Event Comment: Mainpiece: [With alterations by
John Philip Kemble] Not acted
these 4 years. [In his prompt copy (1808) now in
Harvard Theatre Collection Kemble's annotation lists
the following as needed in
the opening scene: 10 principals, Captain of
the Guard, 3 Knights, 2 Pages, 2 Gentlemen with Crown, 2 Gentlemen with Map, Physician, Herald, 2 Ladies with Goneril, 2 Ladies with Regan, 2 Standard Bearers, 12 Guards. Nearly every scene opens or closes with drums and trumpets. In
the storm scene, "Thunder and lightning; lamps down," i.e.
the footlights lowered out of sight into a shallow trough. It is not unlikely that
these arrangements were adhered to in this present revival.] "Kemble said that, however singular it might be, in
Lear an audience quite unsettled him;
the noise of
the box-doors caught his ear, and routed all his meditated effects; and he found it absolutely impossible to do that at night which he had thrown out during
the rehearsal in
the morning" (
Boaden, Siddons, II, 376). Receipts: #350 9s. 6d. (310.9.6; 38.12.0; 1.8.0)
Performances
Mainpiece Title: King Lear
Afterpiece Title: The Deserter