Riddle (p. 69)—all of which confirms Chetwood’s account, from
which it may have been copied. He does, however, include more detail on the first role in
which she made a huge impact on the audience
In the year 1730 she had an opportunity of displaying most amazing comic
powers, in the character of Nell in the Devil to Pay. Her merit in this character
occasioned her salary to be doubled, and not only established her own
her own reputation with the audience, but fixed the piece itself on the
constant list of acting farces; an honour which, perhaps, it would never
have arrived at, had she not performed the capital character in it, nor
may long maintain, when her support in it is lost.
(p. 69)
Unfortunately no records survive to substantiate the claim that Mrs. Clive’s salary was
doubled after her performance in The Devil to Pay—an afterpiece by Charles Coffey
which was her fourteenth such role in her third season with the Drury Lane Company—
but such an increase seems highly unlikely. As is documented in Table 8, p. 210, Mrs.
Clive rose quickly but steadily within the company; her roles in the 1730-31 season after
The Devil to Pay do not show the sort of meteoric rise that might be expected if such a
salary increase had indeed occurred. The piece itself was indeed very popular and
whether or not Mrs. Clive was responsible for its initial success, it continued in the
repertory for the rest of the eighteenth-century.
Quin’s biographer then comments on the relationship between the comedian and
Mrs. Clive, saying that “they could never agree while they were united in the same
company” (p. 69) and goes on to decry his subject’s attitude towards both Mrs. Clive and
“the ladies” in general, explaining the roots of Quin’s dislike of Kitty Clive:
214
the first disgust Quin took to this lady, was upon his offering some
indecencies to her in her dressing-room; she made a complaint to
the manager, who rebuked him for his conduct. This lady’s virtue
had never been impeached, and he ought not therefore to have
supposed, that so brutish an attack, as it is said, he made upon her,
could meet with success;
(pp. 70-71)
Presumably this incident, if it did occur, took place when James Quin joined the Drury
Lane Company in 1734, at which time he was a seasoned actor, aged 41, with a
reputation for a fiery and sometimes violent temper whereas Kitty Clive was 23 years old
and only in the sixth year of her career.145 The manner in which she is supposed to have
dealt with Quin’s advances is indicative of the character she would show throughout her
career—a strong personality who had disagreements with fellow performers, and at times
the company management, but who did not allow such things to interfere with her
performances on stage or the development of her career as a whole.
Another positive endorsement of Mrs. Clive, at roughly the same time that this
incident was supposed to have taken place, comes from the author Henry Fielding in his
preface to The Intriguing Chambermaid—an afterpiece first performed, and printed, in
1734 written specifically for her—which takes the form of a four page “Epistle to Mrs.
Clive.” Fielding takes the first page to explain that such epistles as he is writing are too
often full of gross flattery and reflect no credit either on the author or the recipient, but
that he is not afraid to criticize or praise when either is truly deserved.
145
Quin probably began his career on the Dublin stage, at Smock Alley, and was at Drury Lane from 1715
and by the time he met Mrs. Clive had been involved two separate incidents which had resulted in the death
of his opponents—both fellow actors. The Biographical Dictionary 12: 226-242 gives the details of James
Quin’s life and career.
215
The epistle is of particular interest when looking at the career of Kitty Clive not
just because of its author but because of what he chooses to say. This is not just the
standard “rave review” for the theatrical talents of a leading actress but a piece which
attempts to establish her personal character and situate her in a broader theatrical context
than that in which she may have previously been considered by her audience:
It is your Misfortune to bring the greatest Genius for acting on the Stage,
at a time when the Factions and Divisions among the Players have
conspired with the Folly, Injustice, and Barbarity of the Town, to
finish the Ruin of the Stage, and sacrifice our own native Entertainments
to a wanton affected Fondness for foreign Musick; and when our
Nobility seem eager to rival each other, in distinguishing themselves
in favour of Italian theatres, and in neglect of our own.
……………………………………………………………………………
But as great a Favourite as you at present are with the Audience, you
would be much more so, were they acquainted with your private character;
cou’d they see you laying out great part of the Profits which arise to you
from entertaining them so well, in the support of an aged Father; did they
see you who can charm them on the Stage with personating the foolish and
vicious Characters of your Sex, acting in real Life the Part of the best Wife,
the best Daughter, the best Sister, and the best Friend.
The Part you have maintain’d in the present Dispute between the Players
and the Patentees, is so full of Honour, that had it been in higher Life, it
would have given you the Reputation of the greatest Heroine of the Age.
216
You looked on the cases of Mr. Highmore and Mrs. Wilks with Compassion . . .
In short, if Honour, Good-nature, Gratitude, and Good Sense, join’d with the
most entertaining Humour, wherever they are found, are Title to publick
Esteem, I think you may be sure of it; at least. I am sure they will always
recommend you to the sincere Friendship of,
MADAM,
Your most oblig’d humble Servant,
HENRY FIELDING
The conflict to which Fielding is referring is the defection of many of the senior actors
from Drury Lane, led by Theophilius Cibber, in protest of the management style of John
Highmore who, with Robert Wilks’ widow, held the Drury Lane patent. Highmore was
an amateur who was “dabbling” in theatre, unlike Cibber who—however reprehensible
his character—and been born and bred in the London theatre world. As Hume points out,
there must have been considerable general dissatisfaction on the part of the majority of
the company when they followed Cibber away from the patent company.146 T. Cibber’s
mutterings of discontent changed to outright rebellion when his father, Colley Cibber,
sold his entire share of the patent to Highmore and then Highmore refused T. Cibber’s
offer to be deputy manager running the day-to-day operations of the theatre.147
Virtually the only star performer to remain with Highmore was Mrs. Clive. Why
did she choose to stay with the Drury Lane Company when most of her fellow actors
chose to leave? Unfortunately we have no definite answer to this question, though there
are a number of factors which may have influenced her decision. She may have done so
146
Robert D. Hume Henry Fielding and the London Theatre 1728-1737 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988)
p. 157.
147
Ibid. pp. 155-164 gives a detailed explanation of Cibber’s plan for a new company.
217
partly from a residual loyalty to Robert Wilks whom she had greatly admired, but this
does not seem sufficient motivation for a woman who took her profession very seriously.
Another possibility is that she felt safer staying with the patent company rather than
risking the unknown but this too seems rather unlikely—Mrs. Clive had only been with
Drury Lane for five years but was already one of their most popular and valuable
performers who was well aware of her own worth. An additional suggestion is that she
was motivated by her distrust and dislike of T. Cibber—he had been married to her
fellow actress and friend Jane Johnson who died in childbirth on January 25th 1733, just
two months before the actors rebellion— and Mrs. Clive was therefore unwilling to place
her career in his hands. The depth of the dislike between Cibber and Mrs. Clive at this
time is not known, nor is it possible to gauge the extent to which she would have allowed
her personal feelings to override her professional self-interest.
The reasons behind Kitty Clive’s decision to remain at Drury Lane may be due to
one of these factors, or a combination of all, or may owe nothing to any of them. As we
have no extant letters or reports on her thoughts on the matter we can only speculate
rather than provide a definitive answer but her choice, given the circumstances, seems
rather puzzling.
The championing of Mrs. Clive in this epistle may have been an attempt on the
part of Fielding to counteract the growing public perception of her as a difficult and
irascible person who showed little thought or consideration for others. Fielding worked
very well with Mrs. Clive and created a number of roles especially for her, in both main
and afterpieces.148 Her talents lay in comedy and singing, and at least early in her career
148
Fielding wrote the part of Isabel in The Old Debauchees, Kisinda in The Covent Garden Tragedy, the
chambermaid in The Intriguing Chambermaid, and Lappet in The Miser, for Mrs. Clive.
218
she specialized in the pert and saucy maid/companion roles; although her range of comic
roles did change to a certain degree as she aged, these were the type of roles for which
she was remembered.
Mrs. Clive’s roles.
As a comic actress with a good singing voice, Kitty Clive not only played leading
roles in mainpieces but was also the mainstay of many of Drury Lane’s very popular
afterpieces. Her first documented role however was not a comic one—Mrs Clive’s first
full season with Drury Lane debuted with Bianca in Othello—but this was one of the few
roles in tragedy that she would perform. As can be seen from Table 8 below, she quickly
became established as a comedy specialist; the seasons when she acted principally in
afterpieces do not reflect any decline in popularity but rather periods when the company
was performing mainly tragedies—for example, in February 1739 the tragedy Mustapha
ran for 12 nights—and Mrs. Clive was sensibly cast where she would have greatest
effect.
One of the few exceptions to Kitty Clive’s comedy “rule” was the part of Ophelia
in Hamlet, which she first played in 1734 aged twenty-three—when she could reasonably
have been cast against type simply for her youth—but she was still performing the role in
1741 at the age of thirty. Given her rise within the company during this time, by 1741
she would have been in a position to decline roles she felt were unsuitable, this retention
would seem to indicate that Ophelia was a personal favorite; perhaps a tragic role which
she knew well was a welcome change of pace from the saucy characters in farce that had
become her stock-in-trade.
219
Table 8.
Mrs. Clive’s new roles per season.
Notes:
1. DL after the date signifies that she acted this season at Drury Lane.
CG after the date signifies that she acted this season at Covent Garden.
2. Column 3 lists the mainpieces in which she appeared whether they were straight acting
roles or involved some form of music.
3. Titles in bold denote new works.
Season
1728-29
(DL)
Role
Bianca
Minerva
Dorinda
Honoria
Rosella
Valeria
Flora
Bonvira
Phebe
Arethusa
Maria
Phillida
1729-30
(DL)
Night
Kitty
Isabella
Rosella
Dulceda
Serena
The Fairy
Queen
Jenny
Prue
Peggy
1730-31
(DL)
Procris
Dorinda
Phillida
Play/Opera
Afterpiece
Othello
Perseus &
Andromeda
The Tempest
Love Makes a Man
The Village Opera
The Rover
The Lover's Opera
The History of Bonduca
Phebe, or, The
Beggar's Wedding
The Contrivances
Whig and Tory
Love in a Riddle
The Comical
Distress of Pierot
The Humours of Oxford
The Stage Coach
Opera
The Chambermaid
Baye's Opera
The Orphan
The Fairy Queen
The Provok'd Husband
Love for Love
The Fair Foundling
Cephalus & Procris
The Tempest
Damon & Phillida
220
Jenny
Rachel
Annie
Farcia
1731-32
(DL)
The Amours of
Billingsgate
The Jovial Crew
The Jovial Crew
Baye's Opera
The What D'Ye Call
It
Kitty
Nanny
Urania
Nell
The Highland Fair
The Triumphs of Honour
Miss Littlewit
Miss Sprightly
Busy
Bartholmew Fair
The Tragedy of Tragedies
The Man of Mode
The Devil to Pay
The Country
Wedding
The Devil of a
Duke
The Comical
Revenge
Margery
Flametta
Martin's wife
Isabel
The Old Debauchees
The Covent Garden
Tragedy
The Lottery
The Ephesian
Matron
The Mock Doctor
Kisinda
Chloe
Not named
Dorcas
Polly
1732-33
(DL)
Silvia
Leonora
Cyndaria
Thalia
Edging
Deborah
Belnda
Mrs. Fanciful
Aranthes
Cicely
Jenny
Thirsis
The Beggar's Opera
The Old Batchelor
Sir Courtly Nice
The Indian Emperour
The Judgement of Paris
The Careless Husband
Deborah; or, A Wife for You
All
The Man of Mode
The Imaginary Cuckholds
Theodosia
Wat Tyler
The Boarding School
Damon and Daphne
221
1733-34
(DL)
Philis
Venus
Lappet
The Miser
Estifania
Rule a Wife and Have a Wife
Diana
Elvira
Kitty
Dollalolla
Miranda
Mercury
1734-35
(DL)
Harlequin Doctor
Faustus
The Spanish Fryar
The Harlot's Progress
The Opera of Opera's
The Busy Body
Timon in Love
the
Chambermaid
Columbine
Fillipanta
The Confederacy
Primose
The Mother-in-law
Lucy
Mrs.
Pinchwife
Maragret
Lady Wou'dbe
Nell
Maria
Cherry
Ophelia
A spirit
Hoyden
1735-36
(DL)
The Livery Rake
Cupid and Hymen
Doll Common
Lady Froth
Lady Sadlife
Aurelia
Flavia
Clymene
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
Cupid and Psyche
The Virgin
Unmask'd, or, An
Old Man Taught
Wisdom
The Country Wife
A Cure for a Scold
Volpone
The Merry Cobbler
The Man of Taste, or, The
Guardian
The Strategem
Hamlet
Merlin, or, The
Devil of Stonehenge
The Relapse
The Alchemist
The Double Dealer
The Double Gallant
The Twin Rivals
The Connoisseur
The Fall of
222
Phaeton
1736-37
(DL)
Biddy
Lady Fanciful
Phaedra
The Tender Husband
The Provok'd Wife
Amphitryon
Isabella
Arabella
Ghost of
Statira
the Wanton
Wife
The Squire of Alsatia
The Wife's Relief
Eurydice
Liberia
Lady Fanciful
1737-38
(DL)
1738-39
(DL)
1739-40
(DL)
1740-41
(DL)
The Rival Queens
The Amorous Widow
Eurydice, or, The
devil Henpeck'd
The Universal Passion
The Provok'd Wife
Narcissa
Laetitia
Doris
Olivia
Miss Kitty
Violetta
Miss Kitty
Euphrosyne
Love's Last Shift
The Old Bachelor
Aesop
The Plain Dealer
Viletta
Hillaria
Ann Lovely
Loveit
Miss Notable
She Wou'd and She Wou'd Not
Tunbridge Walks
A Bold Stroke for a Wife
The Man of Mode
The Lady's Last Stake
The Coffee House
Art and Nature
Sir Cockle at Court
Comus (masque)
An Hospital for
Fools
Britons Strike
Home
the Daughter
Kitty
Milliamant
The Way of the World
Manto
Emilia
Caelia
Olivia
Lady Townley
Rosamond
Oedipus, King of Thebes
A Fond Husband
As You Like It
Twelfth Night
The Provok'd Husband
Rosamond
223
Bessy
Portia
1741-42
(DL)
1742-43
(DL)
1743-44
(CG)
The Blind Beggar of
Bethnal Green
The Merchant of Venice
Lady Lurewell
Pallas
Lucy
The Constant Couple
The Judgement of Paris
Dalila
Not named
Not named
Kitty
Bayes
Samson
Messiah
L'Allegro
Miss Lucy in Town
The Lying Valet
The Rehearsal
the Shade of
Hero
The Necromancer
Orpheus &
Eurydice
Rhodope
1744-45
(CG)
1745-46
(DL)
1746-47
(DL)
1747-48
(DL)
1748-49
(DL)
1749-50
Morayma
Don Sebastian, King of
Portugal
Lucy
Melissa
The Beggar's Opera
Timon of Athens
Ariel
The Tempest
Harlequin
Incendiary
Columbine
Melantha
Lucinda
Clarinda
The Comical Lovers
The She Gallant
The Commonwealth of Women
Sophronia
Betty
The Refusal
Marry or Do Worse
Margery
Lady
Wronghead
Tag
Mrs. Riot
a Shepherdess
Clarinda
Lady Harriet
The Dragon of
Wantley
The Provok'd Husband
Miss in Her Teens
Lethe
The Triumph of
Peace
The Suspicious Husband
The Funeral
224
(DL)
Pastora
Lady
Squeamish
The Chaplet
Friendship in Fashion
Bayes in Petticoats
**
Bayes
1750-51
(DL)
1751-52
(DL)
1752-53
(DL)
1753-54
(DL)
1754-55
(DL)
1755-56
(DL)
1756-57
(DL)
1757-58
(DL)
1758-59
(DL)
1759-60
(DL)
1760-61
Diana
Bisarre
Girtred
Secular Masque
The Inconstant
Eastward Hoe
The Shepherd's
Lottery
Daphne
Mrs. Marwood
Lady Haughty
Zara
"Herself"
The Way of the World
Epicoene
The Mourning Bride
Mrs. Frail
Pricess
Theoraz
Love for Love
Abigail
Jacintha
the Mother
Mrs. Kitely
The Drummer
The Mistake
The Chances
Every Man in His Humour
Catherine
Lady
Wronglove
Flora
Mrs.
Cadwallader
A Lick at the Town
The London 'Prentice
Catherine and
Petruchio
The Lady's Last Stake
The Wonder, a Woman Keeps
a Secret
The Author
Lady Wishfort
The Way of the World
Patch
The Busy Body
Kitty
Lucy
Termagant
Muslin
High Life Below
Stairs
The Guardian
The Upolsterer
The Way to Keep Him
225
(DL)
1761-62
(DL)
1762-63
(DL)
1763-64
(DL)
1764-65
(DL)
1765-66
(DL)
1766-67
(DL)
1767-68
(DL)
1768-69
(DL)
Lady Freelove
The Jealous Wife
Lady Beverly
The School for Lovers
the Old Maid
The Old Maid
Not named
Sketch of a Fine
Lady's Return from
a Rout**
Mrs. Friendly
the Faithful
Irishwoman
Lady Fanshaw
Lisetta
Widow
Blackacre
Mrs.
Heidelberg
The Dupe
The Faithful
Irishwoman**
The Platonick Wife
The Capricious Lovers
The Plain Dealer
The Clandestine Marriage
No new roles
A Peep Behind the
Curtain
Lady Fuz
Mrs Winifred
The School for Rakes
One of the major roles which Kitty Clive assumed, beginning in the 1732-33
season, was that of Polly in The Beggar’s Opera; one of her greatest successes, it would
also provide one of the most intense, and public, disputes of her long career. By the
1735-36 season when Mrs. Clive was well established, and exceedingly popular, in the
part, Charles Fleetwood, then manager of Drury Lane, decided that another actress would
be better suited to the role—the second Mrs. Theophilus Cibber, Susanna Maria (née
Arne). Whether Fleetwood arrived at this conclusion by himself or was prompted by
Cibber is impossible to say, though some involvement from Cibber seems likely, but he
226
could not have predicted the storm that would ensue or how involved the theatre-going
public, and the press, would become.
Susanna Maria Arne (1714-1766) had married T. Cibber in 1734, some fifteen
months after the death of his first wife, and was a well established singer/actress before
her marriage.149 Although her career had only begun in 1732, Miss Arne’s exceptional
musical talent was recognized very quickly as is indicated both by the roles she was
given and the fact that she had a solo benefit night within her first year. She first
encountered T. Cibber when she joined his rebel group of players at the Haymarket in the
autumn of 1733, and stayed with the company when they returned to Drury Lane in the
spring of 1734. In addition to Mrs. Cibber’s singing roles, her straight acting line was in
tragedy, so there should not have been any particular conflict with Mrs. Clive once the
rebels returned to Drury Lane. Before the move to Drury Lane Mrs. Cibber had been
primarily a singer—she sang the title roles in Teraminta and Rosamond at Lincoln’s Inn
Fields in the 1732-33 season—and when she began to develop her acting line the roles in
which she excelled, and for which she was lauded by the public, were tragic parts such as
the title role in Aaron Hill’s Zara, Desdemona in Othello, Isabella in Measure for
Measure, and Monimia in Thomas Otway’s The Orphan. Monimia was a role created by
Elizabeth Barry in 1680, and while Mrs. Barry, though renowned as a tragic actress, did
perform many comedic roles, the London theatre world had changed considerably in the
intervening fifty-six years.150 By the 1730’s leading performers were becoming far more
specialized, a trend which continued to the extent that each theatre virtually had two
distinct companies—one for tragedy and the other for comedy.
149
Susanna Maria Arne came from a musical family and her older brother, Thomas would go on to become
one of England’s most prominent musicians and composers.
150
For details on Elizabeth Barry’s roles and career see Chapter 2, pp. 34-86.
227
Thus the circumstances at the time of the controversial performance of The
Beggar’s Opera—Mrs. Clive’s proven abilities in comparison with Mrs. Cibber’s relative
inexperience, and the non-theatrical background of the manager, Charles Fleetwood—
would seem to indicate that Theophilus Cibber had considerable involvement in the
affair. As the actress already “in possession” of the part, Kitty Clive had a long standing
theatrical “right” to the role of Polly and she was very popular with the audience;
however, Mrs. Cibber was a rising star who had her own supporters both in the theatre
and among the public—so the stage was set for a contretemps which would keep the
public entertained for several months and which was happily fuelled by the press. Not
only were opinions bandied back and forth in the newspapers, but the battle for Polly was
immortalized in a new farce—Henry Giffard capitalized on the public interest in the
dispute and produced the very successful The Beggar’s Pantomimes; or Contending
Columbines at his Goodman’s Fields theatre. Kitty Clive entered the newspaper debate
directly on November 19th 1736 with a letter to the London Daily Post and General
Advertiser in which she clarified her position
I have shewn an Unwillingness to surrender my own Part of
Polly and to act the inferior Part of Lucy, I confess is true. But
then I must declare this Unwillingness did not proceed from my
Jealousy of Mrs. Cibber, or from any Intent of mine to obstruct
the Progress of her Merit: No; the true and only Reason is this:
Not only the Part of Polly, but likewise other Parts (as could be
made to appear) have been demanded of me for Mrs. Cibber,
which made me conclude (and I think, with Reason) that there
228
was a Design form’d against me, to deprive me by degrees of
every Part in which I had the happiness to appear with any
Reputation; and at length, by this Method, to make me so little
useful to the Stage, as not to deserve the salary I now have,
which is much inferior to that of several other Performers.
In this letter Mrs. Clive not only defends her right to the role of Polly, but by putting the
conflict in the broader context of the management of the theatre—both in the matter of
role allocation and salary—she is astutely making the public aware that this is not a
frivolous spat between temperamental leading ladies but a serious matter involving her
future. The outcome of the dispute was that Kitty Clive retained the role of Polly for the
duration—how relations stood between the two actresses after this is not known, but the
atmosphere within the company cannot have been particularly pleasant for quite some
time afterwards.
This letter, in addition to showing that Kitty Clive was an intelligent woman well
able to defend her rights and manipulate her audience, also illustrates the approach she
would adopt for the rest of her career. She was frequently criticized for being fiery and
outspoken, but this does not seem to have been a matter of a diva expressing
“temperament” but a highly professional actress, well aware of her own worth and
abilities who did not suffer fools gladly—whether she encountered them in the Green
Room, the management’s office, or in society at large. The claims she makes here with
regard to her salary did not become a serious issue at this time but are indicative of the
problems the Drury Lane actors would have with Charles Fleetwood’s management in the
years to come, and which would result in another actors’ rebellion in 1743.
229
Mrs. Clive and Covent Garden
Other than two seasons at Covent Garden (1743-45), Kitty Clive spent all of her fortyone year career at Drury Lane—so what caused her to move from the company where she
had risen to be London’s leading comedienne for only two seasons? The answer lies in
the actors’ rebellion of 1743 at Drury Lane, which was precipitated by manager Charles
Fleetwood’s treatment of his actors.151
At the end of the summer of 1743 the principal actors of Drury Lane together
wrote to Fleetwood requesting a guarantee that he would pay the promised salaries of all
theatre employees for the upcoming season. He refused to discuss the matter and a few
days later more than twenty actors from Drury Lane, led by Macklin and Garrick and
including Kitty Clive, signed a formal petition to the Lord Chamberlain in which they
stated
That many of your Petitioners have for a long time suffer’d
great hardships and Calamities by the Oppressive Measures
of the present Patentee Charles Fleetwood Esqr by his violating
all contracts, and withholding great part of the stipulated agreement[s]
from the Actors. There is not one of the underwritten Petitioners
who has not at this present sum of money (some large ones)
owing to him or her. That the Distresses and Miserie of the
lower sort of People have been unspeakable, many of them
having been ready to perish for Want (not having received the
151
What follows here is a brief summary of events, for a full account of the actors’ rebellion see Judith
Milhous and Robert D. Hume’s “The Drury Lane Actors’ Rebellion of 1743,” Theatre Journal 42:1 (March
1990): 57-80.
230
smallest Sum from the Theatre for Sixteen or Eighteen weeks
together, and if they have insisted upon their money owing,
have been discharged the Playhouse. That your Petitioners often
have made small collections to prevent the lower people from
starving.
………………………………………………………………….
That his [Fleetwood] Effects and Estates are either so secured
by Friendly Executions or loaded with Mortgages that your
Petitioners cannot fin the least redress.
These are our Grievances.
We humbly beg leave to lay before your Grace how great the
profits of the Theatre have been (by his own confession) and how
enabled he has been from the said profits to perform all Contracts
with your Graces Petitioners, And likewise the proposals made by
your Petitioners to the Patentee before we would give your Grace
this trouble. 152
The petition continues with a suggestion of a possible financial solution and ends with a
long list of individual “Monies owing.” On September 19th the petition was sent from the
Lord Chamberlain’s Office to Fleetwood; when he eventually deigned to answer on Oct
4th, his written reply categorically denied that he had illegally withheld any money owing
to the actors; stated that no-one had suffered any hardship; and asserted that far from
making a £3000 profit (as the petitioners had claimed), he had in fact suffered a £2000
loss—mainly due to the exorbitant salaries he was paying the lead actors. The actors
152
Ibid pp. 59-60, quotation from The National Archives LC 5/204.
231
managed to produce documentation of the receipts for the 1742-43 season but Fleetwood
maintained that the costs outstripped these, though he refused to produce proof.
Milhous and Hume show that “Fleetwood was a ruined gambler” and that he had
borrowed money from the theatre’s treasurer, Mr. Pierson, among others—thus the actors
had no allies on the financial front and no way in which to prove that the books were
being cooked. In an attempt to demonstrate that the actors were vastly overpaid,
Fleetwood published a comparison of current salaries and a salary list from 1708-09
when Wilks, Betterton and Mrs. Oldfield were the leading performers (taken from
Zachary Baggs “Advertisement Concerning the Poor Actors” of 1709) which “showed”
how inflated were the salaries of Garrick, Macklin, Mrs. Clive, and Mrs. Woffington.
However, as Milhous and Hume point out, in 1709 the actors salaries were considerably
reduced since the theatres lost circa three months acting time due to royal mourning and
the temporary silencing of the Drury Lane, and Fleetwood also exaggerated the current
season, claiming 200 days of performance when in fact there were only 183. He also did
not address the principal grievance of his actors—the fact that they had not actually been
paid their agreed salaries, therefore rendering any set of salary figures meaningless.
Unfortunately for the actors, the Lord Chamberlain, the Duke of Grafton, was so
offended by the supposedly huge salaries the lead actors were “receiving” that he missed
the point that they had not in fact been paid; he also seems to have ignored completely
the plight of the “lower sort” in the theatre and the result was that he sided with
Fleetwood. This decision by the Lord Chamberlain left the actors with no other choice
but to go back to Fleetwood on his terms or try their luck with John Rich at Covent
Garden. They had requested permission to set up their own company—as Betterton,
232
Barry, and Bracegirdle had done in 1695—but were denied since the Lord Chamberlain
was determined to enforce the Licensing Act of 1737.
Mrs. Clive went to Rich at Covent Garden but on terms not much better than
those offered by Fleetwood—although there was no formal agreement, or cartel, between
the two London theatres at this time, in practice the Licensing Act created one since if a
performer left, or was forced out of, one theatre then there was only one other option left.
Incensed by the treatment she and her colleagues had received, Kitty Clive put her case to
the public in a pamphlet published in 1744, entitled The Case of Mrs. Clive Submitted to
the Publick in which she stressed not only her particular grievances but also the effect the
behavior of the management was having on the way in which theatre business was
conducted. She opens with the usual rhetorical device of having been advised to publish
her complaints by friends and moves on to throw herself on the mercy of her readers by
reminding her public that they have always supported performers who pleased them on
the stage. She clearly thinks that the current state of affairs—with both Drury Lane and
Covent Garden offering the actors very poor terms—was a deliberate conspiracy on the
part of Fleetwood and Rich:
As only two theatres were authorized, the Managers thought it
was in their Power to reduce the Incomes of those Performers,
who could not live independent of their Profession; but in order
to make this appear with a better Face to the Town, it was agreed
to complain of the Actors Salaries being too great, and accordingly
a false Account was published of them in the daily Papers, by whom
I will not say:
(p. 8)
233
She goes on to point out that in the past, when the theatres were well managed, that not
only were the actors and everyone else working in the theatre paid properly and on time,
but that the management also made a considerable profit from the enterprise. Mrs. Clive
describes how after the failure of the rebellion, the managers seemed already to have
decided between themselves who would go to Covent Garden and who would return to
Drury Lane and as proof of the existence of the cartel informs her readers
I did, indeed, apprehend I should meet with better Terms at
Covent-Garden, because that manager had made many Overtures
to get me into his Company the preceding Season, and many times
before: But when I apply’d to him, he offered me exactly the same
which I had refused at the other Theatre, and which I likewise
rejected, but was persuaded to accept some very little better,
rather than seem obstinate in not complying as well as others, and
yielded so far to the Necessity of the Time, as to Act under a much
less Salary than several other Performers on that Stage, and submitted
to pay a Sum of Money for my Benefit, notwithstanding I had had
one clear of all Expence for Nine Years before; an Advantage the
first Performers had been thought to merit for near Thirty Years,
and had grown into a Custom.
(pp. 10-11)
This account indicates that Kitty Clive was not only concerned about the financial impact
of the “arrangement” between the two sets of management but also about the blow to the
position which she had worked very hard to achieve. For a leading actress to be forced to
take unfavorable terms with a different company would have difficult enough without the
234
added humiliation of the benefit custom being ignored in her case. Mrs. Clive continues
with an a account of how she was treated with further disrespect at Covent Garden, where
she says she had intended to stay, but after her first season (1743-44) though she was not
given any notice, realized that other actresses were being listed in her parts. At the time
she wrote this pamphlet she had not yet been made any offer by Drury Lane, though
several of the other rebels had been taken back and Mrs. Clive was also very angry that
the lack of notice from Covent Garden meant she was not able to make any arrangements
to transfer to the theatre in Ireland—she did in fact return to Covent Garden for one more
season but Rich did not employ her until November 1744.
Whilst at Covent Garden Kitty Clive continued to play lead roles but did not add
many new ones—only three new mainpiece roles (Moryama in Don Sebastian, Lucy in
The Beggar’s Opera, and Melissa in Timon of Athens) and two new afterpiece ones (the
Shade of Hero in The Necromancer and Rhodope in Orpheus & Eurydice). For the 174546 season she returned to Drury Lane, which was now under the management of James
Lacy but did not really regain her place in the company until the following season when
David Garrick became manager.
Mrs. Clive’s workload
One of the points which Kitty Clive raises in her defense in The Case of Mrs. Clive is that
she
not only acted in almost all the Plays, but in Farces and Musical
Entertainments; and very frequently two Parts in a Night, even to the
Prejudice of my Health. I have been at a very great Expence in Masters
235
for Singing; for which Article alone, the Managers now give five and
six Pounds a Week.
(p.19)
She was not exaggerating about the number of performances she gave, either at this
particular time, or indeed throughout her career. Table 9 below shows the number new
roles she undertook over the course of her long career and Tables 10-13 provide four
different “snapshots” of Mrs. Clive’s work as an actress in 1738-39, 1747-48, 1757-58,
and 1767-68.
Table 9.
Number of new roles per season performed by Mrs. Clive in main and afterpieces.
Season
1728-29
1729-30
1730-31
1731-32
1732-33
1733-34
1734-35
1735-36
1736-37
1737-38
1738-39
1739-40
1740-41
1741-42
1742-43
1743-44
1744-45
1745-46
1746-47
1747-48
1748-49
1749-50
Plays/Opera Afterpieces
8
4
6
4
6
5
5
7
12
3
7
3
7
4
8
1
6
1
6
2
5
0
1
2
7
1
2
1
4
1
1
2
2
0
4
1
2
0
0
1
2
3
3
1
236
1750-51
1751-52
1752-53
1753-54
1754-55
1755-56
1756-57
1757-58
1758-59
1759-60
1760-61
1761-62
1762-63
1763-64
1764-65
1765-66
1766-67
1767-68
1768-69
3
3
0
2
4
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
0
1
0
1
0
0
1
1
0
1
0
0
1
1
0
0
2
0
0
2
0
1
0
0
1
0
As this table illustrates, Kitty Clive took on at least one new role—either in a
mainpiece or an afterpiece—for thirty-nine of her forty seasons on the London stage, thus
demonstrating a very high level of commitment to her profession. Up to and including
the season of 1740-41, when she was thirty years old and had been acting for twelve
years, Mrs. Clive had at least five new roles in mainpieces per annum, as well as at least
one new role in an afterpiece (with the exception of the 1738-39 season). She maintained
this level of work in new roles until the season of 1755-56 when she began to take on
only one to three new parts per year; by this time, Mrs. Clive was forty-four and had been
on the stage for twenty-three years.
Her number of new roles peaked in the 1732-33 season, when she performed
twelve new parts in mainpieces and three new afterpiece roles, which gives an indication
of how quickly she became one of Drury Lane’s leading actresses. Since this was the
237
season leading up to the Theophilus-Cibber-led actor rebellion, these figures also show
how badly the company would have been affected had Mrs. Clive chosen to depart with
the rebels.
Although she naturally decreased the number of new parts she performed as she
grew older, her later roles—though of an appropriate age—were still major ones. In the
1765-66 season, three years before her retirement, she added Widow Blackacre in The
Plain Dealer and Mrs. Heidelberg in The Clandestine Marriage to her repertoire.
Table 10.
All roles played by Mrs. Clive in her 1738-39 season at Drury Lane.
Notes:
The reason for choosing this season is that it was Mrs. Clive’s tenth at Drury Lane, she
was at the top of her profession and thus this “snapshot” gives a useful picture of the
work load she carried at this point in her career.
A number after a play or afterpiece title indicates the number of performances given of
that piece in that month; no number indicates that this piece received only one
performance in the given month.
DATE
ROLE
September
Ophelia
Lucy
Hoyden
Colombine
Lady Froth
PLAY
AFTERPIECE
Hamlet
The Virgin Unmask'd
The Relapse
Colombine Courtezean
(5)
The Double Dealer
the
Chambermaid
Kitty
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
Harlot's Progress
October
Laetitia
Colombine
Aurelia
Estifania
The Old Batchelor
Colombine Courtezean
(5)
The Twin Rivals
Rule a Wife Have a Wife
238
Ophelia
Lady Fanciful
Polly
Elvira
Hamlet
The Provok'd Wife
The Beggar's Opera
The Spanish Fryar
Lappet
Prue
Flippanta
The Miser
Love for Love (2)
The Confederacy (2)
November
Viletta
Aurelia
Lady Fanciful
Biddy
Colombine
She wou'd and she wou'd
not (4)
The Twin Rivals
The Provok'd Wife
The Tender Husband
Colombine Courtezean
December
Biddy (2)
Colombine
Lucy
Clymene
Elvira
Kitty
Hileria
Estifania
Ophelia
Clymene
Polly
Aurelia
Prue
The Tender Husband
Colombine Courtezean
(2)
The Virgin Unmask'd
The Fall of Phaeton
The Spanish Fryar
Harlot's Progress (3)
Tunbridge Walks (3)
Rule a Wife Have a Wife
Hamlet
The Fall of Phaeton (3)
The Beggar's Opera
The Twin Rivals
Love for Love
1739
January
Lucy
Elvira
the
Chambermaid
Lady Sadlife
Colombine
Aurelia
The Virgin Unmask'd (3)
The Spanish Fryar
The Intriguing
Chambermaid (3)
The Double Gallant (2)
Colombine Courtezean
(4)
The Twin Rivals
239
Polly
Flippanta
Anne Lovely
Edging
Chloe
Narcissa
Lady Fanciful
Ophelia
Phillida
The Beggar's Opera
The Confederacy
A Bold Stroke for a Wife
(4)
The Careless Husband
The Lottery (2)
Love's Last Shift
The Provok'd Wife
Hamlet
Damon & Phillida
February
Philis
the
Chambermaid
Loveit
Phillida
Anne Lovely
Lappet
Prue
The Conscious Lovers (3)
The Intriguing
Chambermaid (2)
The Man of Mode (3)
Damon & Phillida
A Bold Stroke for a Wife
The Miser
Love for Love
March
Colombine
Lucy
Miss Notable
Phillida
Dorcas
Jenny
Olivia
Colombine Courtezean
(3)
The Virgin Unmask'd (3)
The Lady's Last Stake
Damon & Phillida
The Mock Doctor
The Provok'd Husband
The Plain Dealer (2)
April
Olivia
Prue
Polly
Maria
Lappet
Lucy
Primrose
Phoebe
May
The Plain Dealer
Love for Love
The Beggar's Opera (2)
The Man of Taste
The Miser
The Virgin Unmask'd
The Mother-in-law
Phoebe, or, The
Beggar’s Wedding
240
Mrs.
Pinchwife
Loveit
Jenny
Aurelia
Lady Fanciful
Olivia
Viletta
Laetitia
Lucy
Ophelia
Aurelia
Wanton wife
Estifania
Lappet
Jenny
Polly
Prue
The Country Wife
The Man of Mode
The Provok'd Husband
The Twin Rivals (2)
The Provok'd Wife
The Plain Dealer
She wou'd and she wou'd
not
The Old Batchelor
The Virgin Unmask'd (2)
Hamlet
The Twin Rivals
The Amorous Widow
Rule a Wife Have a Wife
The Miser
The Provok'd Husband
The Beggar's Opera
Love for Love
Table 11
All Mrs. Clive’s roles for the 1747-48 season.
Notes:
1) The reason for choosing this season for the second “snapshot” of Mrs. Clive’s career is
that helps indicate her position at Drury Lane two years after her return from Covent
Garden, and also shows the company’s repertory ten years after the Licensing Act.
2) A number after a play or afterpiece title indicates the number of performances given of
that piece in that month; no number indicates that this piece received only one
performance in the given month.
DATE
ROLE
September
Portia
Lucy
Sophronia
Ophelia
Nell
October
Flippanta &
the
PLAY
AFTERPIECE
The Merchant of Venice
The Beggar's Opera
The Refusal (2)
Hamlet
The Devil to Pay
The Confederacy
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
241
chambermaid
the
chambermaid
Ophelia &
Lucy
The Intriguing
Chambermaid (2)
Hamlet
The Virgin Unmask'd
Lady Lurewell
& Tag
Portia
Sophronia
The Constant Couple
The Merchant of Venice
The Refusal
Miss in her Teens(5)
November
Celia
Lucy
Philis
Tag
Lady Fanciful
Euphrosyne
Nell
the
chambermaid
Ophelia
Chloe
As You Like It (2)
The Virgin Unmask'd
The Conscious Lovers
Miss in her Teens (3)
The Provoked Wife(3)
Comus
The Devil to Pay
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
Hamlet
The Lottery (2)
December
Chloe
Philis &
Margery
Lucy
Lady Fanciful
the
chambermaid
Tag
Nell
Ariel
Philis
Lucy
The Conscious Lovers
The Beggar's Opera (3)
The Provoked Wife
The Lottery
The Dragon of Wantley
(3)
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
Miss in her Teens (2)
The Devil to Pay
The Tempest(3)
The Conscious Lovers
The Virgin Unmask'd
January
Portia & Tag
the
chambermaid
Olivia &
The Merchant of Venice
Miss in her Teens (3)
Twelfth Night (2)
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
Damon & Phillida (3)
242
Phillida
Margery
Miss Prue
Lady Fanciful
Viletta
Lucy
Ophelia & the
Chambermaid
Sophronia
Philis
The Dragon of Wantley
(2)
Love for Love
The Provoked Wife(2)
She Wou'd and She Wou'd
Not (2)
Hamlet
The Refusal
The Conscious Lovers
The Virgin Unmask'd (2)
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
February
Nell
Lappet & Kitty The Miser
The Devil to Pay
The What D'ye Call It(3)
Margery
The Dragon of Wantley
(2)
Viletta & Tag
Phillida
Lady Fanciful
Miss Prue &
Margery
She Wou'd and She Wou'd
Not
Miss in her Teens
Damon & Phillida
The Provoked Wife
Love for Love
March
Ophelia
Celia & Lucy
Tag
Hamlet
As You Like It
Margery
the
chambermaid
Lady Fanciful
& Kitty
Nell
Lucy
The Virgin Unmask'd
Miss in her Teens (2)
The Dragon of Wantley
(2)
The Inriguing
Chambermaid (2)
The Provoked Wife
The Devil to Pay
The Beggar's Opera
April
the
chambermaid
Ariel
The Intriguing
Chambermaid (2)
The Tempest
243
Viletta
Phillis &
Phillida
Margery
Ophelia
Pallas
Sophronia
Lady Fanciful
Tag
She Wou'd and She Wou'd
Not
The Conscious Lovers
Damon & Phillida
The Dragon of Wantley
(3)
Hamlet
The Judgment of Paris
The Refusal
The Provoked Wife
Miss in her Teens (2)
May
Lucy
Phillis &
Phillida
Nell
Portia
Celia
Flippanta
The Beggar's Opera
The Conscious Lovers
Damon & Phillida
The Devil to Pay
The Merchant of Venice
As You Like It
The Confederacy
Table 12.
All Mrs. Clive’s roles for the 1757-58 season.
Notes:
1) This season shows Mrs. Clive’s career a further ten years on, by which time she was
47 years of age and had been acting for 29 years.
A number after a play or afterpiece title indicates the number of performances given of
that piece in that month; no number indicates that this piece received only one
performance in the given month.
DATE
ROLE
September
Nell
Pastora
Lucy
October
Phillis &
Pastora
Edging
Nell
Lady Fanciful
PLAY
AFTERPIECE
The Devil to Pay
The Chaplet
The Beggar's Opera
The Conscious Lovers
The Careless Husband
The Chaplet
The Devil to Pay
The Provok'd Wife
244
Flora
Mrs.
Cadwallader
Lady Froth
The Wonder
The Author (4)
The Double Dealer
November
Mrs. Riot
Lethe (2)
Mrs.
Cadwallader
Pastora
Celia
Phillis
As You Like It
The Conscious Lovers
Lady Fanciful
The Provok'd Wife
The Author
The Chaplet
December
Mrs.
Cadwallader
Edging &
Mrs. Riot
Pastora
The Author (3)
The Careless Husband
Lethe
The Chaplet
January
Lady Fanciful
Mrs.
Cadwallader
Lucy
Phaedra
Pastora
The Provok'd Wife
The Author (2)
The Beggar's Opera
Amphitryon
The Chaplet
February
Mrs.
Cadwallader
Abigail
the
chambermaid
Edging & Mrs.
Riot
Bissare
The Author
The Drummer
The Intriguing
Chambermaid (2)
The Careless Husband
The Inconstant
Lethe
March
Lady Wishfort
Catharine
Slipslop
The Way of the World
Catharine & Petruchio
The Upolsterer
April
Slipslop
The Upolsterer (8)
245
Mother
Nell
Lady Wishfort
& Slipslop
Lady Fanciful
Phaedra
Phillis &
Pastora
the
chambermaid
The Chances (2)
Isabella
Jacintha
Slipslop
Phaedra
The Squire of Alsatia
The Mistake
The Devil to Pay (3)
The Way of the World
The Provok'd Wife
Amphitryon (2)
The Conscious Lovers
The Chaplet
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
May
Edging &
Slipslop
Lucy & the
chambermaid
Celia
Lappet
Mrs. Riot
The Upolsterer (3)
Amphitryon
The Careless Husband
The Beggar's Opera
As You Like It
The Miser
The Intriguing
Chambermaid
Lethe
Table 13.
All Mrs. Clive’s roles for the 1767-68 season.
Notes:
1) This was Mrs. Clive’s second to last year on the stage—she retired in the Spring of
1769.
2) A number after a play or afterpiece title indicates the number of performances given of
that piece in that month; no number indicates that this piece received only one
performance in the given month.
DATE
ROLE
September
Mrs.
Heidelberg
Lady Freelove
October
Lady Freelove
Lady Beverley
PLAY
The Clandestine Marriage
(2)
The Jealous Wife
The Jealous Wife
The School for Lovers
AFTERPIECE
246
High Life Below Stairs
(2)
Kitty
Lady Fuz
Mrs.
Heidelberg
A Peep Behind the
Curtain (6)
The Clandestine Marriage
November
Lady Fuz
Phillis
Lady Beverley
Mrs. Riot
Mrs.
Heidelberg
A Peep Behind the
Curtain (7)
The Conscious Lovers
The School for Lovers
Lethe
The Clandestine Marriage
Widow
Blackacre
The Plain Dealer
Sift
The Widow'd Wife(9)
December
Lady Fuz
Mrs.
Heidelberg
Phillis
Kitty
Widow
Blackacre
Lady Beverley
A Peep Behind the
Curtain (4)
The Clandestine Marriage
The Conscious Lovers
High Life Below Stairs
The Plain Dealer
The School for Lovers
January
Sift
The Widow'd Wife (3)
Mrs.
Heidelberg
The Clandestine Marriage
(2)
A Peep Behind the
Curtain
Lady Fuz
February
Lady Fuz
Mrs.
Heidelberg
Kitty
Sift
March
A Peep Behind the
Curtain (2)
The Clandestine Marriage
(2)
High Life Below Stairs
The Widow'd Wife
247
High Life Below Stairs
(2)
Kitty
A Peep Behind the
Curtain (2)
Lethe
Lady Fuz
Mrs. Riot
Sift
Lady Wishfort
The Widow'd Wife
The Way of the World
Lady Freelove
Muslin
The Jealous Wife
The Way to Keep Him (2)
Mrs.
Heidelberg
The Clandestine Marriage
(2)
Widow
Blackacre
The Plain Dealer
April
May
Lady Fuz
Lady Beverley
Muslin
Lady Freelove
Mrs.
Heidelberg
A Peep Behind the
Curtain
The School for Lovers
The Way to Keep Him
The Jealous Wife
The Clandestine Marriage
The tables above demonstrate both Mrs. Clive’s style of performance and the
heavy workload she carried throughout her career. Her claim in The Case of Mrs. Clive
(1744) that she frequently played in both mainpiece and afterpiece on a given night is
substantiated in Tables 3, 4 and 5. Although Kitty Clive was obviously a very hard
working actress, she, and presumably the management, seem to have taken care not to
overstretch her—on the nights when she performed both pieces of the program, her roles
in the mainpiece, and often the afterpiece also, were invariably ones with which she was
very familiar. In December of 1747 Mrs. Clive performed the new role of Margery in the
afterpiece The Dragon of Wantley and also performed her role of Phillis in the mainpiece,
The Conscious Lovers, which she had been performing regularly since 1734-35. In
248
January 1748, she doubled up with Olivia in Twelfth Night (first performed in 1740) and
Phillida in Damon and Phillida (first performed 1730); also that month Mrs. Clive played
her role of Ophelia in Hamlet (first performed in 1734) in conjunction with the
Chambermaid in The Intriguing Chambermaid (first performed in 1733). Thus although
she would have been on stage for most of the full evening’s performance, Mrs. Clive—
being an experienced performer—would not have been placed under undue stress on
these occasions. She also did not continue with this work load for all her career, as can
be seen from Table 13, which shows her second to last year, when she did not give any
double performances.
Table 14 below shows that although Mrs. Clive did not maintain her earlier level
of performance throughout her career she continued to be one of the hardest working
actresses of the Drury Lane company. Her workload does decrease between the 1738-39
and 1747-48 seasons but shows little change after that. In the 1757-58 season Mrs. Clive
gave thirty-one performances in mainpieces and forty-four in afterpieces, whereas ten
years later—one year before her retirement—she performed forty-three times in
mainpieces and thirty-one in afterpieces. Given Kitty Clive’s level of seniority there is
no reason why she would have continued to perform so often other than her commitment
to her chosen profession.
Table 14.
Summary of Mrs. Clive’s workload (number of performances) for the seasons
detailed in Tables 3-6.
Season
1738-39
1747-48
1757-58
Plays
84
57
31
Afterpieces
52
66
44
249
1767-68
43
31
Mrs. Clive—personal life
Although there is a wealth of information available on Kitty Clive’s career, there is very
little on the person behind the actress. Some hints of her personality can be gleaned from
the theatrical conflicts in which she was involved and her pamphlet The Case of Mrs.
Clive (1744) but in many ways these public writings are just another kind of performance
by a woman who was adept at getting an audience to believe her. We do not know the
extent of her personal correspondence—her bad spelling and poor writing were remarked
upon—but some of her letters to David Garrick are extant. There are only seven of these
letters, dated between 1765 and 1778, with three from the time when Mrs. Clive was still
acting; the last four letters were written from her home in Twickenham and are naturally
more general correspondence than theatre business but do give a greater insight as to her
character.153
Kitty Clive’s first letter to Garrick was written on October 14th, 1765 and is a
bitter complaint about his financial treatment of her.154 This letter indicates that Garrick
had stopped some of Mrs. Clive’s salary because of her lack of attendance at the theatre
and she argues that
153
References to and quotations from these letters are taken from James Boaden’s The Private
Correspondence of David Garrick ( London: Colburn & Bentley, 1831-32) 2 vols. As a footnote to the
first letter from Mrs. Clive, pp. 203-204, Boaden says that out of respect for this excellent actress he
“would not perpetuate her bad spelling”, therefore the quotations given here are his corrections.
154
Although Kitty Clive and David Garrick became friends in later years there relationship at Drury Lane
was not always an easy one. They were both strong characters with definite ideas about their
performances, which did not always agree; they did however respect each others abilities and came to work
well together.
250
It was never before expected of a performer to be in waiting when their
names are not in the papers or bills; the public are witness for me
whether I have ever neglected my business.
………………………………………………………………………….
I have always had good health, and have ever been above subterfuge.
………………………………………………………………………….
You stopped four days’ salary when I went to Dublin, though you gave
me leave to go before the house shut up, and said you would do without
me……………………………………………………………………….
I had my money last year stopped at the beginning of the season for not
coming to rehearse two parts that I could repeat in my sleep, . . .
Mrs. Clive goes on to say that she has always done her best to “serve and oblige”
Garrick—she mentions how she traveled to and from London at her own expense to
rehearse the newcomer Mrs. Vincent in the part of Polly, because he asked her to; and
how she has only had a small share, compared to his, of the profits made by Drury Lane.
She also mentions that
you gave Mrs. Cibber 600l. for playing sixty nights, and 300l.
to me for playing a hundred and eighty . . .
The tone of this letter is what one would expect from Kitty Clive, the fiery leading actress
determined to defend her rights—if she did not, then who would? Whatever her ability
with spelling, or lack thereof, her defense of her position in the theatre is clear and well
argued—she raises a number of issues and deals with each one in turn. Unfortunately
251
there is no extant copy of Garrick’s reply, or any indication that he did indeed write a
reply.
Most of the other letters are more general in nature—enquiring after Garrick’s
brother George, praising his treatment of his nephew David, criticizing the behavior of
R.B. Sheridan —but two in particular show Mrs. Clive in a different light. On January
13th, 1774 she wrote to Garrick on a matter completely unrelated to the theatre, requesting
his help on behalf on her local wine merchant, Mr. Crofts, who “. . . wants to get his son
into the excise.” (Vol. I, 604) 155 Garrick obviously requested further details because her
next letter refers to forwarding a letter of reference from the vicar, Mr. Costard, on behalf
of “young Crofts.” (p. 610) Although Mrs. Clive’s professional record shows that she
was usually kind to other performers with regard to benefit performances, this shows her
going to considerable trouble for a young man of whom she knew little, simply because
his father had asked for a favor that she was able to grant.
155
Garrick was a commissioner of the Excise at this time.
252
Chapter 5:
Conclusion
The basic answer to the initial question—did acting change as a profession for
women over the course of the long eighteenth-century?—is yes. To examine the changes
and suggest reasons why they occurred, an analysis of both the private and the public
lives of the actresses from the three sample groups is necessary.
Although the personal and professional life of any individual are necessarily
intertwined, to help provide a clear analysis of the actresses considered in this study, I
have separated these two facets. The first section—Personal Lives—considers how
women came to join the acting profession; how old they were when they went onstage,
and when they left; whether or not they married and/or had children; and whether, or not,
these factors affected their careers. The second section—Public Lives—deals with how
the actresses were viewed by the public; how they fared in their company; the speed at
which they progressed through the company ranks, or not; how, or if, their roles changed
over time; the workload they carried as actresses; whether or not they specialized in
particular lines, and how this affected their careers.
However, one must always remember that the extant theatrical records from the
Restoration to the beginning of the eighteenth century are not complete. Therefore, the
conclusions drawn with regard to the first sample group (1670-1675) are necessarily
based on data available.
Personal Lives
Since women had not appeared on the professional stage in England prior to 1660,
one of the first questions is—where did actresses come from? As no one had done this
253
before, did a few women suddenly decide that they wanted to appear on stage, and if so,
how did they go about joining a company? The most logical starting point for recruiting
actresses would seem to be the families of those already involved in the theatre—wives
and daughters of actors, managers, theatre employees. However, this does not seem to
have been the case. Of the forty-two actresses in sample one, only ten appear to have had
a family connection with the theatre, and of these ten five became leading actresses.156
Unfortunately, there are no extant records on many of the performers of this time so
determining how, or why, they began careers on the stage is impossible. Given this lack
of family connection to theatre, one may ask the question why was this case, why did
women already connected to the companies not try their hand at this new opportunity?
One possibility is that the actors/managers/theatre employees felt that the stage was an
unsuitable place for their wives/sisters/daughters, one where the women would be on
public view, in contact with, and open to comment from, a variety of men. This type of
concern however does not seem particularly valid given that the husband/brother/father
would have been on hand to look after the woman on question and also that those
involved in the theatre were generally of a practical rather than puritanical outlook. Also,
the Duke’s Company was run by Sir William Davenant, with the support of his wife
Mary—they housed the first actresses of the company, and their adopted daughter,
Elizabeth Barry, went on to become one of the company’s leading actresses. So although
the theatre may have seemed very scandalous to outsiders, those working within would
have had a very different viewpoint.
156
In this group there are 9 actresses about whose personal lives we know nothing but since their surnames
do not match any of the known actors or theatre employees of the time, they are unlikely to have had a
family theatre connection.
254
Unfortunately this does not help explain why more women connected with the
theatre did not go onstage. The reason may be as simple as a lack of interest or a lack of
talent. Since there are no surviving advertisements for new performers, or any audition
process, perhaps a number of women with theatre connections tried out and were
rejected; we have no way of knowing.
Another possibility is that since acting as a profession for women was an
unknown quantity, those close to the theatre who needed to work may have decided to
stick to more traditional forms of employment that had more stability. Actors in the
lower ranks were not well paid, and should the theatres be closed—due to plague, or
mourning for a member of the royal family, for instance—then they were not paid at all.
In such situations, a family would be financially more secure if all the working members
were not involved in the same business.
Perhaps surprisingly, the figures for the sample group of actors for the same
period show an even smaller percentage with family connections to the theatre:
1670-1675
Actors with family connections:
15%
Actresses with family connections: 24%
This would seem to indicate that acting, as a profession for either sex, was not at this time
something that was seen in the light of a ‘family business’—though of course, there is no
guarantee that siblings or children will have the same degree of talent, or aptitude for
learning how to act.
Both actors and actresses with family connections to the theatre do however tend
to have longer careers, though of course not all performers with long careers have family
255
connections to the theatre. Mrs. Cartwright is the only exception to this—she was
probably married to the actor William Cartwright, possibly she was the third of his three
wives, but since we only have one known role for her and no dates of birth or death, no
reasonable speculation can be made as to why her career was so brief. Other than this,
actresses with family connections had careers which lasted from thirteen to thirty-seven
years; actors had careers from seven to sixty-three years. The logical reason for this
would seem to be that those who had spouses, children, or siblings, also working in the
theatre were more likely to have a greater commitment to the company both in terms of
loyalty and family finances.
When we look at the second and third sample groups the percentage of those who
had family connections to the theatre does change:
1710-1715
Actors with family connections:
50%
Actresses with family connections: 55%
1750-55
Actors with family connections:
52%
Actresses with family connections: 67%
The percentages change, and though the situation regarding career length for those with
family connections in sample one holds generally true for samples two and three there are
a greater number of exceptions. From the 1670-1675 to the 1710-1715 sample group the
percentage of those performers with family connections more than doubles for both men
and women. A possible explanation for this is that during this time there was only one
256
theatre company operating in London; therefore any individuals’ chance of getting work
as an actor was halved. In these circumstances ‘outsiders’ would have been less likely to
gain a position in the company; also, by this time women had been on the London stage
for fifty years, so in that sense the profession had stabilized.
The third sample group shows a distinct difference between actresses and actors
in terms of those with family connections. The actors remain almost the same as the
second group, with 52%, but by this time 67% of the actresses have a family connection.
There seems to be no particular reason as to why this dramatic increase should occur in
the third sample; though one difference with this group is that there are a greater number
of actresses whose mothers were also in the profession.
Although having a connection with the theatre may have been an advantage when
getting started, this does not translate into a guarantee of success within the company—
some actresses who became major stars had family connections, many others did not.
There is no discernible “cause and effect” between how an actress began and how
successful she became. The one difference that having a family connection does make,
and this holds true for all the sample groups, is that the vast majority of those with
connections have long careers—90% of actresses with family connections have careers of
ten years or over. In addition to the personal investment already discussed, those
actresses who came from theatrical families would also have had much more accurate
expectations of a stage career. An outsider looking in at the world of the theatre tends to
see the glamour, the success, the scandal; an insider knows the hard work, long hours,
and difficult conditions that form most of an actor’s life. In other words, those coming
257
from a theatrical background knew what they were getting in to and therefore would be
more likely to stay the course.
Not all family connections within the theatre were by blood; many were formed
through marriage. Since marriage gave a woman’s person, and her property, to her
spouse, marriage could have a significant effect on an actress’s career—did actresses
marry during this time period and if so how did this affect their professional lives? The
short answer is yes, many did marry and this often had surprisingly little effect on their
careers. As Table 1 illustrates, the percentage of those who married increases as the
century progresses; though as must be remembered, there are a number of actresses,
particularly in the first sample group, for whom we have no personal information.
Table 1.
Actresses’ marriage and children.
Notes:
1) Name in bold denotes major career.
2) M is for “Married” and Y in this column indicates that yes, the actress was married;
an (L) after this indicates that she left the stage when she got married.
3) C is for “Children” the number of children is shown where known, a Y indicates that
she had children but we do not know how many, ? indicates that she probably had
children but we are not certain.
4) Children born to an actress after she left the stage are not included in this table
5) A blank in the “Starting Age” or “Finishing Age” columns indicates that there is no
extant information on birth date for this actress.
6) A blank in the “Married” and/or “Children” columns indicates either that the actress
was unmarried and/or without children, or that there are no records of either.
7) The row of ? for Miss Davis in sample three indicates the confusion existing over
possible dates and people (for full details see pp. 190-194).
Actress
SAMPLE 1
Elizabeth Barry
Mary Betterton
Elizabeth Boutell
Career
length
(yrs)
35
34
32
Starting Finishing
Age
Age
c. 17
23
c. 16
c. 53
57
c. 48
M
C
1
Y
258
Mrs. Burroughs
Charlotte Butler
Mrs. Cartwright
Mrs. Clough
Mary Corbett
Katherine Corey
Elizabeth (Betty) Cox
Mrs. John Coysh
Elizabeth Currer
Mrs Eastland
Susanah Elliot
Elizabeth Farley
Mrs. Ford
Eleanor (Nell) Gwyn
Elizabeth James
Mrs. Jennings
Mrs. Johnson
Mrs. Knapper
Mary Knepp
Mary Lee (Lady Slingsby)
Elinor Leigh
Mrs. Lilburne
Jane Long
Elizabeth (Betty) Mackarel
Rebecca Marshall
Mrs. Norris
Mrs. Norton
Margaret Osborn
Mrs. Pratt
Jane Rathbun
Anne Reeves
Margaret Rutter
Anne Shadwell
Elizabeth Slade
Mrs. Spencer
Mrs Timothy Twyford
Susanna Uphill
Mrs. Wright
Mrs Wyatt
1
12
1
3
7
32
10
11
15
10
2
18
1
7
7
9
3
3
15
15
37
1
12
30
17
22
8
23
21
1
5
19
26
7
2
13
6
1
1
Y
25
32
57
42
Y
Y
Y
Y
4
Y
Y
Y?
22
C
(L)
29
Y
Y
Y
Y
Y
c. 16
c. 42
4
8
Y
Y?
2?
Y
5
Y
259
SAMPLE 2
Baker, Katherine
Bicknell, Margaret nee Younger
Bradshaw, Lucretia
Clark(e), Mrs.
Cox, Susannah
Cross, Letitia
Finch, Katherine
Garnet, Mrs.
Horton, Christiana
Hunt, Mrs.
Kent, Mary, Mrs. Thomas
Knight, Frances Maria
Mills, Margaret, Mrs. John
Moore, Henrietta
Mountfort, Susanna
Oldfield, Anne
Porter, Mary
Powell, Mary, Mrs. George
Rogers, Jane
Rogers, Jane, Mrs. Christopher
Bullock
Santlow, Hester, Mrs. Barton Booth
Saunders, Margaret
Sherburn, Elizabeth
Smith, Miss
Spiller, Elizabeth, Mrs. James
Stockdale, Mrs.
Thurmond, Sarah, Mrs. John
Vincent, Mrs.
Willis, Mary
Willis, Elizabeth, Mrs. Richard
Younger, Elizabeth
29
21
18
28
13
38
23
6
38
15
26
40
21
32
15
31
45
28
26
22
27
14
2
5
31
1
22
1
33
44
23
SAMPLE 3
Ann Allen
27
Susanna Mara Arne (Mrs. T.
Cibber II)
Mrs. Baker
33
40
17-22
c. 15
38-43
c. 32
Y
Y (L)
c. 17
c. 55
Y
15
53
Y
1
Y
Y
13
c. 16
c. 15
c. 15
c. 16
21
28
c. 47
c. 60
c. 37
c. 43
35
c. 7
c. 25
c. 12
c. 40
c.69
c. 35
18
51
2
2
Y
Y (L)
Y
1
Y
Y
3
Y
Y?
Y
2
Y
Y (L)
2
1
Y
Y?
3
260
Ann Barrington (neé Halam)
George Anne Bellamy
Elizabeth Bennet
Esther Bland (Mrs. John
Hamilton)
Mary Bradshaw
Elizabeth Chambers
Kitty Clive
Mary Cokayne
Elizabeth Copin
Mrs. Cowper
Frances Cross (neé Shireburn)
Mrs. John Cushing
Susannah Davies (neé Yarrow)
Miss Davis
Mary Dunstall
Harriet Dyer (neé Bullock)
Mary Elmy (neé Morse)
Mrs Ferguson
Jane Ferguson
Elizabeth Fitzhenry (neé Flanagan)
Ann Glen
Mary Ann Graham (Mrs. Richard
Yates II)
Jane Green (neé Hippisley)
Mrs. (Urusla?) Griffith
Isabella Hallam (Mrs. George
Mattocks)
Hannah Haughton
Elizabeth Havard (formerly Mrs.
Kilby)
Susanna Helme
Elizabeth Hippisley
Christiana Horton
Mrs. Harris James
Elizabeth Jefferson (neé May)
Miss Kennedy (Elizabeth Griffith)
Isabella Lampe (neé Young)
Ann Macklin (the first Mrs. Charles)
Maria Macklin
26
33
31
35
7
10
41
22
28
9
54
8
15
?
18
45
29
15
38
20
11
Y
c. 13
19
18
c. 39
52
59
20
74
?
?
41
?
c. 7
21
c. 52
50
Y
Y
Y
Y
1
Y
Y
Y
Y
Y
?
Y
Y
Y
Y?
1
Y
2
3
30
45
3
25
16
55
61
Y
Y
Y
52
30
6
62
Y
34
22
27
38
18
13
8
57
37
35
1
3
3
?
1
4
1
1
1
Y
15
53
22
30
c. 9
c. 44
Y
Y
Y
Y
Y
Y
1
2
2
1
2
261
Elizabeth Mills (neé Holliday)
Sybilla Minors (or Myners) (Mrs.
John Walker)
Anna Maria Morrison (Mrs. Thomas
Hull)
Susanna Mullart (Mrs. Evans)
Maria Isabella Nossiter
Ann Pitt
Miss Popling
Mrs. Price (Mrs. William Parsons I)
Hannah Pritchard (neé Vaughan)
Mary Ridout (neé Woodman)
Ninetta de Rossenaw
Elizabeth Simpson
Miss Thomas
Sarah Toogood
Catherine de Vallois
Jane Vernon ( neé Poitier, later
Thompson)
Elizabeth Vincent (neé Bincks)
Sarah Ward (neé Achurch)
Ann Willoughby (Mrs. James Lacy
II)
Peg Woffington
Mrs. Wright
Miss Yates
Mrs. Thomas Yeates
Ester Young (Mrs. Charles Jones)
32
c. 21
c. 53
Y
26
18
44
Y
38
34
6
47
7
25
36
14
1
30
23
8
28
10
5
18
c.25
48
39
24
c. 72
Y
Y
43
44
25
6
21
c. 18
4
26
22
10
9
40
23
c. 14
59
49
65
c. 43
?
2
Y
Y
Y
3
Y
6
Y
1
1
Y
Y
Y
3+
9
Y
1
c. 40
Y
Y
262
Table 2.
Marriage and children – sample comparison.
Notes:
1) The figures for sample one are based on the extant records which are incomplete.
2) The columns which show the number of actresses known to be married and those
known to have had children during their acting careers do not relate directly to each
other—not all those who had children were married.
Sample Group
One
Two
Three
Total no.
43
31
64
Known no.
married
18 (42%)
15 (48%)
43 (67%)
Known no. with
children
7 (16%)
9 (29%)
27 (42%)
Given what is known about population statistics in the eighteenth-century—the
first modern census in England was not until the beginning of the nineteenth-century, so
conclusions are drawn primarily from parish records—the figures displayed in Table 2
are very surprising. From 1600 to 1700, the population of London increased from
approximately 200,000 to 575,000 and by the time of the first national census in 1801, it
had reached 958,863.157 Since London, then as now, attracted a large number of
migrants, these dramatic increases—which far outstrip the population gains seen by other
metropolitan center in England—can be attributed to a number of factors, including the
marriage and fertility rates of those living in the capital. According to E. A. Wrigley’s
calculations, from the period 1681-1821 the population of England increased by 133%
with the most dramatic growth taking place between 1751 and 1821. The explanation for
this increase in population over the long eighteenth century lays two-thirds with the
increase in fertility and one-third in the decrease in mortality. This increase in fertility he
attributes to the decrease in the marriage age of women—from an average of 26.5 years
157
These figures are taken from Roger Finlay, Population and Metropolis: The Demography of London
1580-1650 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981) p.xi and Fergus Linnane, London, the wicked
city: A thousand years of vice in the capital (London: Robson Books, 2003) p.268.
263
in the 1680’s to 23.5 years by the early 1800’s—combined with the increase in the
numbers marrying. Wrigley estimates that in the early seventeenth-century 85% of
women were married whereas by the end of the eighteenth-century this had increased to
93%; and with marriage, comes children. 158
Thus the actresses in all three sample groups diverge significantly from the
population norms with regards to marriage and children during this period. Although the
percentage of those actresses who married does increase from 42% in the first group to
67% in the third, this falls far short of the national average. Since the extant data shows
that 96% of all the women in the three sample groups began their stage careers before the
age of 23, then if Wrigley’s figures are correct, the majority of their marriages would
have taken place after they had joined a theatre. Given this fact, a low marriage rate in
the sample group from 1670-75 might be explained by (a) the public perception of
actresses as whores and therefore less likely to marry outside the theatre, (b) many of the
actors were already married when women were admitted to the stage, and (c) the
incompatibility of an actress’s schedule with that of men working in non-theatrical
employment, but these factors become less applicable as the eighteenth-century
progresses. The theatre stabilizes as a profession for women, theatre work becomes a
“family business” for a number people, and while the unsocial hours remain, the public
perception of actresses becomes more favorable as the century progresses. The most
likely explanation for the relatively low numbers of actresses who married in the
eighteenth-century is simply that it was a matter of choice. However, even more
surprising than the marriage figures are the numbers regarding children—in a time when
reliable contraceptives were virtually non-existent, and assuming “normal” sexual
158
E.A. Wrigley “Population Growth: England, 1680-1820,” ReFRESH 1 (Autumn 1985): 1-4.
264
relations between marriage partners, children were not a matter of choice and large
numbers of pregnancies were the norm.159
While we can never know the number of actual pregnancies an actress had—
sometimes there is a report of an actress being taken ill very suddenly which could be due
to a miscarriage but there are also any number of other possibilities which could cause
and actress’s absence—most of those who did have children had surprisingly few. Table
3 shows that in sample one 42% of those with children had only 1 or 2, increasing to 78%
in sample two, and decreasing somewhat to 63% in sample three; no one in sample two
had more than 5 children and only 14% of sample one, and 7% of sample three did.
Table3.
Actresses and their numbers of children.
Note:
1) These figures are of known children—due to the gaps in the data those for Sample One
in particular are incomplete.
2) The last column “Number unknown” refers to actresses who we know had children
during their careers but records do not show how many.
Sample
Group
Total no.
1-2 children
3-5 children
>6 children
actresses
One
Two
Three
Number
unkown
7
3
3
1
0
9
7
1
0
1
27
17
7
2
1
Even allowing for miscarriages, and the possible negative effects of a stressful
career on a woman’s ability to conceive, and the possibility that a certain number of
marriages may have been in name only in order to “protect” a homosexual male—
homosexual acts between men were a criminal offence whereas lesbianism was not—this
159
Condoms were available—made of fine silk or animal skins—but seem to have been more associated
with prevention of venereal disease than pregnancy. (Angus McLaren, A History of Contraception: From
Antiquity to the Present Day (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990) pp. 157-158.) Women used a variety of
herbal preparations and douches but with variable success. ( Shyama Perera, Taking Precautions: an
intimate history of birth control (London: New Holland, 2004) chp. 1.)
265
is an extraordinarily low number of children. Since the number of actresses with long
careers increases as the long eighteenth-century progresses, this would indicate that more
women were taking acting seriously as a career rather than as a means to a husband or
“protector”, and for a serious actress children are not desirable. The physical changes
wrought by pregnancy are concealable only up to a point and while strategic draping of a
costume can hide a certain amount, having the innocent young heroine played by an
eight-month pregnant actress would not have been well received by either management or
audience; so depending on an actress’s rank in the company, her roles may have been
under threat. Then there is the time off required for the birth itself, with the
accompanying danger of serious illness following after, and then the issues of child care
begin. During the theatrical season, performers were required to attend daily rehearsals
and although leading performers, at least, did not perform every evening the theatre was
open, most of them still maintained a very heavy workload—as the case studies for all
three samples illustrate.
Given that children were a major inconvenience for any woman wishing to make
the stage her career, the question still remains: how did these actresses manage to control
their number of pregnancies? The short answer is, we do not know. The possibilities are
(a) celibacy—unlikely for most actresses either married or single (if even half the rumors
about actresses’ sex lives were true); (b) abortion—this was illegal and physically very
dangerous; however, the chances of being left sterile after a “backstreet” abortion would
have been very high, which for someone not wishing for further children would have
been a plus; unfortunately there is no way of estimating how common abortion was let
alone how many actresses may have resorted to it; (c) sexual practices that did not
266
involve vaginal intercourse—this seems the most likely explanation but again, there is no
indication that this is what occurred.
What these facts about actress’s personal lives show is that while they presumably
enjoyed their time in the spotlight, being a professional actresses meant living a life that
was different and in many cases, not having what is termed a woman’s “normal life’—
husband, children, domesticity. For many women involved in the theatre, this may not
have been a sacrifice at all but rather an opportunity for a career which they enjoyed and
one which gave them more freedom than a traditional life would have allowed. Since we
do not know how actresses, or actors, were recruited to the London stage, nor do we have
any extant personal musings on their career choice, we cannot say whether or not these
women—particularly those of the lower ranks—viewed the stage as a place of possibility
or simply as a job. However, the fact that the number of actresses with careers over five
years in length dramatically increases from the first sample group to the third, suggests
that as time progressed more and more women did view the stage as their career,
something which they wanted to do, and not just a means of employment.
Professional lives
When considering the development of acting as a career for women, there are a
number of factors which need to be analyzed. Internal theatrical matters—career length,
rank within the company, workload, role specialization—and external influences such as
the way in which actresses were viewed by their public, help show the changes that
occurred for women in the theatre over the course of the long eighteenth-century.
267
Career length
Although any performer’s career length can be influenced by unforeseen personal
circumstances—an individual who had every intention of staying with a company may be
forced to leave through ill-health or family crisis—in general the overall figures for
career length give a very good indication of the stability of the acting profession.
Analysis across the three sample groups shows how the profession developed for women,
but this also needs to be placed in a broader context, where performers of both genders
are taken into account. Therefore, Table 3 shows the career lengths for both actors and
actresses from all the sample groups. The career intervals which I have chosen for this
table are not, statistically speaking, even or random but are those which best reflect a
range of different career types. Those performers who stay a year or less are most likely
to be “trying something new” which does not work out—either they leave of their own
accord or they are fired. Those who remain in the profession from 2-5 years are probably
those who are do not have a particular interest in the stage and leave when a better
opportunity presents itself, or, they are those performers who are not doing particularly
well in London and decide to move to a provincial company, or to Ireland, in hopes of
better roles and status. Some of this latter group will also be in the 6-10 year category
but this reason becomes less likely as the number of years spent on the London stage
increases. A stage career of 11-20 years is a long one, but one which would see the
average performer leaving that career aged 29-38—too young for most to simply stop
working, though ill-health may be a factor here. Performers who remain on the stage for
20 years and over can be considered to be taking this as their life’s work, the reason that I
have further divided this group into those who had careers that lasted from 21-30 years
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and those with careers over 30 years, is that the last group shows individuals who both
had extraordinarily long careers as well as ones which frequently spanned changes in
management and styles of drama.
Table 4. Career length for actresses and actors, all sample groups.
Notes:
1) Column 2 shows the total number of performers in each sample; these are the numbers
used to calculate the percentages showed in columns 4-9 with exception of the actors in
Sample 1 and the actresses in Sample 3—in both these cases the number used is the one
in brackets. The Sample 1 actors total is altered because I have not counted the twelve
actors who had careers before 1660—since the London theatre world was so completely
different before the Interregnum— nor have I included Mr. Cory whose career length we
do not know. The Sample 3 actresses total used is 62, not 63, because I have excluded
“Miss Davis”, about whom there is considerable confusion, from the calculations.
2) Since the percentages are rounded to the nearest whole number, the total number for
each sample is not necessarily 100%.
Sample
Total
number
Career
range
1 year
or less
2-5 years
6-10
years
11-20
years
21-30
years
Over 30
years
One
Actresses
Actors
42
68 (55)
1-37 yrs
1-63 yrs
7 - 17%
7 - 13%
6 - 14%
9 - 16%
9 - 21%
11 - 20%
10 - 24%
11 - 20%
5 - 12%
7 - 13%
5 - 12%
10 - 18%
Two
Actresses
Actors
31
52
1-45 yrs
2-63 yrs
2 - 6%
0
2 - 6%
1 - 2%
1 - 3%
3 - 6%
5 - 16%
11 - 21%
12 - 39%
15 - 29%
9 - 29%
22 - 42%
Three
Actresses
Actors
63 (62)
103
1-52 yrs
1-64 yrs
1 - 2%
2 - 2%
2 - 3%
6 - 6%
10 - 16%
6 - 6%
8 - 13%
10 - 10%
17 - 27%
32 - 31%
24 - 39%
47 - 46%
Although the three sample groups span eighty-five years, from 1670-1755, from a time
when actresses were still a relatively phenomenon to when they had become an integral
part of a theatre company—the proportion of women acting on the London stage remains,
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rather surprisingly, the same. In the 1670-75 group, 38% of performers were female; in
the 1710-15 group 37%; and in the final group, 1750-55, 38%. These figures seem to
indicate that despite changes in company management and changing fashions in the types
of plays being performed, once actresses became part of the theatrical scene their
numbers, proportionally speaking, remained very stable.
While the proportion of actresses to actors remains the same, the proportion of
actresses in the different “career length categories” changes considerably between the
samples. As time progresses, not only does the proportion of those with long careers
increase but the range of career length also expands. In the first sample group, the
longest career is 37 years, and this has lengthened to 52 years by the final group—in this,
the actresses differ from the actors, whose longest career only increases from 63 to 64
over the eighty-five year period. Although the percentages for actors’ and actresses’
career lengths are quite similar for Sample 1—with an expected greater number of
actresses having careers or one year or less, and fewer having careers over 30 years—
more significant changes do occur in Samples 1 and 2.
Overall, there is a general increase in the proportion of actresses with longer
careers—in Sample 1 17% had careers of one year or less and 12% had careers of over 30
years, in Sample 2 the figures are 6% and 29% respectively, whereas by Sample 3 the
shortest career group has reduced to 3% and longest to 39%. This shows a dramatic
change in the career pattern of women on the stage during this time period, demonstrating
perhaps a greater awareness on the part of individuals of what exactly such a career
would entail and an increase in the numbers of women who viewed their work in the
theatre as a “real” career. The pattern for the actors is similar, but they show even
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greater differences between Samples 1 and 2, than do the actresses. In Sample 1 13% of
actors had a career of one year or less and 18% had a career of over 30 years but thirtyfive years later, in Sample 2, the percentages are 0% and 42%. The decrease in the
numbers with very short careers is probably due to the fact that during this time there was
only one theatre company in London so there were more performers than positions open.
The dramatic increase in the numbers having careers longer than 30 years is less easily
explained—perhaps only having the option of one theatre in London made performers
much more wary of leaving earlier in their careers and once established, they simply
stayed put. The increase in the percentage of both actors and actresses with careers over
30 years continues from Sample 2 to 3 but with a smaller leap—actresses go from 29% to
39% and actors from 42% to 46%. All these figures seem to point to an increasing
stabilization of the profession, for both men and women, between the years 1670 and
1755.
Rank, roles and workload
Although there are differences between the actresses of the three sample groups
when looking at the number and type of roles that they performed, the greatest difference
occurs between the ranks of actress within each sample. While dividing a company into
“stars” and “foot-soldiers” is quite straightforward, this does not allow for the more
complex ranking that exist within any group of performers. There is always a “second
rank” of people who do not have leading roles but are very competent actors; these
individuals fill in if the lead is unable to perform and some may in time move up to lead
roles whereas others stay permanently at this level. In the theatrical companies of the
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eighteenth-century, as in present day ones, the factors which determine who achieves
which rank are varied and frequently unpredictable—talent is not necessarily a guarantee
of success. While an argument can be made that a truly extraordinary talent will rise to
the top irrespective of circumstances, chance also plays a part.
The three leading ladies discussed in the case studies—Elizabeth Barry, Anne
Oldfield, and Kitty Clive—were all not only talented actresses, but also were both lucky
and very hard working. Mrs. Barry was raised by Sir William and Lady Mary Davenant,
and so grew up in the Duke’s Company; Mrs. Oldfield was supposedly “discovered”
whilst reading aloud in her uncle’s tavern; and Mrs. Clive somehow went from heroworshiping Mr. Wilks to joining the Drury Lane Company. While talent and hard work
can advance a career, getting that career started is often a matter of luck. Since we do not
know how the London theatres recruited their performers, or what proportion of people
never even passed an initial audition—or possibly one performance—we cannot
determine the success/failure rate of the would-be performers. However the extant
evidence suggests that being in the right place at the right time, and having a particular
“look” or appeal that the company needed at that particular moment, greatly influenced
who was accepted or rejected.
Of those who “made it” and were accepted by a company, only a small proportion
would become leading performers, and since the records are mostly incomplete for the
very minor people—with no information on personal lives or activities before or after
their stage careers—there is no way to gauge how many performers began with hopes of
reaching the top of their profession and how many had little or no ambition and were
content with their minor roles. As Table 1 shows, there is no correlation between length
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of career and rank within a company. While most leading performers have long careers,
unless personal circumstances intervene—for example Nell Gywn’s career lasted only
seven years because she left the stage to become one of Charles II’s mistresses—there are
also a large number of minor actresses who stay in the profession for a very long time.
This raises the question of why would an actress who was not moving up the ranks and
was playing the same, or similar, roles year-in year-out stay performing? The most
obvious answer is that they enjoyed what they did, because for middle and lower rank
performers the theatre did not always provide steady employment. Another contributory
factor may have been their families—many, though not all, of the minor actresses with
long careers had family ties to their companies.
In the case studies for all three samples the actresses discussed under the category
of “long career but remained minor” fall into this group. Elinor Leigh, whose stage
career lasted for 37 years, was married to leading actor Anthony Leigh—whose rank
probably helped her retain her position in the Duke’s Company despite frequent absences
for the birth of their children. Hester Santlow Booth, who had a 27 career as both actress
and dancer, was married to leading actor and manager Barton Booth. Jane Green, whose
husband was a minor actor, came from a theatrical family—the Hippisleys—and had a
career which lasted for 45 years but not with the same company; at first with her husband
and later apparently by herself, she moved between different companies and cities. In the
case of both Mrs. Leigh and Mrs. Booth, their husbands’ positions with their companies
would have enabled them to at least try out a leading role or two, had they so desired—
but there is no record of either of these actresses ever attempting to move outside their
regular lines. Elinor Leigh in particular established a line very early in her career,
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playing the “older” roles such as duenna, governess, and guardian, from the beginning—
when she returned to the stage after the birth of each of her children (usually taking a
break of nine months to a year) she simply took up the same position in the company that
she had left.
Other actresses who belonged to theatrical families, either by birth or marriage,
have similar career patterns to those discussed in detail in the case studies. Two actresses
from different generations of the Bullock family also had long but minor careers—from
Sample 2, Jane Rogers (Mrs. Christopher Bullock) had a 22-year career, and from
Sample 3, her daughter Mrs. Harriet Dyer (née Bullock) had a career which lasted 45
years. While not all those with family connections had long careers, and not all those
with long but minor careers had family connections, the family tie does provide some
explanation of why actresses who were never going to get leading roles may have stayed
in the acting profession.
Once an actress was established with a company, one of the most important
factors in her career was the roles which she was assigned. Traditionally, when a
performer originated a role in a new play, whenever the company performed the play
afterwards that role “belonged” to him or her until they chose to surrender it—a tradition
with which management were not always in sympathy. The question of who played
which role at times caused considerable dissention, particularly when an up-and-coming
actress was challenging an established leading lady. By present day standards, the
leading performers of the eighteenth-century learned a huge number of parts over the
course of their careers, a large number of which were in new plays which frequently did
not survive beyond their first run.
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Table 5.
Leading actresses’ roles in new and old plays.160
Elizabeth Barry
Anne Oldfield
Kitty Clive
Career
dates
16751710
16991730
17281769
Roles in
new plays
Roles in
old plays
Total number
of roles
118
11
129
68
34
102
54
126
180
These figures give an indication of the sheer number of parts a leading actress had
to maintain throughout the period despite the changes that occurred in theatre practice
during this time. Elizabeth Barry has the greatest number of new roles since she was
active at a time when large numbers of new plays were being performed—due mainly to
vigorous competition between the two London companies—but by the time Anne
Oldfield was established, there was only one company in operation and therefore less
need to put on new plays to attract an audience. Kitty Clive’s extraordinary total of 180
roles can be accounted for by her heavy participation in Afterpieces, and although these
were not as dramatically complex as mainpieces, they still represent a considerable
investment of time and effort.
The number of roles performed by an actress during her years on the stage is only
part of the picture of her career—the types of roles performed and also the actual
workload carried give a more complete view of what being an actress during this period
entailed. Though the lack of extant records for the first sample group makes an estimate
160
Since the extant records are not complete and the numbers of roles given here are ones known, these
figures represent the minimum number of roles performers by these actresses. The number of roles in old
plays for Elizabeth Barry is likely to be a serious under-representation since casts were not advertised for
revivals at this time.
275
of workload for these actresses impossible, there is sufficient information for the later
groups to provide an accurate description of the working lives of these women.
One major change that occurs over time is the increased specialization in role type
that takes place, to the extent that by the end of the eighteenth century each London
company is de facto operating two almost entirely separate groups—one for comedy and
one for tragedy.161 The list of known roles for Elizabeth Barry (Table 3, p. 55) shows an
almost equal division between new roles in comedy (62) and tragedy (67) throughout her
career, despite the fact that she is remembered as the great tragic actress of her era.
Whereas Anne Oldfield performed mainly comedic roles—with an occasional stately
tragic part such as Andromache in The Distrest Mother—she did not tackle any of the
really demanding tragic roles such as Elizabeth Barry would have relished. By the time
Kitty Clive began her career in 1728—eighteen years after Mrs. Barry’s retirement—a
greater division between comedy and tragedy actresses was evident. Mrs. Clive, with
exception of a very few roles such as Ophelia in Hamlet, played comedic parts and due to
the combination of her comedic talents and excellent singing voice, also played in great
number of afterpieces—creating a total of 57 new afterpiece roles. Although Anne
Oldfield and Kitty Clive were both comic actresses, their styles were completely
different. Mrs. Oldfield specialized in the witty upper-class leading ladies who inhabit
the plays of Susannah Centlivre and Colley Cibber, whereas Mrs. Clive developed a line
of roles in the broader comedic vein of the “cheeky servant” and later in her career, the
frequently bawdy “older woman” such as Doll Common in The Alchemist and Mrs.
161
At the beginning of any performer’s career there is invariably a considerable mixture of roles while
he/she is being tried out by the management. Also, minor performers do not specialize to the same degree
as the do the major—minor roles tend to be cast according to type e.g. the confidante, the lady-in-waiting,
rather than according to genre.
276
Winifred in The School for Rakes. With regards to new roles, there is however, one
constant factor across the three sample groups—all the leading actresses continue
creating roles right up to their retirement. Naturally, they do not develop the same
number of roles as they did earlier in their careers but Elizabeth Barry, Anne Oldfield and
Kitty Clive, all had at least one new role in their final year on the stage. This further
contributes to the picture of these actresses as women for whom their careers were a vital
part of their lives—none of them had a need to create new roles this late in their careers.
All three were the leading actresses of their day, they were secure in their position, loved
by audiences, and of great value to management, so can not have felt any pressure to
venture into new territory unless it were through a genuine interest in and love for their
stagecraft.
Although the types of new roles that these actresses created changed as they aged,
they often retained roles created in their youth well past what could be considered an
appropriate age. In the first sample group, the records are incomplete but there are some
interesting changes visible for the end of the career of its leading actress. When
Elizabeth Barry retired temporarily in 1708-09 at the age of fifty her roles were taken by
five different actresses—Mrs. Oldfield, Mrs. Porter, Mrs. Bradshaw, Mrs. Knight and
Mrs. Rogers—who were between fifteen and twenty-five years her junior. Mrs. Oldfield
had already taken over her role of Monimia in Otway’s The Orphan in the 1707
production and she was the only actress to keep one of Mrs. Barry’s roles—Mrs. Loveit
in Ethererge’s The Man of Mode—when that actress returned in 1710. Both of these
roles had been created by Mrs. Barry, in 1680 and 1676 respectively. One of the only
other roles that we know Mrs. Barry ceded was Hellena in Behn’s The Rover; her friend
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Anne Bracegirdle had taken over that role by 1707 when Mrs. Barry took the part of
Angellica Bianca.162 The loss of her roles to Anne Oldfield would appear to have been
through pressure from the management, since Mrs. Barry and Mrs. Oldfield were not
friends. There are no extant records indicating how Elizabeth Barry reacted to this change
in casting, or whether or not she objected: however, this occurred towards the end of her
career when she no longer wielded quite the power within the company that she had once
had. Mrs. Barry may also have felt that fighting for a few of her oldest roles was simply
not worth the effort, or potential embarrassment, at this late stage of her career.
In Sample 2, both Anne Oldfield and Hester Booth retained roles that could
logically have been given to younger performers—in Mrs. Booth’s case, both her dancing
and acting roles. The last known acting role for Hester Santlow Booth is Cordelia in
King Lear—a part she first performed in 1712 when she was circa twenty-two years of
age—on April 30th 1733 when she was approximately forty-three; Mrs. Booth also
continued dancing up to her retirement. Given the fact that Hester Booth had a more
prominent career as a dancer than as an actress, her retention of such roles as Cordelia
and Ophelia when she was into her forties may be more attributable to her husband’s
status than her own. Barton Booth’s position as both lead actor and one of the
triumvirate of actor-managers must have been at least part of the equation when roles
were allocated, though theatrical custom regarding the ‘keeping’ of roles does seem to
have exerted quite a strong influence also. Mrs. Oldfield’s roles also show little change
over the years of her career: for example she began playing the Lady Lurewell in The
162
There are no extant cast lists for The Rover between its premiere in 1677, when Mrs. Barry originated
the role of Hellena, and the 1707 production when she played Angellica Bianca. For a full discussion of
the circumstances surrounding this, and Elizabeth Barry’s ‘retirement’ see Chapter 2, pp. 34-86.
278
Constant Couple in 1707—at the age of twenty-four—and was still playing the role in
1730 at the age of 47.
The tradition of performers retaining the roles they had created can be seen to
continue with the actresses of Sample 3. Jane Green, who had a fairly minor career,
albeit a very long one, and did not remain with the same company throughout,
nonetheless retained the roles she had created. In 1735 at the beginning of her career,
aged sixteen, she originated the role of Cherry in The Stratagem for the Covent Garden
company (this was a revival, Farquhar’s play had premiered in 1707) and despite a
number of company changes in the intervening years, played the role again at Covent
Garden in October and December 1757—at the age of thirty-eight. Mrs. Green had no
particular power in the company and indeed had only returned to Covent Garden in 1754
after an absence of nineteen years. The leading actress from this sample group, Kitty
Clive, also retained many of her roles—though she did switch roles in certain plays such
as The Plain Dealer—she began by playing the role of Olivia in 1737, aged twenty-six,
but in 1765, aged fifty-four, had changed to the Widow Blackacre. However, such roles
as Lappet in The Miser, which she created in 1732, Mrs. Clive was still playing in 1748.
The key issues seem to be a combination of convenience for the company—Mrs. Green
and the role of Cherry, for example—and, more importantly, whether or not a performer
actually created that particular role in a new play.
This pattern of role retention across the three sample groups indicates that the
tradition of an actor’s entitlement to a role he/she had created if anything increased over
time. As far as can be judged, earlier in the period the power of the actress in question
seemed to be a strong contributing factor—a leading actress might choose to cede a role
279
to an upcoming young actress but otherwise maintained her list of parts, irrespective of
age. One other issue which needs to be taken into consideration is public opinion—
audiences will stay away if they are not satisfied with what they are seeing. Unlike the
present day London theatre world, which is kept afloat largely by a continual stream of
tourists, thus ensuring a constantly changing audience, the theatre in eighteenth-century
London had a more static group in regular attendance. Thus the tradition of performers
of both sexes playing roles that were written for someone much younger seems to have
been acceptable, particularly if they had created that role in the first place.
As well as the number, types and changes of roles, the final career component to
be considered is the actual workload carried by actresses during this period. The leading
actresses not only created numerous new roles but also spent many more nights
performing than did the more minor performers. Table 6 shows a comparison between
Mrs. Clive’s workload for the 1738-39 season, and that of Mrs. Butler and Mrs.
Pritchard—Mrs. Butler specialized in tragedy and therefore has no afterpiece roles but
Mrs. Pritchard’s line was quite similar to Mrs. Clive’s.
Table 6.
Workload for Mrs. Clive, Mrs. Butler and Mrs. Pritchard 1738-39.
Mrs.
Clive
Month
September
October
November
December
January
February
March
Plays
3
7
12
11
14
9
4
Afterpieces
8
5
1
10
13
3
8
280
April
May
Total
7
17
84
2
2
52
Mrs.
Butler
Month
September
October
November
December
January
February
March
April
May
Total
1738-39
Plays
5
9
7
4
13
17
9
7
8
79
Afterpieces
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Mrs.
Pritch.
Month
September
October
November
December
January
February
March
April
May
Total
1738-39
Plays
1
4
5
11
10
8
4
3
8
54
Afterpieces
1
3
0
4
12
0
4
1
7
32
These tables show that Kitty Clive was giving approximately 50% more performances
than the ‘second’ actresses in her company during this season.
Although the records for the earlier two samples are not complete, the same
pattern of hard work is discernible. In the 1711-12 season, Anne Oldfield had been on
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the London stage for twelve years and was Drury Lane’s undisputed leading actress. In
that season she performed the following number of different roles:
No. of roles
September
October
November
December
January
February
March
April
May
4
23
17
19
16
19
8
14
11
No. of nights of performance
6+
28
23
20
22
21
17+
15+
11
As this table indicates, some of these roles were in single perfromances but others had
multiple nights of performance, demonstrating the level of commitment Drury Lane
expected from their leading lady.
While the absence of advertised casts for revivals makes estimating Elizabeth
Barry’s workload impossible, the sheer number of her known roles gives a good
indication of the type of schedule she must have worked. For all the leading actresses
discussed in this study, while they were working, the stage was the main part of their
lives—the time they put in to learning new roles, maintaining old ones, going to rehearsal
and performing must have left room for little else of significance.
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Public perception
As the careers of actresses changed over the long eighteenth-century, so too did
the ways in which they were perceived by the public. In terms of their place within a
company and their commitment to their work, this study shows that women on the
London stage became increasingly professional in their outlook during the period
considered. While not every actress by 1755 was a dedicated professional with a spotless
personal reputation, the majority were women who regarded their work on the stage as
just that—their means of employment, not their route to a husband/protector and a life
outside the theatre. This increasing professionalization is also reflected in the way in
which the actresses are viewed by the public; from 1670 to 1755 both the tone and the
content of extant comments on actresses changes considerably.
The satires written concerning Elizabeth Barry and many of her contemporaries
do not comment on these women as actresses, critiquing their performances on stage, but
as ‘loose women’ selling their sexual favors to the highest bidder. The actors of this
period are also subject to public comment but are ridiculed for such things as their lack of
acting ability, the airs and graces they give themselves, their vanity—their personal lives
and antecedents are usually left alone. Poems such as Robert Gould’s The Playhouse, a
Satyr (1689, rev. ed. 1709) illustrate the difference in the way in which actors and
actresses were satirized. Gould lashes out at the two principal performers—Thomas
Betterton is portrayed as proud, disdainful and vain while Elizabeth Barry is described in
the filthiest terms as a whore and the daughter of a whore. The 1688 Session of Ladyes
mentions the actress Elizabeth Boutell as “Chestnut-man’d Boutel, whom all the Town
F—ks” ignoring the fact that she was a highly successful actress to concentrate on her
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physicality and supposed immorality.163 None of the extant satires dwells on bad
performances given by actresses; though there must have been quite a few, given the
newness of the profession and the numbers of actresses from the first sample group who
appeared in just a few plays and then vanished completely. I do not suggest that all
actresses of this period were being unjustly maligned—many were highly, and blatantly,
promiscuous—but that the public comments of the time are biased towards actresses as
sexual beings rather than as women engaged in a profession.
The presence of actresses on the London stage undoubtedly helped fuel the
‘immorality of the stage’ debate at the end of the seventeenth-century, even though they
had been part of the theatre scene for nearly forty years at that time. However, when we
reach the second sample group in 1710, public opinion of actresses is beginning to
change. The fashion for lampoons on public figures was dying out but the ‘celebrity
biography’ as produced by such publishers as Edmund Curll (1683-1747) was gaining in
popularity. The two biographies of Anne Oldfield—The Faithful Memoirs and The
Authentick Memoirs—which appeared within a year of her death in 1730 are both hack
works designed for profit rather than providing the public with an accurate account of her
life, yet neither work dwells on her private life in a salacious manner. In spite of the fact
that Anne Oldfield never married but had two children from two long-term and very
public relationships—with Arthur Mainwaring and then Brigadier General Sir Charles
Churchill—neither biographer felt the need to point out her lack of morals. Both works
give what we assume today to be an over-romanticized account of Mrs. Oldfield’s early
life and start on the London stage, and the Faithful Memoirs gives more detail on the
roles she played and her wonderful acting style, but her relationships with Mainwaring
163
Biographical Dictionary 2: 261.
284
and Churchill are treated as if they had been legitimate marriages. Of the negative extant
accounts of Mrs. Oldfield—A Letter to Sir John Stanley, A Justification of the Letter to
Sir John Stanley, The Memorial of Jane Rogers—only the Justification contains any
personal attack of the sort popular during the Restoration. This slander on Mrs. Oldfield
was probably more of an attack on her partner, Arthur Mainwaring; she was simply a
means to an end. The other two documents which paint Anne Oldfield in a less than
flattering light do so in terms of her pride and mistreatment of those around her; no
mention is made of her personal life or morals.
In the final sample group, Kitty Clive is the leading actresses for the case study;
she was a ‘larger than life’ comedian who had a rather abrasive personality, an early
failed marriage and a long-term, apparently platonic, relationship with Horace Walpole—
yet there are no extant comments, or criticisms, of her personal life. Mrs. Clive’s only
contemporary biographer, Chetwood, mentions her background, her beginnings at Drury
Lane, her meteoric rise in the company and her continued success. Kitty Clive’s
personality and personal life held plenty of material for gossip and innuendo yet no one
seems to have taken advantage of this, at least not in print.
While some of the decrease in sensationalist writing over this period may be
attributed to a change in fashion, one thing did not change: actresses were still very
public figures about whom the public wished to know more. Actresses had devoted fans
who championed their cause if their roles were under threat. People went to the theatre to
see a well-known actress in her signature role/s, but by the mid eighteenth-century the
acting had become the focus not the woman. This is not to say that a pretty actress did
not attract considerable attention then as today but rather that the physical body of the
285
woman playing the part, or what she might choose to do with that body while not onstage, was no longer the prime concern. Actresses, by the nature of their profession, have
in the past and will no doubt continue in the future to attract gossip, generate rumor, and
provide sensation for an ever eager public but the emphasis has changed. From the first
sample group to the third, actresses went from being a group of women whose presence
on stage provided titillation and novelty, to being group of women engaged in a
legitimate profession.
286
Works Frequently Cited
Biographical Dictionary
Philip H. Highfill, Jr., Kalman A. Burnim, and Edward A.
Langhans, A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Actresses,
Musicians, Dancers, Managers, and Other Stage Personnel
in London, 1660-1800. 16 vols. (Carbondale: Southern
Illinois University Press, 1973-1993).
Downes
John Downes, Roscius Anglicanus, or an Historical
Review of the Stage (1708) ed. Judith Milhous and Robert
D. Hume (London: The Society for Theatre Research,
1987).
Howe
Elizabeth Howe, The first English actresses: Women and
Drama 1660-1700 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1992).
The London Stage
The London Stage 1660-1800: A Calendar of Plays,
Entertainments, and Afterpieces Together with Casts, BoxReceipts and Contemporary Comment Compiled from the
Playbills, Newspapers and Theatrical Diaries of the
Period. Part 1, 1660-1700, ed. William Van Lennep
(Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1965)
Part 2, 1700-1729. 2 vols., ed. Emmett L. Avery (1960).
Part 3, 1729-1747, 2 vols., ed. Arthur H. Scouten (1961).
Part 4, 1747-1776, 3 vols., ed. George Winchester Stone
Jr. (1962).
Part 5, 1776-1800, 3 vols., ed. Charles Beecher Hogan
(1968).
Document Register
Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume, A Register of English
Theatrical Documents 1660-1737. 2 vols. (Carbondale:
Southern Illinois University Press, 1991).
Wilson
John Harold Wilson, All the King’s Ladies: Actresses of
the Restoration. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1958).
287
Appendix A.
LONDON THEATRE CHRONOLOGY
1660-1757164
1660 May
Charles II returns to the throne.
1660 August 21
Charles II issues a grant to Sir William Davenant and
Thomas Killigrew for a monopoly to run two theatre companies,
the Duke’s and the King’s. The actual patents are issued in 1662
and 1663.
1660 October 1
The Master of the Revels, then Sir Henry Herbert, to license the
printing of plays.
1660 October 6
Actors sworn as servants to the King and are therefore entitled to
certain rights and protections as members of the royal household.
1660 November 5
Formal sharing agreement drawn up between Davenant and his
principal actors in the Duke’s Company.
1660 December 8
A woman plays Desdemona in a production of Othello by the
Kings Company. This is the first recorded public performance of
an actress on the English stage.
1660 December 12 Davenant granted the permanent rights to his own plays and
eleven from the Renaissance, including Shakespeare’s Hamlet
and Macbeth.
1661
The Duke’s Company opens a new theatre at Lincoln’s Inn Fields,
which has changeable scenery.
1662 April 25
The formal patent for Killigrew’s company is issued. Included is
the stipulation that women’s roles in plays, in both companies, are
henceforth only to be performed by women.
1663 January 15
The formal patent for Davenant’s company is issued.
164
The source for items included in this chronology from 1660-1737 is Judith Milhous and Robert D.
Hume, A Register of English Theatrical Documents 1660-1737. 2 vols. (Carbondale: Southern Illinois
University Press, 1991); from 1737-1755 the information provided comes from Jane Milling, The
Cambridge History of British Theatre. 3 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004) Vol 2.
288
1663 May 7
The King’s Company opens its new theatre, also with changeable
scenery, at Bridges Street.
1663 July 23
Davenant and Killigrew are authorized jointly to open a new
theatre, a “nursery”, for the training of boys and girls in the acting
profession.
1665 June 5
Theatres closed due to plague; they remain shut for eighteen
months.
1666 November 29 Both companies receive permission to re-open their theatres.
1668 April 7
Sir William Davenant dies. Control of the Duke’s Company
passes to Lady Davenant in trust for her son, Charles; the day-today management of the company is taken over by leading actors
Henry Harris and Thomas Betterton.
1671 November 9
The Duke’s Company opens their new theatre in Dorset Garden.
1672 January 25
The King’s Company Theatre Royal at Bridges Street burns down;
the company moves temporarily to the theatre at Lincoln’s Inn
Fields recently vacated by the Duke’s Company.
1673 May 1
Thomas Killigrew succeeds Sir Henry Herbert as Master of the
Revels.
1674 March 26
The new Theatre Royal, possibly designed by Christopher Wren,
opens at Drury Lane.
1677 February 22
Charles Killigrew wins legal control of the King’s Company from
his father, Thomas.
1677 February 24
Charles Killigrew also takes over his father’s position as Master of
the Revels.
1678
At the Duke’s Company, Henry Harris retires and is replaced by
William Smith as co-manager with Betterton.
1682 May
Articles of Union between the two companies; the new United
Company to perform at the both the Dorset Garden and Drury
Lane theatres.
1685 February 6
Charles II dies; his brother James II becomes king.
1687 August 30
Charles Davenant sells his shares in the United Company and the
Drury Lane theatre to his brother, Alexander.
289
1687 September 12 Alexander Davenant enters into an agreement with Thomas
Skipwith to help finance his purchase. The papers are held by
Christopher Rich.
1687 October 29
Alexander Davenant installs his brother, Thomas, as manager in
place of Betterton and Smith.
1688 March 22
The share of the Duke’s Company which originally belonged to
Sir William Davenant and had then been granted by him to Sir
William Russell is transferred from the interim owners, Bowes
and Roffey, to Christopher Rich.
1688
The “Glorious Revolution”—James II flees England.
1689
William and Mary accede to the throne.
1691 March 21
Alexander Davenant assigns his share in the rent of Drury Lane to
Christopher Rich in trust for Thomas Skipwith.
1691 March 26
Articles of agreement on the division of Davenant’s shares—Rich
receives 1/6; Skipwith 2, and the patent; Alexander will manage
the theatre and keep the accounts which Rich is free to inspect.
1693 October 23
Alexander Davenant flees to the Canary Islands to avoid his
creditors. Sir Thomas Skipwith and Christopher Rich now take
control of the United Company.
1694 December 28 Queen Mary dies.
1694 November
“The Petition of the Players”—a petition, signed by the senior
actors and actresses of the United Company, led by Betterton,
was sent to Lord Chamberlain Dorset protesting against
Christopher Rich’s management of the company and his treatment
of the players.
1694 December 10 “The Reply of the Patentees”—a detailed refutation of the players’
grievances by the patent holders.
1695 March 25
Lord Chamberlain Dorset sides with the rebel actors and grants
them a license to perform at Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Some
290
performers stay with Rich and Skipwith who are still operating
the theatres at Drury Lane and Dorset Garden.
1702 March 8
William III dies; Anne becomes queen.
1703
John Vanbrugh begins his plans for a new theatre at the
Haymarket where he intends to produce spectacular operas.
1704 December 14 Vanbrugh and Congreve are granted a license for a theatre
company by the Lord Chamberlain. This makes no mention
of the existing companies but Vanbrugh appears to have come
to an arrangement with Betterton and the Lincoln’s Inn Fields
company whereby the actors signed over their shares to him in
return for salaries.
1705 April 9
Vanbrugh’s new theatre at the Haymarket opens; both opera and
plays, acted by the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Company, will be
performed here.
1705 July 19
Vanbrugh puts forward a proposal for a new union of the acting
companies.
1705 July 19
Vanbrugh’s theatre company move back to the Lincoln’s Inn
Fields theatre premises until the Haymarket is finished.
Apparently Vanbrugh rushed the opening of the Haymarket and
moved the actors before the building was properly set up to
accommodate both opera and acting companies.
1705 July
The Drury Lane actors send a petition to the Lord Chamberlain
against Vanbrugh’s proposed union of the companies.
1705 July 25
Rich replies to Vanbrugh and refuses to consider a union.
1705 October 20
Vanbrugh’s theatre company move out of Lincoln’s Inn Fields
and back to the Haymarket theatre.
1705 December
Congreve drops out of the management of the Lincoln’s Inn
Fields Company due to financial reasons.
1706 August(?)
Draft of an order of separation of the companies—operas and other
musical entertainments to be produced only at Drury Lane and
Dorset Garden; plays to be performed at the Haymarket. Such a
separation is resisted by Rich who retains the right to perform
291
both plays and operas while Vanbrugh can produce plays only.
1706 August 14
An agreement is drawn up between Vanbrugh and Owen Swiney
whereby Swiney is to rent the Haymarket theatre from Vanbrugh
for seven years. Swiney will pay Vanbrugh ₤5 for every day the
company acts and will then keep any remaining profits for himself.
1707 December
Vanbrugh takes back control of the Haymarket with Swiney as
manager.
1707 December 31 The Lord Chamberlain orders a union of the acting companies at
Drury Lane, under Christopher Rich; John Vanbrugh is to have a
monopoly of opera at the Haymarket.
1708 March 31
The actors Wilks, Cibber and Estcourt are appointed as managers
of the Drury Lane Company. This contract included a change to
system of actor benefits which allowed the management to claim
a greater proportion of any profits, particularly from the lower
ranked performers.
1709 Spring
Rich extends this to all performers.
1709 March 4
Anne Oldfield writes a letter of complaint against Rich—after her
benefit he deducted not only the agreed house charges, ₤40, but
also claimed a third of her remaining profits, a further ₤31, for
“the benefit of the patent.”
1709 March 10
Owen Swiney signs a partnership agreement with the actors Wilks,
Doggett, and Cibber to form an acting company at the Haymarket.
1709 April 30
The Lord Chamberlain forbids the management at Drury Lane to
deduct more than the house charges of ₤40 from actors benefits.
1709 March/April
Other actors, such as Anne Oldfield, sign on with Swiney’s
proposed company.
1709 June 6
Lord Chamberlain Kent issues an “Order of Silence” for Rich’s
Drury Lane Company.
1709 July 8
The Lord Chamberlain grants permission for the Haymarket to hire
any of the Drury Lane performers that it wishes.
1709 July
The actors who remained at Drury Lane petition the Lord
Chamberlain to be allowed to perform again.
292
1709 September(?) The patentees petition the Queen requesting an investigation of the
Lord Chamberlain’s closure of Drury Lane.
1709 September 6 Rich tries to open a new season without permission; the theatre
is shut down before the performance can begin.
1709 September 15 The new company at the Haymarket opens; by mid-October they
are performing four plays and two operas per week.
1709 November
Swiney requests confirmation of the Haymarket monopoly from
the Lord Chamberlain—at this time one of the patentees, William
Collier, is maneuvering to set up a company at Drury Lane.
1709 November 19 Collier applies for, and is granted, a license for a new company to
perform at Drury Lane provided that he gives up his interest in the
original patent and does not allow any of the other holders of that
patent, including Christopher Rich, to be involved in the
management of the new company.
1709 November 22 Collier takes forcible possession of the theatre at Drury Lane to
find that Rich has removed anything of value but opens the season.
1709 November
Swiney objects to the license and receives limited satisfaction
from the Lord Chamberlain in the form of an order guaranteeing
the services of his principal players.
1710 January(?)
Collier appoints Aaron Hill, an aspiring dramatist, to manage
Drury Lane in place of the existing committee of seven actors.
1710 May
The actors at Drury Lane riot against the management of Hill and
Collier.
1710 June
The actors and Christopher Rich take possession of the Drury Lane
theatre; Hill and Collier are locked out; no performances during
this summer.
1710 November
A compromise is reached—a new genre split; opera will be at the
Haymarket and plays will be performed by a new united company
at Drury Lane.
1710 November 6
A license to operate an acting company is granted to Swiney,
Wilks, Cibber and Doggett.
293
1710 November 16 Swiney sublets the opera concern to Collier on condition that the
original terms of his agreement with Vanbrugh are maintained.
1710 December
Swiney complains of his treatment by Wilks, Cibber, and Doggett;
he requests that the Lord Chamberlain enforces the terms of the
partnership agreement.
1711 January
Swiney accuses his partners of withdrawing large amounts from
the company funds. This was the beginning of the legal battle
between Swiney and the actor/managers over the company
finances and management.
1711 March
By this time Collier’s opera company is in serious financial
trouble.
1711 May
An agreement is reached between Swiney and his partners—
the partnership will be dissolved; Swiney will have no further part
in the management of the acting company and will receive an
annual stipend of ₤600.
1712 April 17
A license is granted to Collier, Wilks, Cibber, and Doggett for an
acting company.
1712 April 17
A license is granted to Swiney for a company to perform opera and
other musical entertainments.
1712 December 6
An agreement is drawn up making Collier a sleeping partner at
Drury Lane and guaranteeing him ₤700 per annum.
1713 January
Swiney is bankrupt and flees to the continent where he tries to sort
out the company finances. John Jacob Heidegger takes over the
management of the opera company.
1713 November 11 Actor Barton Booth is added to the managers listed on the license
for Drury Lane.
1714 August 1
Queen Anne dies; George I accedes to the throne.
1714 August
Wilks, Booth and Cibber manage to oust Collier from
management. He is replaced by Richard Steele.
1714 September
John Rich, son of Christopher, is managing a company at Lincoln’s
Inn Fields.
1717
Rich begins to produce pantomimes at Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
294
1720
The “Little Theatre” opens in the Haymarket.
1720 January
Steele is barred from active management at Drury Lane.
1727 June 11
George I dies; George II accedes to the throne.
1728 January
Barton Booth retires from the stage due to ill health.
1729 October
Thomas Odell opens a new theatre in Ayliffe Street, Goodman’s
Fields.
1729
Sir Richard Steele dies; Cibber, Wilks and Booth apply for a new
patent for Drury Lane.
1731
Henry Giffard takes over the Goodman’s Fields theatre.
1732 July 3
A new patent granted to Cibber, Wilks and Booth for Drury Lane.
1732 July 13
Booth sells half of his share in the patent to John Highmore.
1732 September 27 Robert Wilks dies.
1732 October
Cibber rents his share in the patent to his son, Theophilus, and
goes on salary.
1732 October
Giffard opens a new theatre, designed by Edward Shephard,
at Goodman’s Fields.
1732
John Rich moves his company from LIF to a new theatre, designed
by Edward Shephard, at Covent Garden.
1733 May 10
Barton Booth dies.
1733
Mrs. Hester Booth sells her remaining share of the Drury Lane
patent to Henry Giffard.
1733
Colley Cibber sells his share of the patent to John Highmore and
John Ellys.
1733
Theophilus Cibber leads a revolt of the Drury Lane actors .
1733
Highmore sells out to John Fleetwood.
1734 March 12
T. Cibber reaches an agreement with Fleetwood and the “rebels”
return to Drury Lane.
295
1735 March 5
Sir John Barnard moves for a parliamentary Bill which would
restrict the number of theatres allowed to operate in London, and
control what could be performed. This fails to become law.
1735 December 12 Fleetwood and Rich sign a profit-sharing agreement that might
have been a first step towards a union between Drury Lane
and Covent Garden had the two principals not had a falling out.
1736-37
Henry Fielding assembles and manages a company at the
Little Haymarket.
1737 June 24
Robert Walpole’s “Licensing Act” becomes law. From now on
anyone performing for money without a license or patent
from the Lord Chamberlain’s office would be prosecuted as a
vagabond and all material to be performed was to be first
submitted to the Lord Chamberlain’s office for approval.
1743
Garrick and Macklin lead an actors’ strike at Drury Lane.
1744
A riot ensues at Drury Lane caused by Fleetwood’s attempt
to raise ticket prices; as a result he is forced to leave the theatre.
1744 December
Fleetwood sells out to bankers Norton Amber and Richard Green
who enter into a partnership with actor James Lacy to manage
Drury Lane.
1747 April 9
David Garrick and James Lacy become joint owners/managers
of Drury Lane.
1757 December 11 Colley Cibber dies.
296
Appendix B.
Actors’ careers – Sample 1 (1670-1675), Sample 2 (1710-1715),
Sample 3 (1750-1755)
Table 1.
Sample 1 (1670-1675) Actors’ career lengths.
Notes:
Names in bold indicate actors who can be classified as “major”.
■ after an actors name denotes that this performer began his career in some form of
theatre before the Restoration in 1660; since extant theatrical records from before and
during the interregnum are incomplete, therefore making exact calculations difficult, and
this study is concerned with acting careers from 1660 onwards, then these years have not
been counted in the “Career length” column.
+ after the number of years of a career indicates that this actor also had a stage career pre1660 which has not been counted here.
‡ after a name denotes that this actor was also either a dancer or singer.
♦ after a name denotes that this actor spent part of his career in Ireland.
Y in the “Family Connection” column indicates that “Yes” this actor had a family
connection to the theatre world.
m after Y denotes that this connection was through marriage.
(P) after an actor’s name indicates that he was also a playwright.
Sample 1 1670-1675
Mr. Adams
Edward Angel ■
Mr. Bamfield ‡
William Beeston ■
Richard Bell
Thomas Betterton ■
Theophilus Bird
John Boman ‡
Mr. Burford ‡
Nicholas Burt ■
Philip Cademan
Peter Carlton
William Cartwright ■
Mr. Chapman
John Chudlegh
Thomas Clark
John Cogan
Family
Connection
Y
Y
Ym
Y
Y
Career
Length
(in years)
4
13+
1
10+
4
50
10
63
2
30+
13
4
24+
1
5
21
8
Year of first Year of last
performance performance
1669
1673
1660
1673
1671
1671
1660
1670
1668
1672
1660
1710
1664
1674
1675
1738
1670
1672
1660
1690
1660
1673
1673
1677
1660
1684
1674
1674
1669
1674
1670
1691
1664
1672
297
Mr. Cory
John Coysh
John Crosby
Alexander Douglas
Edward Eastland
Rupert Eastland
William Field
Thomas Gillow
Cardell Goodman
James Gray
Philip Griffin ♦
Joseph Haines ‡
Thomas Hancock
Henry Harris ‡
William (?) Harris
Charles Hart ■
Richard Hart ‡
Thomas Jevon ‡
Matthew Kempton
Nathaniel Kew (or Cue)
Edward Kynaston ■
John Lacy ■ ‡
John Lee
Nathaniel Lee (P)
Anthony Leigh
John Littlewood
Edward Lydall ■
Matthew Medbourne (P)
Michael Mohun ■
James Nokes
Henry Norris
Thomas Percival
John Perin
Martin Powell
Charles Rotch
Samuel Sandford ‡
Robert Shatterell ■
Mr. Sherwood ‡
George Shirley ‡
William Smith
Guilbert Soper
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
?
30
10
1
9
1
1
14
14
10
38
33
15
21
14
21+
8
13
18
10
41+
21+
7
11
21
3
17+
17
22+
31
26
21
13
25
1
37
20+
2
6
31
9
?
1667
1669
1672
1670
1674
1671
1673
1673
1674
1670
1667
1661
1660
1663
1660
1670
1673
1663
1672
1660
1660
1673
1672
1671
1668
1660
1661
1660
1660
1661
1672
1667
1670
1674
1661
1660
1671
1668
1662
1674
1675
1697
1679
1673
1679
1675
1672
1687
1687
1684
1708
1700
1676
1681
1677
1681
1678
1686
1681
1682
1701
1681
1680
1683
1692
1671
1677
1678
1682
1691
1687
1693
1680
1695
1675
1698
1680
1673
1674
1693
1683
298
Cave Underhill
Mr. Venner
Marmaduke Watson ♦
Theophilus Westwood
Mr. Whaley
Walter Williams ■
Joseph Williams
John Wiltshire
William Wintershall ■
John Young
Y
50
2
37
2
1
11+
33
10
17+
14
1660
1673
1660
1670
1671
1660
1673
1675
1660
1662
1710
1675
1697
1672
1671
1671 ?
1706
1685
1677
1676
Table 2.
Sample 1 analysis of actors’ careers.
Career
Span
Career
under 5
yrs
Career
over 20
yrs
Career
pre-1660
1-63
yrs
16 (23%)
24 (35%)
13 (19%)
Total
68
Major
11
(16%)
0
10
6
Minor
57
(84%)
16
14
7
Table 3.
Sample 2 (1710-1715) Actors’ career lengths.
Notes:
Names in bold indicate actors who can be classified as “major”. These do not include
such players as William Pinketheman, who though famous and exceedingly popular with
audiences in their time, specialized in “low comedy” and would not have been able to
carry a play in way which Barton Booth or Robert Wilks did.
‡ after a name denotes that this actor was also either a dancer or singer.
♦ after a name denotes that this actor spent part of his career in Ireland.
“Year of last performance” refers to an actor’s last London performance; if he moved
to Ireland, or the provinces, and did not return to the London stage then I have not
counted these years in the length of career. Career lengths do, however, include seasons
or years spent in non-London venues.
299
Y in the “Family Connection” column indicates that “Yes” this actor had a family
connection to the theatre world.
m after Y denotes that this connection was through marriage.
(P) after an actor’s name indicates that he was also a playwright.
Sample 2 1710-1715
Family
Connection
John Bickerstaff
Matthew Birkhead ‡
Barton Booth ♦
Wiliam Bowen ♦
Mr. Boman
John Boman ‡
Christopher Bullock (P)
William Bullock
James Carnaby
Colley Cibber (P)
Mr. Coker
John Corey (P)
Richard Cross ♦
Thomas Doggett ‡ ♦
Thomas Elrington ♦
Richard Estcourt (P)
John Evans ♦
Richard (?) Frisbe ♦
Benjamin Griffin ‡ (P)
Thomas Griffith ‡ ♦
John Hall ‡ ♦
Joseph Harris ‡
Benjamin Husband ♦
Benjamin Johnson ‡
Theophilus Keene ♦
Mr. Knapp ‡
Francis Leigh
John Leigh ♦
Mr. Maddocks
Josias, or Joseph Miller ‡
John Mills
William Mills
Henry Norris ‡ ♦
Ym
Y
Ym
Y
Y
Y
Y
Y
Ym
Y
Y
Y
Ym
Y
Y
Career
(in
years)
18
15
30
34
32
63
15
44
12
55
6
34
25
26
21
20
22
18
23
37
20
30
46
47
21
24
18
16
2
34
41
38
31
Year of first
Year of last
performance
1703
1707
1698
1683
1712
1675
1707
1695
1701
1690
1715
1701
1700
1691
1709
1693
1695
1715
1714
1698
1714
1685
1695
1695
1696
1694
1701
1709
1714
1704
1695
1712
1693
performance
1721
1722
1728
1717
1744
1738
1722
1739
1713
1745
1721
1735
1725
1717
1730
1712
1717
1733
1737
1735
1734
1715
1741
1742
1717
1720
1719
1725
1716
1738
1736
1750
1724
300
John Ogden ‡
George Pack ‡
Mr. Pendry
William Pinkethman ‡ ♦
George Powell ‡ (P)
James Quin ‡ ♦
John Ray ‡
Thomas Rogers
Lacy Ryan ♦
Mr. Schoolding ‡ ♦
Charles Shepherd
Thomas Smith ‡ ♦
James Spiller ‡
John Thurmond ‡ ♦
John Thurmond Jr. ‡ ♦
Thomas Walker ‡ ♦ (P)
Mr. Weller
Robert Wilks ‡ ♦
G. Wright ‡
Ym
Ym
17
24
7
36
27
40
39
7
48
25
33
31
21
32
29
28
15
41
37
1715
1700
1708
1688
1687
1713
1712
1715
1709
1698
1710
1702
1709
1695
1708
1714
1703
1691
1713
Career
under 5
yrs
Career
over 20
yrs
Also Sang
Part of career
or Danced
in Ireland
1
39 (75%)
25 (48%)
22 (42%)
0
6 (100%)
4 (67%)
4 (67%)
1
33 (72%)
21 (46%)
18 (39%)
Y
Y
Y
Y
Ym
Y
Y
Y
Y
1732
1724
1715
1724
1714
1753
1751
1722
1757
1723
1743
1733
1730
1727
1737
1742
1718
1732
1750
Table 4.
Sample 2 - analysis of actors’ careers.
Career
Total
Major
Minor
52
6
(11%)
46
(89%)
Span
2-63
yrs
301
Table 5.
Sample 3 (1750-1755) Actors’ career lengths.
Notes:
Names in bold indicate actors who can be classified as “major”. These do not include
such players as Edward Shuter, who though famous and exceedingly popular with
audiences in their time, specialized in “low comedy” and would not have been able to
carry a play in the way in which David Garrick or Spranger Barry did.
‡ after a name denotes that this actor was also either a dancer or singer.
♦ after a name denotes that this actor spent part of his career in Ireland.
“Year of last performance” refers to an actor’s last London performance; if he moved
to Ireland, or the provinces, and did not return to the London stage then I have not
counted these years in the length of career—these are indicated by an * after the year.
Career lengths do, however, include seasons or years spent in non-London venues.
Y in the “Family Connection” column indicates that “Yes” this actor had a family
connection to the theatre world.
m after Y denotes that this connection was through marriage.
(P) after an actor’s name indicates that he was also a playwright.
Sample 3 1750-1755
Ellis Ackman
Mr. Allen
Mr. Anderson
John Arthur
Charles Atkins ‡
Thomas Baker ‡
John Barrington ♦
Spranger Barry ♦
John Beard ‡
James Bencraft ‡
Warner Bennet ‡
Edward Berry ‡
Charles Blakes ‡
Mr. Blakey
George Bland ♦
Astley Bransby
Mr. Bridges ♦
Roger Bridgwater ‡
Mr. Brown ‡
Family
connection
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Career
length
(in years)
24
12
29
39
27
37
37
32
34
33
27
30
26
20
3
33
9
31
3
Year of first Year of last
performance performance
1750
1774
1745
1757
1738
1767
1735
1769
1748
1775
1745
1782
1735
1772
1744
1776
1732
1766
1729
1762
1741
1768
1729
1759
1736
1762
1743
1763
1748
1751
1744
1777
1752
1761
1723
1754
1748
1751
302
George Bulbrick ‡
Edmund Burton
Samuel Cautherley
Theophilus Cibber ‡ ♦
Thomas Clough
William Collins ‡
Patrick Costollo ♦
Richard Cross ‡
Richard Cross Jr. ‡
John Cushing
Thomas Davies ♦
John Dexter
John Dunstall ‡
Michael Dyer ‡ ♦
Richard Elrington ♦
Samuel Foote ♦ (P)
David Garrick ♦ (P)
William Gibson
J. Goodfellow ‡ ♦
James Gray ‡
William Havard (P)
Edward Holtom
(Holtham)
Mr. Howard ‡ ♦
Richard Hurst ‡ ♦
Harris James ‡
Thomas Jefferson ♦
John Johnston ‡ ♦
James Lacy
Robert Layfield ‡ ♦
John Lee ♦ (P)
Jonathan Legg ‡
Philip Lewis ‡ ♦
Thomas Lowe ‡ ♦
Charles Macklin ‡ ♦
Henry Marr ‡
John Marten
Robert Montgomery ♦
Mr. Moore
Henry Mossop ♦
Thomas Mozeen ‡ ♦ (P)
Ym
Y
Y
Y
Y
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Y
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Y
Ym
Y
Ym
Ym
7
26
25
38
29
21
21
21
12
41
26
3
38
32
22
33
35
32
8
32
39
1750
1746
1755
1720
1741
1741
1745
1729
1748
1741
1736
1751
1740
1742
1729
1744
1741
1739
1744
1729
1730
1757
1772
1775*
1758
1770
1762
1766
1750
1760
1782
1762
1753*
1778
1774
1751*
1777
1776
1771
1752*
1761
1769
34
10
26
19
30
39
18
22
32
27
48
42
64
37
27
2
17
14
26
1744
1748
1754
1732
1747
1742
1724
1729
1745
1751
1740
1740
1725
1740
1737
1750
1755
1749
1742
1778
1758
1780*
1751
1777*
1781
1742
1751
1777
1778
1788
1782
1789
1777
1764
1752
1772
1763*
1768
303
Arthur Murphy (P)
James Oates ‡ ♦
Mr. Paddick
John Palmer
James Quin ‡ ♦
James Raftor ‡
John Ray
Samuel Redman ♦
Frederick Charles
Reinhold ‡
Mr. Ricard ♦
Issac Ridout
Ellis Roberts ‡
Edward Rooker
David Ross ‡ ♦
Lacey Ryan ♦
Henry Scrase
Thomas Sheridan ♦
Edward Shuter ‡ ♦
Mr. Simpson
Mr. Slim
Charles Smith ‡ ♦
Richard Smith ‡
John Sowdon ‡ ♦
Issac Sparks ‡ ♦
Luke Sparks ♦
Mr. Stevens
George Alexander
Stevens ♦
Michael Stoppelaer ‡ ♦
James Taswell
Mr. Tomlinson
Howard Usher ♦
Henry Vaughan ‡ ♦
William Vaughan ‡ ♦
Joseph Vernon ‡ ♦
Mr. Vincent
Thomas Wogan Wallace
‡
Edward White ♦
John Wignell
Y
Ym
Ym
Y
Y
Ym
Y
Ym
Ym
Ym
Y
Y
Ym
Y
Ym
Ym
Y
Y
Ym
Ym
3
36
25
20
40
37
39
40
1753
1715
1735
1748
1713
1733
1712
1735
1756
1751
1760
1768
1753
1770
1751
1775
30
5
29
35
26
38
50
15
44
32
24
1
43
40
24
37
33
7
1755
1750
1731
1728
1748
1749
1709
1749
1732
1744
1733
1754
1726
1741
1747
1734
1732
1745
1785
1755
1760
1763
1774
1787
1759
1764
1776
1776
1757
1754
1769
1781
1771
1771
1765
1752
31
47
30
34
60
35
17
31
1
1741
1730
1728
1747
1739
1731
1740
1750
1750
1773*
1777
1758
1781
1799
1766
1757
1781
1750
24
24
42
1754
1742
1732
1778
1766
1774
304
James Wilder ‡ ♦ (P)
Richard Winstone ‡
Henry Woodward ‡ ♦
James Worsdale ‡ ♦ (P)
Richard Yates ‡
Thomas Yeates ‡
Ym
Ym
Ym
Ym
Y
7
21
48
23
47
27
1748
1732
1729
1737
1736
1725
Table 6.
Sample 3 - analysis of actors’ careers.
Career
Total
Major
Minor
103
5
(5%)
98
(95%)
Span
1-64
yrs
Career
under 5
yrs
Career
over 20
yrs
8 (8%)
81 (79%)
0
5 (100%)
8
76 (76%)
Sang or Ireland
danced
50
(49%)
3 (60%)
47
(48%)
46
(45%)
5
(100%)
42
(42%)
1755*
1753*
1777
1760
1783*
1752
305
Appendix C.
Will transcriptions
Hester Booth
In the name of God Amen,
I Hester Booth of Great Russell Street in the parish of Saint-George Bloomsbury in the
county of Middlesex widow do make as my last will and testament in the manner
following (that is to say) my body I desire may be buried near the remains of my late
mother and of my late husband Barton Booth Esquire interred in the Church of Cowley in
the County of Middlesex.
I give the sum of ten guineas to be distributed by my executors herein after mass among
such of the poor Widows of Cowley parish not receiving alms of the parish as they my
executors shall think fit. I give to Mrs. Elizabeth Lally the widow of Michael Lally
Esquire deceased my diamond ring with two hearts joined together. I give to Mrs.
Frances Perrin my diamond ring set round the hoop with sparks. I give and bequeath to
Edward Eliot of Port Eliot in the county of Cornwall Esquire one of my executors herein
after named all my pictures except the oval portrait of myself and the portrait of my said
late husband both of which hang in the back parlour of my house in Great Russell Street
and which said portrait pictures I give to Charles Cooke Esquire who married Elizabeth
the daughter of the Honourable Harriet Hamilton late of Wigmore Street Cavendish
Square widow deceased. I give to Mrs. Ann Evans who formerly lived in my service
fifty pounds. I give to Mrs. Annabella Plunkenet the wife of Mr. Thomas Plunkenet one
306
hundred pounds to be paid into her own proper hands for her own separate use and
benefit nothwithstanding her Jointure and I so will and direct that her receipt shall be a
full and sufficient discharge to my Executors. For the same I give to Margaret Dobson
who formerly lived in my service ten pounds. I give to each of my maid servants who
now live with me in case they respectively shall be living with me at the time of my
decease five pounds for mourning and also all my wearing apparel to be divided among
them in such a manner and proportions as Mrs. Bonfoy and Mrs. Neale herein after
named shall think proper. I give to my servant Thomas Child, in case he shall continue to
live with me until the time of my death an annuity or yearly sum of twenty pounds for
and during his natural life, such annuity to be paid him quarterly without any deductions
in equal proportions, the first payment to be made to him at the end of the calendar month
next after my decease and I give to the said Thomas Child five pounds for mourning. I
give to the Trustees of the Charity School of the Parish of Saint-George Bloomsbury fifty
guineas to be by them applyed for the use and benefit of said School. I give to Benjamin
Victor of Maiden Lane Covent Garden Esquire fifty guineas. I give to the two Mrs.
Blakes being Sisters and living in Great Russell Street five pounds a piece for rings. I
give to Mr. Beruda of Southampton Row who hath aced as my agent twenty pounds. I
give to Mrs. Ann Bonfoy daughter of Mrs. Bonfoy of Wimpole Street and Mr. John
Hamilton the son of the said Harriet Hamilton deceased twenty guineas apiece. I give to
Mrs. Elizabeth Cooke the wife of the said Charles Cooke the sum of two hundred pounds
and I give to Mrs. Eliot the wife of said Edward Eliot twenty guineas and I so constitute
and appoint the said Edward Eliot and Samuel Salt of the Inner Temple London Esquire
Executors of this my will and do give to the said Samuel Salt the sum of one hundred
307
pounds fro his trouble in the Execution of the same will and I so give devise and
bequeath unto the said Edward Eliot and Samuel Salt their heirs executors and
administrators all the rest and residue of my near and personal estate where soever and of
what nature or kind soever. In trust that they the said Edward Eliot and Samuel Salt or
the survivor of them his heirs or Executors so and shall call in sell and dispose thereof
and after payment of my debts and funeral expenses and the Legacies herein before
bequeath and subject to the said annuity to the said Thomas Child do and shall lay out
and invest one fourth of the residue of the moneys to arise by such sales and of Other the
moneys to be received by them on account of my personal Estate in Government or
Parliamentary Securities at interest in their names. In trust that they the said Edward Eliot
and Samuel Salt and the survivors of them and the Executors and administrators of such
survivor do and shall receive the dividends interest and proceed of the said fourth part so
to be invested from time to time as the same shall become due and payable and shall and
do pay the same to Mrs. Harriet Neale the wife of Pendock Neale Esquire and daughter of
the said Harriet Hamilton deceased, for and during the term of her natural life for her own
sole and separate use and benefit notwithstanding her Jointure and her receipt and from
time to time shall be a sufficient discharge to my said trustees for the same and I so give
and bequeath the said fourth part directed to be invested as aforesaid from and
immediately after the decease of the said Harriet Neale in case she shall survive me and
the other three fourths of the said residue of the moneys to arise and be produced by the
sale of or to be received from or on account of my real and personal Estates and also the
said fourth part thereof in case the said Harriet Neale shall die in my life time
immediately after my decease unto John Eliot now Governor of west Florida the said Ann
308
Bonfoy and Catherine Eliot son and daughters of the said Harriet Hamilton deceased or to
such of them as shall be living at the time of my death to be equally divided among and
between them if more than one of them then living share and share alike and if only one
of them shall survive me then the whole to such one of them and so I will and direct that
my said Executors and Trustees for the time being shall pay assign and transfer the sums
accordingly and though I have given less to the said Edward Eliot and Mrs. Cooke than to
their said brother and sisters I hope and desire they will not mistake it to any difference in
my affections towards them since I have an equal regard for all but to their different
situations in life and lastly I do hereby revoke all former and other wills by me at any
time heretofore made and do make this only my last will and Testament by witness
wherof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this twenty second day of February in the
year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and sixty nine. Hester Booth
Codicil
I give to Mrs. Ann Bonfoy my Silver Tea Kettle and also my Silver Tea Table and all the
rest of my Silver Tea Equipage that is in my Ebony Tea Box. Hester Booth
309
Barton Booth
Wholly resignd and Submitting to the Will of God
I Barton Booth of the Parish of St Pauls Covent Garden so make and ordain this my last
Will and Testament as follows. I bequeath to an old servant to my father Christian
Hannah the sum of five pounds. All and singular my Estate as well seal as personal ready
money Bonds notes plate, Jewells Goods and Chattells of what kind or nature soever I
give and bequeath absolutely to my dearest and well beloved wife Hester Booth her heirs
Executors and assigns for ever and I appoint and constitute my said wife Hester Booth
full and sole executrix of this my last Will and Testament hereby repealing and making
void all other wills made. ‘Tis my dearest desire to be buried privately and without
ostentation in Cowley Church near Uxbridge. As I have been a man much known and
talked of my not leaving legayces to my Relations may give occasion to censorious
people to reflect upon my Conduct in this latter Act of my life. Therefore I think it
necessary to assert that I have considered my Circumstances and finding upon a strict
Examination, that all I am now possessed of, does not amount to two thirds of the fortune
my said Wife brought me on the Day of our Marriage, together with the yearly Additions
and Advantages since arising from her Laborious Employment upon the Stage during
twelve years past; I thought myself bound by Honesty, Honour, and Gratitude due to her
constant affection not to give away any Part of the remainder of her Fortune at my death,
having already bestowed in free Gifts upon my Sister Barbara Rogers upwards of £1300
out of my Wife’s Substance and full £400 of her money upon my undeserving Brother
George Booth (besides the Gifts they received before my Marriage) and all these Benefits
were conferred on my said Brother and Sister from time to time at the Earnest
310
Solicitation of my Wife who was perpetually intreating me to continue the Allowances I
gave my Relations before my Marriage. The Inhuman return that has been made my wife
for these Obligations by my sister I forbear to mention. Once more and making void all
former Wills I declare this present Testament to be my true and last Will so witness
whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this second day of June Anno Domni one
thousand seven hundred thirty and one and in the fourth year of the reign of our
Sovereign Lord King George the Second. All written in my own hand. B. Booth.
311
Anne Oldfield
In the Name of God. XXXIIIII
I Anne Oldfield of the parish of St George Hanover-Square in the County of Middlesex
being of sound and disposing mind and memory do make and ordain my last will and
testament as follows. I hereby ratify and confirm the disposition I have made by deed by
me duly executed—of the house in which I now inhabit and dwel in Grosvenor Street in
the parish of St George Hanover I the County of Middlesex for the benefit of my son
Charles Churchill but in case my said son Charles Churchill shall depart this life under
the age of one and twenty years without having any Issue living at his Death, then and in
such case I give and desire the said house for all the residue and remainder of my term
therein as shall be then remaining and unexpired unto my son Arthur Mainwaring in case
he shall be then living. But if the said Arthur Mainwaring be dead then to the
Honourable Brigadier General Charles Churchill. Item, I hereby will and direct my
Executors herein aftermentioned to turn and convert all my Estate and Effects that I shall
leave behind me at my death except my said house in Grosvenor Street and some small
trifles that I may direct to be given away and except what is already placed out in the
funds or in other publick securities into ready money with all convenient speed and that
the money arising from the sale of my said estate placed out at Interest on Government
and other good security at the discretion of my said Executors’ whom I hereby direct to
pay all my just Debts in the first place and after my debts paid and the Expense of my
funeral defrayed I hereby give and bequeath the following legacies to which I submit my
whole Estate and which I direct my Executors o pay accordingly, that is to say I will and
312
direct my Executors to pay the interest or produce of five thousand pounds to my son
Arthur Mainwaring by half yearly payments, the first payment to commence from the day
of my death until he shall attain the age of thirty years—if he shall so long live and upon
his attaining that age then I direct that the sum of five thousand pounds be paid out of my
Estate to this said Arthur Mainwaring to be at his own disposal but in case he shall dye
before he attains that age then I give and bequeath the said sum of five thousand pounds
to my son Charles Churchill if he be living at such the death of the said Arthur
Mainwaring but if my said son Charles Churchill be then likewise dead then and in such
case I give and bequeath the said sum of five thousand pounds to the honourable
Brigadier General Charles Churchill his Executors and administrators. Then I give and
bequeath to my mother Mrs. Anne Oldfield the sum of ten guineas in money to be paid to
her immediately after my decease and to also give and bequeath to my said mother Mrs.
Anne Oldfield the sum of sixty pounds per annum for her life to be paid to her by my
Executors quarterly at four equal payments in the year the first payment to be made on
the quarter day next, following the day of my death. Item, I give and bequeath to my
aunt Jane Gourlaw ten Guineas in money to be paid her immediately after my decease
and in case my said aunt Jane Gourlaw shall survive my said mother Anne Oldfield then
and in such Case but not otherwise I give and bequeath to my said aunt Jane Gourlaw the
yearly sum or annuity of thirty pounds per annum for her life the said yearly sum or
annuity to be paid to her quarterly by four even payments in the quarter first payment this
to begin and commence from the quarter day that shall most happen from the death of my
said mother. Item, I give and bequeath unto Mrs. Margaret Saunders the yearly amount
or annuity of ten pounds per annum to be paid to her during her life by four quarterly
313
payments the first payment thereof to be made out the quarter day next following the day
of my death. Item, I will that what shall remain of the yearly produce of my Estate after
payment of my said debts and legacies shall from time to time be put out at Interest by
my Executors and added to the bulk of my Estate by way of interest thereof and
immediately upon and from and after the death of said Anne Oldfield my mother, the said
Jane Gourlaw my aunt and the said Margaret Saunders and the deaths of the survivor of
them I will and direct that my whole Estate not herein before by me disposed of and that
shall then remain be divided into three equal parts or shares two parts or shares thereof to
go and be paid to my said son Arthur Mainwaring and the remaining third part or share
thereof to be paid to my said son Charles Churchill but in case my sons Arthur
Mainwaring and Charles Churchill both or either of them should be dead then the part or
share of him or them that is dead to go and be paid to the said Brigadier General Charles
Churchill his executors and administrators and I do hereby nominate and appoint the
honourable John Harvey Esq. commonly called Lord Harvey, John Hedges of Finchley in
the County of Middlesex Esq. and the honourable Brigadier General Charles Churchill
and the survivors of them to be executors of this my will and I do hereby revoke all
former and other wills by me at any time heretofore made and do publish and declare this
to be my last Will and Testament. And witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and
seal—this twenty seventh day of June in the fourth year of King George the Second Anno
Domni 1730. Oldfield signed.
A Codicill to my last will beginning date the 15th day of September 1730. I do hereby
give and bequeath to my Aunt Jane Gourlaw the yearly sum or annuity of ten pounds to
314
be paid her during the life of my Mother Anne Oldfield to commence from the day of my
death and to determine upon the death of my Mother Anne Oldfield when the said
annuity of ten pounds shall revert and go back to my Executors for the use and purpose
directed in my Will and I hereby these other things ratify and confirm my said last Will.
In witness hereto of I have hereunto set my hand this 15th day of September 1730. Anne
Oldfield.
315
Jane Green
This is the Last Will and Testament of Mrs. Jane Green of the parish of Clifton in the
County of Glouester widow. First I give and graise unto my three sons Charles Green
John Hippisley Green and Henry Green all that my Messuage and Tenement with the
Garden thereunto adjoining and belonging situate at Jacobs Wells within the said parish
of Clifton which I hold under the Incorporated Society of Merchant Venturers of the city
of Bristol which I hold for the term of my own Life and the lives of the said John
Hippisley Green and Henry Green my sons the rents and profits to be equally divided
between them and I do also give unto my said three sons all my household furniture plate
linen and china and all my wearing apparel to be equally divided and distributed between
them. But if they cannot agree upon the equal distribution and division of my said Estate
and effects and it shall appear more eligible to sell the same then I give the same part
thereof to Samuel Hall of Coalrot(?) near Sainboth(?) Esquire my Executor named in
trust to sell the same and every part thereof by public Auction and to give the moneys
arising from the sale thereof to and amongst my said three sons in equal proportions and
as to all my other estate and effects and sums of money out and owing to me at the time
of my death and more particular as to what moneys I shall die possessed of now invested
in the funds of Great Britain commonly called the five percents. It is my will and desire
that after all of my just debts and the costs of proving this my will the net product thereof
after the same shall be sold out for the highest price they are then at with all the sums of
money out to be equally divided amongst my said sons in equal thirds and I constitute
and appoint the said Samuel Hall sole Executor of this my will hereby revoking all
316
former wills and ordaining this only to be my last will and Testament in witness whereof
I have hereunto set my hand and seal the twentieth day of November in the year of our
Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty six. Jane Green
317
VITA
SUSAN M. MARTIN
Education
2008 Ph.D., English
Pennsylvania State University
1995 M.A., (Honours), Drama & Theatre Studies University College Cork, Ireland
1988 Higher Diploma in Education
University College Cork, Ireland
1987 B.A., (Honours), English and Geography
University College Cork, Ireland
Employment
August 2006 – May 2008
Research assistantship on the Hemingway Letters Project
Pennsylvania State University
Fall 2002 – Spring 2006
Teaching assistantship
Pennsylvania State University
Fall 2001 – Summer 2002
Teacher of English and Communications
Cork College of Commerce, Ireland
Fall 1988 – Summer 2001
Teacher of English, Theatre Studies, and Geography
Schools in Ireland and the U.K.