Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: In the way observing the streete full of coaches at the new play, The Indian Queene; which for show, they say, exceeds Henry the Eighth

Event Comment: Diary of Richard Boyle, Volume III, in the Duke of Devonshire's Library in Chatsworth: the new play caled the Indian Queen. [I am indebted to Professor Kathleen Lynch for this notice.

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: And took my wife out immediately to the King's Theatre, it being a new month, and once a month I may go, and there saw The Indian Queen acted; which indeed is a most pleasant show, and beyond my expectation; the play good, but spoiled with the ryme, which breaks the sense. But above my expectation most, the eldest Marshall did do her part most excellently well as I ever heard woman in my life; but her voice not so sweet so Ianthe's [Mrs Betterton's]; but, however, we came home mightily contented

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: My wife and I by coach to The Duke's house, where we say The Unfortunate Lovers; but I know not whether I am grown more curious than I was or no, but I was not much pleased with it, though I know not where to lay the fault, unless it was that the house was very empty, by reason of a new play at the other house. Yet here was my Lady Castlemaine in a box. In An Elegy on the Death of Edward Angel, 1673, two lines suggest that Angel acted Friskin: @Adieu, dear Friskin: Unfort'nate Lover weep,@Your mirth is fled, and now i' th' Grave must sleep.

Event Comment: Pepys, 7 March, refers to a new play at the King's Theatre. Possibly it was Thomas Porter's The Carnival, published in 1664, with no actors' names, no prologue, no epilogue, and announced in The Intelligencer, 2 May 1664

Event Comment: Charles II to Madame, 14 July 1664: I am just now come from seeing a new ill play and it is almost midnight (C. H. Hartman, Charles II and Madame [1934], p. 108). W. J. Lawrence, in a review of Boswell, The Restoration Court Stage, in Modern Language Review, XXVIII (1933), 103, stated his belief that this play was acted at court this day

Event Comment: The King's company. On 31 Aug. or 1 Sept. 1664 Orrery wrote to Sir Henry Bennett: Ther was noe Play of myne Acted, they are now but Studyinge it; I hope within less then a Fortnight twill be on ye Theater And if you are not surfetted, with what of mine you have already seene [Henry V], I will beg ye honour to wait on you when tis Acted (see The Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, ed. W. S. Clark@II [Cambridge, Mass., 1937], 1, 102). The play is also on the list of Herbert, Dramatic Records, p. 138. Boswell, Restoration Court Stage, p. 281, lists it among the plays given at court, but Sir Heneage Finch's note (see below) seems to indicate an afternoon performance. Sir Heneage Finch to Sir Edward Dering, 15 Sept. 1664: Yesterday was acted, in the Greatest and noblest presence wch ye Court can make, before ye fullest Theatre, & with the highest applause imaginable, my Lo Orerys new play calld ye Generall formerly acted in Ireland by the name of Altamira, but much altered & improved. From thence the whole Court went to Wallingford house, where the Earl of Arran and the Lady Mary Stuart were that night before Supper marryd in the Gallery (Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, I, 103, from Stowe MS 744 f. 81)

Event Comment: The Kings' Company. The play was probably acted through 11 Oct. Pepys, Diary, 4 Oct.: To-morrow they told us should be acted, or the day after, a new play, called The Parson's Dreame, acted all by women

Event Comment: The Vestal-Virgin; or, The Roman Ladies (by Sir Robert Howard) was probably acted by February 1664@5. It was entered in the Stationers' Register on 7 March 1664@5 and published in 1665 in Four New plays. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus p. 15) lists it by title only. The King's Company

Event Comment: W. S. Clark (Works of Orrery, 1, 40-41) believes that this is Thomas Middleton's play, not one by Orrery. Henry Savile to George Savile: I am come newly from my Lord of Orrery's new play called The Widow, whose character you will receive from better hands. I will only say that one part of it is the humour of a man that has great need to go to the close stool, where there are such indecent postures as would never be suffered upon any stage but ours, which has quite turn'd the stomach of so squeamish a man as I am, that am used to see nothing upon a theatre that might not appear in the ruelle of a fine lady (Savile Correspondence, ed. W. D. Cooper, Camden Society, LXXI [1858], 4)

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: I away before to White Hall and into the new play-house there, the first time I ever was there, and the first play I have seen since before the great plague. By and by Mr Pierce comes, bringing my wife and his, and Knipp. By and by the King and Queene, Duke and Duchesse, and all the great ladies of the Court; which, indeed, was a fine sight. But the play being Love in a Tub, a silly play, and though done by the Duke's people, yet having neither Betterton nor his wife, and the whole thing done ill, and being ill also, I had no manner of pleasure in the play. Besides, the House, though very fine, yet bad for the voice, for hearing. The sight of the ladies, indeed, was exceeding noble; and above all, my Lady Castlemayne. The play done by ten o'clock. I carried them all home, and then home myself, and well satisfied with the sight, but not the play

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: After dinner I put the women into a coach, and they to the Duke's house, to a play which was acted, "The [....]." It was indifferently done, but was not pleased with the song, Gosnell not singing, but a new wench, that sings naughtily

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: To White Hall, and got my Lord Bellasses to get me into the playhouse; and there, after all staying above an hour for the players, the King and all waiting, which was absurd, saw Henry the Fifth well done by the Duke's people, and in most excellent habits, all new vests, being put on but this night. But I sat so nigh and far off, that I missed most of the words, and sat with a wind coming into my back and neck, which did much trouble me. The play continued till twelve at night. A Prologue for this play is in A Letter from a Gentleman to the Honourable Ed. Howard (London, 1668)

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: With my wife, to the Duke's house, and there saw Mustapha, a most excellent play for words and design as ever I did see. I had seen it before but forgot it, so it was wholly new to me, which is the pleasure of my not committing these things to my memory

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: With my wife by coach to the Duke of York's play-house, expecting a new play, and so stayed not no more than other people, but to the King's house, to The Mayd's Tragedy; but vexed all the while with two talking ladies and Sir Charles Sedley; yet pleased to hear their discourse, he being a stranger. And one of the ladies would, and did sit with her mask on, all the play, and, being exceeding witty as ever I heard woman, did talk most pleasantly with him; but was, I believe, a virtuous woman, and of quality. He would fain know who she was, but she would not tell.... By that means lost the pleasure of the play wholly, to which now and then Sir Charles Sedley's exceptions against both words and pronouncing were very pretty

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: With my wife to the King's house, but there found the bill torn down and no play acted.... Here [at lif; see below] met with Mr Rolt, who tells me the reason of no play to-day at the King's house. That Lacy had been committed to the porter's lodge for his acting his part in the late new play [see 15 April], and that being thence released he come to the King's house, there met with Ned Howard, the poet of the play, who congratulated his release; upon which Lacy cursed him as that it was the fault of his nonsensical play that was the cause of his ill usage. Mr Howard did give him some reply, to which Lacy [answered] him, that he was more a fool than a poet; upon which Howard did give him a blow on the face with his glove; on which Lacy, having a cane in his hand, did give him a blow over the pate. Here Rolt and others that discoursed of it in the pit this afternoon did wonder that Howard did not run him through, he being too mean a fellow to fight with. But Howard did not do any thing but complain to the King of it; so the whole house is silenced, and the gentry seem to rejoice much at it, the house being become too insolent

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: After dinner my wife and I to the Duke's playhouse, where we saw the new play acted yesterday, The Feign Innocence, or Sir Martin Marr-all; a play made by my Lord Duke of Newcastle, but, as every body says, corrected by Dryden. It is the most entire piece of mirth, a complete farce from one end to the other, that certainly was ever writ. I never laughed so in all my life. I laughed till my head [ached] all the evening and night with the laughing; and at very good wit therein, not fooling. The house full, and in all things of mighty content to me

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the King's playhouse, my eyes being so bad since last night's straining of them, that I am hardly able to see, besides the pain which I have in them. The play was a new play; and infinitely full: the King and all the Court almost there. It is The Storme, a play of Fletcher's; which is but so-so, methinks; only there is a most admirable dance at the end, of the ladies, in a military manner, which indeed did please me mightily....And there comes my wife home from the Duke of York's playhouse. Two songs, printed somewhat later in Choice Songs and Ayres, The First Book, 1673, may have been prepared for this revival: Hark the storm grows, set by Robert Smith; and Cheer up my mates, set by Pelham Humphrey

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: With my wife abroad to the King's playhouse, to shew her yesterday's new play, which I like as I did yesterday, the principal thing extraordinary being the dance, which is very good

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, p. 31) lists it as one of several plays whose runs expired on the third day. Pepys, Diary: To the Duke of York's playhouse, but the house so full, it being a new play, The Coffee House, that we could not get in...The Journals of John Lauder Lord Fountainhall (ed. Donald Crawford, 1900), pp. 174-75: heir is the Dukes playhouse, wheir we saw Tom Sydserfes Spanish Comedie Tarugo's Wiles, or the Coffee House, acted....He could not forget himselfe: was very satyricall sneering at the Greshamers for their late invention of the transfusion of blood, as also at our covenant, making the witch of Geneva to wy it and La Sainte Ligue de France togither

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: [After looking in at lif], and so to the King's house: and there, going in, met with Knepp, and she took us up into the tireing-rooms: and to the women's shift, where Nell was dressing herself, and was all unready, and is very Pretty, prettier than I thought. And so walked all up and down the house above, and then below into the scene-room, and there sat down, and she gave us fruit: and here I read the questions to Knepp, while she answered me, through all her part of Flora's Figary's which was acted to-day. But, Lord! to see how they were both painted would make a man mad, and did make me loath them; and what base company of men comes among them, and how lewdly they talk! and how poor the men are in clothes, and yet what a shew they make on the stage by candle-light, is very observable. But to see how Nell cursed, for having so few people in the pit, was pretty; the other house carrying away all the people at the new play, and is said, now-a-days, to have generally most company, as being better players. By and by into the pit, and there was the play, which is pretty good

Event Comment: Because of the losses in the plague and fire, the pageantry was again omitted from the swearing in of the new Lord Mayor of London

Event Comment: [The Duke's Company. For Harris' role, see Pepys, 11 May 1668. For Angel as Stephano, see An Elegy Upon...Mr Edward Angell, reprinted in A Little Ark, pp. 38-39: @Who shall play Stephano now? your Tempest's gone@To raise new Storms i' th' hearts of every one.@ For Underhill as Trincalo, note his nickname of Prince Trincalo. (For Mary Davis as Ariel and Mrs Long as Hypolito, see J. H. Wilson, All the King's Ladies, pp. 140, 166.) Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, p. 33): The Tempest...Acted in Lincolns-Inn-Fields...alter'd by Sir William Davenant and Mr Dryden before 'twas made into an Opera. Pepys, Diary: At noon resolved with Sir W. Pen to go see The Tempest, an old play of Shakespeare's, acted, I hear, the first day; and so my wife, and girl, and W. Hewer by themselves, and Sir W. Pen and I afterwards by ourselves; and forced to sit in the side balcone over against the musique-room at the Duke's house, close by my Lady Dorset and a great many great ones. The house mighty full; the King and Court there: and the most innocent play that ever I saw; and a curious piece of musique in an echo of half sentences, the echo repeating the former half, while the man goes on the latter, which is mighty pretty. The play [has] no great wit, but yet good, above ordinary plays. Thence home with Sir W. Pen, and there all mightily pleased with the play

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Downes (p. 29): It took well, but Inferior to Love in a Tub. Pepys, Diary: I to the Duke of York's playhouse; where a new play of Etherige's called She Would if she Could; and though I was there by two o'clock, there was 1000 people put back that could not have room in the pit: and I at last, because my wife was there, made shift to get into the 18d. box, and there saw; but, Lord! how full was the house, and how silly the play, there being nothing in the world good in it, and few people pleased in it. The King was there; but I sat mightily behind, and could see but little, and hear not all. The play being done...here was the Duke of Buckingham to-day openly sat in the pit; and there I found him with my Lord Buckhurst, and Sidly, and Etherige, the poet; the last of whom I did hear mightily find fault with the actors, that they were out of humour, and had not their parts perfect, and that Harris did do nothing, nor could so much as sing a ketch in it; and so was mightily concerned: while all the rest did, through the whole pit, blame the play as a silly, dull thing, though there was something very roguish and witty; but the design of the play, and end, mighty insipid. Thomas Shadwell, Preface to The Humorists (1671): The last (viz.) imperfect Action, had like to have destroy'd She Would if she could, which I think (and I have the Authority of some of the best Judges in England for't) is the best Comedy that has been written since the Restauration of the Stage: And even that, for the imperfect representation of it at first, received such prejudice, that, had it not ben for the favour of the Court, in all probability it had never got up again; and it suffers for it, in a great measure, to this very day

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: By one o'clock to the King's house: a new play, The Duke of Lerma, of Sir Robert Howard's: where the King and Court was; and Knepp and Nell spoke the prologue most excellently, especially Knepp, who spoke beyond any creature I ever heard. The play designed to reproach our King with his mistresses, that I was troubled for it, and expected it should be interrupted; but it ended all well, which salved all. The play a well-writ and good play, only its design I did not like of reproaching the King, but altogether a very good and most serious play