Event Comment: [The
Duke's Company. This performance is on the
L. C. lists at
Harvard. See
VanLennep, "
Plays on the English Stage", pp. 16-17. This performance may have been the premiere.
Shadwell, in his Preface, implies that it was
acted six days. As Saturday was a day frequently chosen for a first showing and as the play was certainly given again on 14 Dec. 1670, the sequence of performaces which follow in this Calendar is based on the assumption that Saturday 10 Dec. 1670 was the first day, Wednesday 14 Dec. 1670 the fourth day of acting. The Preface: This Play...came upon the Stage with all the disadvantages imaginable: First, I was forced, after I had finish'd it, to blot out the main design of it; finding, that, contrary to my intention, it had given offence. The second disadvantage was, that notwithstanding I had (to the great prejudice of the Play) given satisfaction to all the exceptions made against it, it met with the clamorous opposition of a numerous party, bandied against it, and resolved, as much as they could, to damn it, right or wrong, before they had heard or seen a word on't. The last, and not the least, was, that the Actors (though since they have done me some right) at first were extreamly imperfect in the Action of it.... This of mine, after all these blows, had fall'n beyond Redemption, had it not been revived, after the second day, by her [
Mrs Johnson's (?)] kindness (which I can never enough acknowledge)
who, for four days together, beautified it with the most excellent Dancings that ever has been seen upon the Stage. This drew my enemies, as well as friends, till it was something better
acted, understood, and liked, than at first