Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: We met with Mr Salisbury, who took Mr Creed and me to the cockpitt to see The Moore of Venice, which was well done. Burt acted the Moore; by the same token, a very pretty lady that sat by me, called out, to see Desdemona smothered. Possibly Clun acted Iago. Pepys (6 Feb. 1668@9) refers to his playing that role, and a reference to Clun as Iago appears in A Most Execrable Murther in A Little Ark, ed. G. Thorn-Drury, pp. 30-31. See also entry of 14 Aug. 1660

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: After dinner Sir Tho. Crew and my Lady to the Playhouse to see The Silent Woman

Event Comment: The Countess of Derby to the Duchess de la Tremoille, 25 Feb. 1660@1: Plays are often acted at court, and the King and their Royal Highnesses have been present at two this evening, at the Duchess of Buckingham's (Madame Guizot de Witt, The Lady of Latham [London, 1869], p. 268)

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: So back to the Cockpitt [Whitehall], and there, by the favour of one Mr Bowman, he [Creed] and I got in, and there saw the King, and Duke of York and his Duchess (which is a plain woman, and like her mother, my Lady Chancellor). And so saw The Humersome Lieutenant acted before the King, but not very well done. But my pleasure was great to see the manner of it, and so many great beauties, but above all Mrs Palmer, with whom the King do discover a great deal of familiarity. Sometime before the Coronation of Charles II, on 23 April 1661, there may have been acted The Merry Conceited Humours of Bottom the Weaver. An edition of 1661 refers to its being "often publikely acted by some of his Majesties Comedians" and the Dedication suggests that it would make a good entertainment at the mirthful time of the Coronation. The edition lists no actors' names, no prologue, no epilogue

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: With my Lady Batten, Mrs Rebecca Allen, Mrs Thompson, &c., two coaches of us, we went and saw Bartholomew Fayre, acted very well

Event Comment: At Oxford in the morning A Mad World My Masters was played; in the afternoon, The Merry Milkmaids of Islington. According to Richard Walden (Io Ruminans, 1662) Anne Gibbs played Harebrain's Wife in the former, A Lady in the latter

Event Comment: 'It is not certain what company played at this theatre ont his day Pepys, Diary: To Salisbury Court play house, where was acted the first time 'Tis pity Shee's a Whore, a simple play and ill acted, only it was my fortune to sit by a most pretty and ingenious lady, which pleased me much

Event Comment: The King's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the Theatre to The French Dancing Master, and there with much pleasure gazed upon her (Lady Castlemaine); but it troubles us to see her look dejectedly and slighted by People already. The play pleased us [Pepys and Mrs Pepys] very well; but Lacy's part, the Dancing Master, the best in the world

Event Comment: In an edition of Covent Garden Drollery, M. Summers, p. 67, prints an Epilogue, Spoken by the Lady Mary Mordant, before the King and Queen, at court, to the faithfull Shepherdess; Summers includes a letter (p. 121) from Gerrard to Lord Strafford, 9 Jan. 1662@3, concerning a performance of The Faithfull Shepherdess at Court. In another edition of the Covent Garden Drollery (London, 1928), G. Thorn-Drury argues that the performance belongs to Twelfth Night, 1633@4 (pp. 146-47)

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. See also 15 and 23 Dec. 1662. Pepys, Diary: There being the famous new play acted the first time to-day, which is called The Adventures of Five Hours, at the Duke's house, being, they say, made or translated by Colonel Tuke, I did long to see it; and so made my wife to get her ready, though we were forced to send for a smith, to break open her trunk...and though early, were forced to sit almost out of sight, at the end of one of the lower forms, so full was the house. And the play, in one word, is the best, for the variety and the most excellent continuance of the plot to the very end, that ever I saw, or think ever shall, and all possible, not only to be done in the time, but in most other respects very admittable, and without one word of ribaldry; and the house, by its frequent plaudits, did show their sufficient approbation. Evelyn, Diary: I went to see Sir S: Tuke (my kinsmans) Comedy acted at the Dukes Theater, which so universaly tooke as it was acted for some weekes every day, & was belived would be worth the Comedians 4 or 5000 pounds: Indeede the plot was incomparable but the language stiffe & formall. Downes (pp 22-23): Wrote by the Earl of Bristol, and Sir Samuel Tuke: This Play being Cloath'd so Excellently Fine in proper Habits, and Acted so justly well....It took Successively 13 Days together, no other Play Intervening. Lady Anglesey to her husband, 10 Jan. 1663: Lord Bristol has made a play which is much commended (CSPD 1663-64, p. 8)

Event Comment: The King's Company. This marks the opening of the new Theatre Royal in Bridges Street, Drury Lane, to which Killigrew moved his company from Vere Street. Downes erroneously gives the opening date as 8 April, a fact which led to the creation of the famous spurious playbill for Bridges Street, Thursday, 8 April 1663. See Montague Summers, The Restoration Theater (London, 1934), p. 15. Pepys, Diary: This day the new Theatre Royal begins to act with scenes the Humorous Lieutenant, but I have not time to see it, nor could stay to see my Lady Jemimah lately come to town, and who was here in the house. Downes (p. 3): Note, this Comedy was Acted Twelve Days Successively

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. The date of performance is uncertain. The play was entered in the Stationers' Register, 15 Feb. 1663@4, and its publication noted in The Newes, 3 March 1663@4. Katherine Philips, writing from Cardigan, Wales to Lady Temple in London, 24 Jan. 1663@4: I beleive er'e this you have seen the new Pompey either acted or written & then will repent your partiallity to ye other, but I wonder much what preparations for it could prejudice Will Davenant when I heare they acted in English habits, & yt so aprope yt Caesar was sent in with his feather & Muff, till he was hiss'd off ye Stage & for ye Scenes I see not where they could place any yt are very extra-ordinary, but if this play hath not diverted ye Cittizens wives enough Sr W: D: will make amends, for they say Harry ye 8th & some later ones are little better then Puppett-plays. I understand ye confederate-translators are now upon Heraclius, & I am contented yt Sr Tho. Clarges (who hath done that last yeare) should adorn their triumph in it, as I have done in Pompey (Harvard Theatre Collection)

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. William Hamon (or Hammond) saw a performance near the end of the period between Michaelmas 1663 and Lady Day 1664. The entry in his journal (which I owe to the courtesy of Dr. Giles Dawson) reads: Item spent in carrying Mrs & sistar to King Lear 00 09 06 (Folger MS. v. a. 422)

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: 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: Pepys, Diary: My wife not being come home from my Lady Jemimah, with whom she had been at a play and at court to-day

Event Comment: Evelyn, Diary: Saw a fine Mask at court perform'd by 6 Gent: & 6 Ladys surprizing his Majestie, it being Candlemas day. Pepys, Diary, 3 Feb.: Then Mrs Pickering...did, at my Lady's command, tell me the manner of a masquerade before the King and Court the other day. Where six women (my Lady Castlemayne and Duchesse of Monmouth being two of them) and six men (the Duke of Monmouth and Lord Arran and Monsieur Blanfort, being three of them) in vizards, but most rich and antique dresses, did dance admirably and most gloriously. God give us cause to continue the mirthe!