Event Comment: Benefit Henry Eccles, Jr. At 6 p.m. Tickets 2s. 6d. The Dancing Room is in Crosby Square in Bishopsgate Street

Event Comment: Mainpiece: Not Acted these Fifty Years. At the Desire of several Ladies of Quality. Written by Shakespear. N.B. The above Play of King Henry IV is the Genuine Play of Shakespear, and not that alter'd by Mr Betterton, and so frequently acted at the other Theatre

Event Comment: 1 Written by Shakespear. Benefit Powell, Howard, and others; by particular Desire. Afterpiece: Never acted there before. [The Debauchees; or, The Jesuit Caught, originally issued as The Old Debauchees by Henry Fielding, 1 June 1732, dl. Concluding the program with the National Anthem now omitted from the advertisements.

Event Comment: [K+King Henry VIII] Containing the Death of the Duke of Buckingham ; the Tryal and Divorce of Queen Catherine ; the Death of Cardinal Wolsey ; the Christening of the Princess Elizabeth ; and many other Historical passages. Receipts: #140 (Cross)

Event Comment: Benefit for Aickin and Mrs Lee. House Charges #33 8s. Rec'd stopages #2 13s. (Treasurer's Book). Tickets deliver'd by Sg Giorgi and Miss Berkley will be admitted. Neville MS Diary: Went to ye Pit to see 2nd part of Henry IV. [Comments on performances of individual characters in general.] Falstaff very well by Love. This last uses his eyes with great propriety in this and many other characters....Pistol by Baddeley (King should have played it)

Event Comment: KKing Henry, Mr Garrick (Cross Diary). Mainpiece: Not acted these 3 years. [See 8 May 1767.

Event Comment: KKing Henry, Mr Garrick (Cross Diary)

Event Comment: KKing Henry, Mr Garrick (Cross Diary)

Event Comment: Paid Younger for 2 Licenses (King Henry II, and The Man of Business) #4 4s. Paid Farrington & Scarr (haberdashers) #26 16s. Receipts: #179 7s. (Account Book)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Hartley. Mainpiece: By Particular Desire, with New Music, Dresses and Decorations. Interlude taken from Prior's celebrated poem, The Nut Brown Maid. Books of the Interlude to be had at the Theatre. Adapted by Henry Bate. Charges: #72 9s. 6d. Profit to Mrs Hartley #54 15s., plus #61 18s. from tickets (Box 202; Pit 76). Paid Whitfield for making cloaths #33 17s. 4d.; Paid Mr Walker for trimmings &c. #13 4s. Receipts: #127 4s. 6d. (Account Book)

Event Comment: [On this night Sg and Sga Zuchelli, Henry and Sga Crespi also danced in 3 ballets at king's. A probable explanation is that the play at dl began three-quarters of an hour earlier than did the opera.] Receipts: #103 4s. (69.16; 31.18; 1.10)

Event Comment: [In the 1st ballet the playbill lists Mme Rossi, but she did not dance. As the 2nd ballet the playbill announces Il Ratto delle Sabine, but Mme Rossi was ill, which "rendered a verbal apology unavoidable. 'Mme Rossi was in hopes that her wish to court your favour would enable her to overcome her illness, but it has been as sudden as it is now alarming. She has just been let blood. The manager therefore intreats your indulgence, and that you will accept of Apelles and Campaspe instead of the Grand Ballet, which cannot possibly be performed.' . . . Henry performed the part of Alexander with the greatest propriety" (Public Advertiser, 19 Dec.).]

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Martyr. 1st piece: Never performed here. [Miss Thornton is identified by MS annotation on Kemble playbill. Address by Horatio Edgar Robson (European Magazine, May 1786, p. 369).] 2nd piece: Not acted these 7 years. 3rd piece: Written by Henry Fielding. Morning Herald, 19 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Martyr, No. 31, Tavistock-street, Covent Garden. Receipts: #280 6s. 6d. (138/15/6; 3/6/0; tickets: 138/5/0) (charge: #105)

Event Comment: "A new Tragedy, called Eloisa [and Richard Coeur de Lion, both announced on playbill of 16 Dec. were] to have been represented last night; but on account of the illness of Farren [were] obliged to be deferred, and Fontainbleau, with Hob in the Well were announced [in playbill of this present night], but on account of the sudden indisposition of Edwin...both pieces were obliged to be changed to Henry IV, with Barataria" (Public Advertiser, 19 Dec.). Receipts: #117 0s. 6d. (115.0.0; 2.0.6)

Event Comment: The United Company. The date of the first performance is not known, but it very probably occurred not later than May 1691, as the play was advertised in the London Gazette, 4-8 June 1691. For discussions of it, see E. W. White, Early Performances of Purcell's Operas, Theatre Notebook, XIII (1958-59), 44-45, and R. E. Moore, Henry Purcell and the Restoration Theatre, Chapter III. Downes, Roscius Anglicanus, p. 42: King Arthur an Opera, wrote by Mr Dryden: it was Excellently Adorn'd with Scenes and Machines: The Musical Part set by Famous Mr Henry Purcel; and Dances made by Mr Jo. Priest: The Play and Musick pleas'd the Court and City, and being well perform'd, twas very Gainful to the Company. Roger North: I remember in Purcell's excellent opera of King Arthur, when Mrs Butler, in the person of Cupid, was to call up Genius, she had the liberty to turne her face to the scean, and ner back to the theater. She was in no concerne for her face, but sang a recitativo of calling towards the place where Genius was to rise, and performed it admirably, even beyond any thing I ever heard upon the English stage....And I could ascribe it to nothing so much as the liberty she had of concealing her face, which she could not endure should be so contorted as is necessary to sound well, before her gallants, or at least her envious sex. There was so much of admirable musick in that opera, that it's no wonder it's lost; for the English have no care of what's good, and therefore deserve it not (Roger North on Music, ed. John Wilson [London, 1959], p. 217-18)

Event Comment: The United Company. This performance is on the L. C. list, 5@151, p. 369. See also Nicoll, Restoration Drama, p. 352. This appears to be a substitution for a previously scheduled performance of Amphitryon (Nicoll, p. 352). In L. C. 5@150, p. 74 (Nicoll, p. 357) is an order for a large looking glass to be provided for Sir Courtly Nice at this performance. In addition, there appears to have been a concert in honor of the Queen's birthday. See D'Urfey, Wit and Mirth, I, 62-64: An Ode on the Anniversary of the Queens-Birth. Set to Musick by Mr Henry Purcel, April 30th, 1690

Event Comment: Mainp1ece; With the Original Musick. Afterpiece: A masque by Henry Purcel

Event Comment: 2nd piece: By the late Henry Purcel

Event Comment: Oratorio: Set to Music by Handel. 2nd piece: By the late Henry Purcel

Event Comment: Rich's Company. The date of the premiere is not knwon, but the Dedication is dated February 1699@1700, the play was entered in the Term Catalogues in February 1699@1700, and advertised in the Flying Post, 16 March 1699@1700. The latest likely date for the first production is January 1700, but the play may have appeared in late December as a rival to lif's production of I Henry IV early in January 1700. Cibber, Apology, I, 275: But the Master of the Revels, who then licens'd all Plays for the Stage, assisted this Reformation [of the morality of the stage] with a more zealous Severity than ever. He would strike out whole Scenes of a vicious or immoral Character, tho' it were visibly shewn to be reform'd or punish'd; a severe Instance of this kind falling upon my self may be an Excuse for my relating it: When Richard the Third (as I alter'd it from Shakespear) came from his Hands to the Stage, he expung'd the whole first Act without sparing a Line of it. This extraordinary Stroke of a Sic volo occasion'd my applying to him for the small Indulgence of a Speech or two, that the other four Acts might limp on with a little less Absurdity! no! he had no leisure to consider what might be separately inoffensive. [Cibber continues with an explanation of the censor's argument for cutting the act.] Preface to Cibber's Ximena, 1719: Richard the Third, which I alter'd from Shakespear, did not raise me Five Pounds on Third Day

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Henry. [As afterpiece the playbill announces Arthur and Emmeline, but it was not acted. Kemble Mem. lists the substitute play.] Diary, 24 May: Tickets to be had of Mrs Henry, Bruton-street, Berkeley-square. Receipts: #153 12s. (38.6; 21.2; 0.19; tickets: 93.5) (charge: #111 13s. 9d.)