Event Comment: [As afterpiece
Public Advertiser announces
The Rival Candidates, but see
Hopkins Diary, 12 Oct.] The Managers met again to-day, but nothing settled.
Hamlet was given out. I saw
Mr Sheridan, he told me that
Mr Lacy and he had agreed that no Play should be given out, nor any Bills put up, till they had settled this Affair, which was to be done to-Morrow at
Mr Wallis's (the Attorney's) where they were all to dine. I waited on Mr Lacy, who agreed to the same, and no Bills or Paragraph were sent to the Papers. All the Business of the Theatre is at a Stand, and no Rehearsal called. Wed. 16th--Mr Sheridan,
Dr Ford and
Mr Linley dined today by Appointment with Mr Wallis where Mr Lacy was to have met them; about four o'clock he sent a verbal Message that he could not come to Dinner, but would wait upon them in the Evening, and about nine o'clock he came, and everything was settled to the Satisfaction (of them all) and a Paragraph sent to the Papers, and the
Hypocrite and
Christmas Tale was advertised for Friday, but no Play was to be done on Thursday--
Covent Garden did not play on Friday (
Hopkins Diary).
Public Advertiser, 16 Oct., summarizes the proprietors' dispute: the
Drury Lane patent had been purchased [in 1747] by
David Garrick and
James Lacy. On his death Lacy had devised his half-share to his son,
Willoughby Lacy; on his retirement from the stage Garrick had sold his half-share to Sheridan, Ford and Linley. The original agreement between Garrick and Lacy, as recited in a document retained by the attorney
Albany Wallis was that, in case of the sale of either share of the patent, or any part of either share, the seller was obligated to offer the first refusal to purchase to the other partner, and that this was to be done only when the theatre was closed for the summer. In selling one half of his share to
Robert Langford and to
Edward Thompson, Willoughby Lacy was--so argued his three partners--acting illegally: he had not offered to them the first refusal, and he was negotiating the sale at a time when the theatre was open.
Public Advertiser, 17 Oct.. prints a statement from Lacy saying that he did not feel himself bound by the original agreement between his father and Garrick, but that, in the interest of the business of the theatre, he had asked Langford and Thompson to withdraw their claim to partnership, to which request they had acceded. Receipts: #130 9s. 6d