Event Comment: Benefit for Weston and Miss Ogilvie. By Authority. Being the Last Night. [Many advance bills noted the continuous deferment of this on account of Weston's bad state of health.] Mr Weston's late and precarious State of Health making it extremely doubtful whether he could go through so long and laborious part as Richard, he humbly recommends to the Public Mr Gentleman's friendly intention of undertaking the Character for that Night, and will for the Capital Entertainment of his Friends, speak a new Occasional Prologue, and appear in the Farce, that the strength he has gained for some Days past may not be impaired by Fatigue

Event Comment: Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. Gallery 2s. Upper Gallery 1s. Drury Lane--New Painted and Decorated. Miss Pope's good acting is said to have made up for her deficiency in singing (Genest, V, 314). On Sept. 19 Fisher, Musician, married the widow of the late Powell, Patentee of cg (Winston MS 10). Rec'd Mrs Johnston's 1 year's rent to Lady Day Last #6; Paid Mr French on Acct per order Mr G. G. #20. Paid Renters #8. [This payment occurs each playing night throughout the season, and is not noted further.] The total amounted to #1576 (Drury Lane Treasurer's Book). Receipts: #188 15s. 6d. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: [Vernon's Song specified in later bills as the "Original Epilogue Song."] Mainpiece: Not acted in 8 years. [See 6 Jan. 1764.] This Comedy was well perform'd & had great applause (Hopkins Diary). Rec'd Mr Condill's 1st payment for fruit Office #20; Paid Mr Williams, 1 night in Musical Lady #1 1s. (Treasurer's Book). Receipts: #162 2s. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Afterpiece: By Particular Desire. Latter end of next month the Theatre Royal, Haymarket, which has been much enlarg'd and Beautified will open with Subs[cription] Jubilee Masque (Winston MS 10). Paid Mr Hopkins, Prompter's Bill, #23 16s.; Mr Calthorpe's 1st payment #157 10s.; Printer's bill #9 6s. (Treasurer's Book). Receipts: #237 (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: [This New Comedy (by Mrs Elizabeth Griffith) seems not to have been performed this night, according to the author's Preface to her Edition of 1772. Shuter had been unattentive and absent from many rehearsals]: At length though late [in the season] a day was appointed for the representation, and on that morning Mr Shuter appeared at rehearsal, pretty much in the same state as before, and confessed himself incapable of performing his part, that night. Upon which the play was oblig'd to be further postponed, and handbills were sent about at noon, to advertise town of the disappointment....A further final day was afterwards determined on, but the audience being out of humour at their former disappointment, called Mr Shuter to account for it, on his first appearance; which threw him into such confusion, that he was not able to get the better of it, throughtout the whole performance...in the hurry of his spirits the actor not only forgot his part, the deficiency of which he endeavoured to supply with his own dialect, but also seemed to lose all idea of the character he was to perform; and made the Governor appear in a light which the author never intended: that of a mean, ridiculous buffoon. [Mrs Griffith concluded her preface by relating how her friends stood by the piece, but two or three in the gallery, when it was given out again objected and threw an apple at the chandeliers, which so perturbed the management that the play was withdrawn. She therefore published it by subscription, prefixing the names of about 440 subscribers, persons of the first quality, including James Boswell, Edmund Burke, Col. Burgoyne, the Duke of Devonshire, David Garrick, Mrs Montague, William Richardson, and a host of writers, players, and people of fashion. This list provides a pretty good roster of those who filled the boxes and part of the pit of both theatres at the time.] Paid Younger #2 2s. for the license for A Wife in the Right (Account Book). Receipts: #218 12s. (Account Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Barry. Tickets deliver'd for King Arthur will be taken. Part of Pit laid into Boxes. Ladies send servants by 4 o'clock. Paid Supers, Kettle Drum, & practices to King Arthur #2 16s.; Printer's Bill #8 12s. (Treasurer's Book). Mary Martin to J. M. Rebow, 6 April (MS correspondence in Washington State University Library): There has not been any mention of Barry's Benefit in ye Papers till to Day when it is advertis'd for ye 23rd of this Month, & ye Play. After...ye Constant Couple, which I imagine is no very desirable thing to see so late in ye Season, therefore pray tell me if I must send ye Tickets back directly, or may keep them till you are in Town again, which I hope you certainly will be before that time; I find we are not ye only unfortunates that Mr Johnson disappoints of Places, for that it is his Constant Practice not to let a single Place, till all his Five Guinea Chaps are serv'd even if you are at ye Play House, & apply ye Instant ye Play is given out, for which reason Mr Garrick has desir'd Gentlemen will Write to him upon such Occasions, & it is now very commonly done. Receipts: #264 11s. 6d. Charges: #67. Profits to Barry: #197 11s. 6d. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Afterpiece: By Desire. Paid Balance of Mr Hatsell's (late Clutterbuck's) last summer's Acct #148 8s. 5d.; Mr Evans last season's Wardrobe allowance #10 10s. Receipts: #135 13s. 6d. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: By Command of their Majesties. [From the Westminster Magazine for March: "On Friday the third instant the Entertainments peculiar to this season commenced. Messrs Bach and Abel were first, and have been at each successive Oratorio since (one night excepted when the King and Queen favored Mr Stanley, with bringing the only good House he has hitherto had), honoured with the presence of their Majesties, who have been accused, we think justly, of partiality to these foreigners, in overlooking Mr Stanley's past services and great personal merits. Justice, however, requires us to observe, that both in point of vocal and instrumental performers, the former have displayed a striking superiority over the latter. The singers at Messrs Bach and Abel's are, Parry, Corse, Mrs Weichsel, Miss Brown and Sga Corri. At Drury Lane, Norris, Reinhold, Mrs Mattocks, Mrs Barthelemon, and a young Lady from the Founding Hospital."

Event Comment: Matilda deferr'd Reddish ill. Afterpiece: Performed for the last time this Season. Mr Reddish was to have play'd in Matilda to Night but Sent word late last Night that he could not play Mr Brereton Play'd Posthumus & very well had great Applause-House (Hopkins Diary). Rec'd stopages #16 17s. 6d. Paid salary list #566 6s.; J. French on acct #5 5s. Receipts: #88 13s. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Mainpiece: Not acted these 3 years. [See 30 April 1773. See, for afterpiece, the Regatta attached to Queen Mab, 11 Nov.] Mr Moody very bad in Maj. Oldfox , &c. Mrs Greville not much better in Olivia (Hopkins Diary). Rec'd from the late Mrs Johnston for Old Women's Cloaths #10 10s.; By ditto from Mr Garrick for wax candles #1 12s. Receipts: #150 13s. 6d. (Treasurer's Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Reddish [and his last appearance on the stage]. Tickets sold at the Doors will not be admitted. Public Advertiser, 1 May: Tickets to be had of Reddish, No. 14, near the Turnpike, Tottenham Court Road. "Poor Reddish, on the 5th of May, had a benefit, and it was resolved to try whether he could not go through the character of Posthumus. He was now infirm; in common occurrences imbecile, but to be exited by his former profession, or nothing. The late John Ireland gave an affecting detail of this attempt. He met his friend an hour before the performance began. Reddish entered the room with the step of an idiot, his eye wandering, and his whole countenance vacant. Mr Ireland congratulated him, that he was sufficiently recovered to perform his favourite Posthumus. 'Yes', said he, 'and in the garden scene I shall astonish you.' 'The garden scene! I thought you were to play Posthumus?' 'No, Sir, I play Romeo.' His friend assured him that Posthumus was the part he was to act--and he walked to the theatre, reciting Romeo all the way. When dressed for Posthumus, and in the green-room, it was still hard to undeceive him--at length he was pushed upon the stage....The instant he came in sight of the audience his recollection seemed to return; his countenance resumed meaning, his eye became lighted up, he made the modest bow of respect, and played the scene as well as he had ever done. But Romeo again met him in the green-room, and it was only the stage cue that had the power to unsettle this delusion; and that never failed to do it through the whole play. Mr Ireland thought him, on this occasion, less assuming and more natural than he had seemed in the full enjoyment of his reason" (Boaden, Kemble, I, XVI-XVII; Ireland, 58-60)

Event Comment: By Permission of the Lord Chamberlain. Benefit for The Literary Fund. [In this performance the male parts were acted chiefly by amateurs; the female parts were acted by professionals. Prologue and Epilogue by Thomas Morris (Morning Herald, 17 Apr.).] The Committee for the Management of the Literary Fund respectfully inform the Public that affecting instabces of Merit in distress exceed their power of relief by the ordinary Subscription; and that they wish to have recourse to every honourable expedient to increase that power. The Admission will be by Tickets, at the Opera Prices. Boxes and Pit 10s. 6d. 1st Gallery 5s. 2nd Gallery 3s. No more Company will be admitted than the House will hold with perfect convenience; and when the proper number of Tickets is issued, no means of admission can be obtained. The Doors to be opened at 6:00. To begin at 7:00 precisely. Registers: Thomas Dale, M. D.; Mr Deputy Nichols. Treasurers: Thomas Morris, Esq.; Mr E. Brooke. "In the course of the play we observed several restorations of Shakespeare's text, with some interpolations. The boldest of the latter was the introduction of Richard's son to him in the tent, the night befiredthedbefore the Battle of Bosworth field. This scene was borrowed, as we believe, from Thomas? Hull's Legendary Tale of Richard Plantagenet. It was well written, and produced a considerable degree of effect. The Ghosts were banished, and the start and stagger of Richard, heretofore the theatrical trick of the scene, necessarily omitted" (Diary, 17 Apr.)

Event Comment: [The playbill assigns Joseph Surface to Palmer, but "Palmer at a late hour sent word that he was unable to attend to his Business this Evening, in consequence of which a messenger was dispatch'd after Mr Barrymore to play Joseph Surface, but he could not be found, Mr Benson was therefore sent for, who, after having an apology made for him, play'd the Part. Banks play'd Surface's Servant " (Powell: Trip to Scarborough rehearsed at 10; Measure at 12. Receipts: #252 16s. (172.13.0; 77.9.6; 2.13.6)

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: Mrs Pierce and her husband and I and my wife to Salisbury Court, where coming late he and she light of Col. Boone that made room for them, and I and my wife sat in the pit, and there met with Mr Lewes and Tom Whitton, and saw The Bondman done to admiration

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Having sent for Mr Creed, had thought to have shown my wife a play before the King, but it is so late that we could not

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: By coach to White Hall, thinking to have met at a Committee of Tangier, but nobody being there but my Lord Rutherford, he would needs carry me and another Scotch Lord to a play, and so we saw, coming late, part of The Generall, my Lord Orrery's (Broghill) second play; but, Lord! to see how no more either in words, sense, or design, it is to his Harry the 5th is not imaginable, and so poorly acted, though in finer clothes, is strange. And here I must confess breach of a vowe in appearance, but I not desiring it, but against my will, and my oathe being to go neither at my own charge nor at another's, as I had done by becoming liable to give them another, as I am to Sir W. Pen and Mr Creed; but here I neither know which of them paid for me, nor, If I did, am I obliged ever to return the like

Event Comment: Newsletter: Lacy, the famous comedian, is at length, by great intercession, released from his durance under the groom porter, where he stood committed by His Majesty's order for having 'on his own head' added several indecent expressions in the part he acted in a late play called The Change of Crowns, written by Mr Edward Howard (HMC, Fleming MSS, 12th Report, Part VII [1890], p. 47)

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: Pepys, Diary: [Mercer] and I to the Duke of York's playhouse, and there saw The Tempest, and between two acts, I went out to Mr Harris, and got him to repeat to me the words of the Echo, while I writ them down, having tried in the play to have wrote them; but, when I had done it, having done it, withour looking upon my paper, I find I could not read the blacklead. But now I have got the words clear, and, in going in thither, had the pleasure to see the actors in their several dresses, especially the seamen and monster, which were very droll. So into the play again. But there happened one thing which vexed me, which is, that the orange-woman did come in the pit, and challenge me for twelve oranges, which she delivered by my order at a late play, at night, to give to some ladies in a box, which was wholly untrue, but yet she swore it to be true. But, however, I did deny it, and did not pay her; but, for quiet, did buy 4s. worth of oranges of her, at 6d. a-piece. Here I first saw my Lord Ormond since his coming from Ireland, which is now about eight days

Event Comment: The King's Company. This performance is on the L. C. list, 5@12, p. 17: King here. See also Nicoll, Restoration Drama, p. 344. See Noyes, Ben Jonson on the English Stage, p. 307, for a letter to Lady Sunderland on this performance, and, p. 308, for an anecdote from The Life of the Late Famous Comedian, Jo. Haynes, concerning Haynes and Hart in a scene. For another allusion to the action, see Henri Ferneron, Louise de Keroualle, Duchess of Portsmouth (London, 1807), p. 179n. Pepys, Diary: 15 Jan. 1668@9: It is about my Lady Harvy's being offended at Doll Common's [Mrs Corey's] acting of Sempronia, to imitate her; for which she got my Lord Chamberlain, her kinsman, to imprison Doll: when my Lady Castlemayne made the King to release her. Mrs John Evelyn to Mr Terryll, 10 Feb. 1668@9: There has not been any new lately revived and reformed, as Catiline, well set out with clothes and scenes (Diary and Correspondence of John Evelyn, ed. William Bray, IV, 14). See also 7 and 11 Dec. 1667

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. This performance is on the L. C. list at Harvard. See VanLennep, "Plays on the English Stage," p. 14. Pepys, Diary: My wife and I to White Hall; and there, by means of Mr Cooling, did get into the play, the only one we have seen this winter: it was The Five Hours' Adventure: but I sat so far I could not hear well, nor was there any pretty woman that I did see, but my wife, who sat in my Lady Fox's pew with her. The house very full; and late before done, so that it was past eleven before we got home

Event Comment: The King's Company. The date of the premiere is not known, but the play was entered in the Term Catalogues, June 1670, and the Prologue refers to the arrival of French royalty at Dover (May 1670); hence, it is likely that the play was first produced in the late spring. Edition of 1670: Written in French by Moliere; and rendered into English with much Addition and Advantage By Mr Medbourne, Servant to His Royal Highness

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. The date of the premiere is not known, but a licensing date of 18 Feb. 1677@8 suggests a premiere not later than January 1677@8. It is possible, however, that this play followed Sir Patient Fancy (17 Jan. 1677@8), as the licensing date of Timon follows that for Sir Patient Fancy. Part of the music for Timon was composed by Louis Grabu and was published, without the singers' names, in Choice Ayres and Songs, 1679. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, p. 37): Timon of Athens, alter'd by Mr Shadwell; 'twas very well Acted, and the Musick in't well Perform'd; it wonderfully pleas'd the Court and City; being an Excellent Moral

Event Comment: The King's Company. The date of the first performance is not known, but its listing in the Term Catalogues, November 1681, suggests late October as a likely latest date for its premiere. If Mithridates was acted in mid-October at the opening of Drury Lane, Sir Barnaby Whigg may well be the first new play offered by the King's Company in the autumn. A Song in Act I, Blow Boreas Blow, with music apparently by Henry Purcell, is in A Third Collection of New Songs...Words by Mr D'Urfey, 1685, and in Dramatic Works of Henry Purcell, Purcell Society, III (1917), xiv-xv