Event Comment: Mainpiece: In I a Masquerade Scene incident to the Play. [This was included in all subsequent performances.] No Money to be returned. Places for the Boxes to be taken of Brandon at the Theatre. The Doors to be opened at 5:30. To begin at 6:30 [see 2 Nov.]. [No playbill this season lists the various prices of admission; they were probably, as usual: Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. 1st Gallery 2s. Upper Gallery 1s.] Receipts: #255 6s. (253.11.6; 1.14.6)

Event Comment: No Money to be returned. Books of the Performance to be had at the Theatre. Places for the Boxes to be taken of Fosbrook, at the Theatre. Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. 1st Gallery 2s. 2nd Gallery 1s. The Doors to be opened a 5:30. To begin at 6:30 [same throughout oratorio season]. [Master Clement was from the Imperial Opera House, Vienna.

Event Comment: Mainpiece: Never acted at this Theatre. [Under his real name, Snow, Hargrave had 1st appeared at this theatre on 7 Oct. 1791. In mainpiece the playbill assigns Sadi to Knight, but "The part of Sadi, which [Knight] was prevented from appearing in by indisposition, was undertaken by Townsend, who acquitted himself very ably" (Morning Herald, 8 Oct.). Townsend's part as a Muleteer was probably omitted.] Receipts: #128 11s. (125.16; 2.15)

Event Comment: Benefit for Miss Wallis. 2nd piece: By Permission of the Proprietors of Drury Lane Theatre, and for that night only; with additional Songs [Sga Storace had sung in the oratorios at this theatre in the 1789 season.] True Briton, 13 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Miss Wallis, Gower-street. Receipts: #376 9s. 6d. (192.15.6; 2.16.0; tickets: 180.18.0)

Event Comment: [Miss Andrews' 1st appearance on the stage was at dl on 13 May 1796.] The Publick is respectfully informed that, in consequence of the Benefit advertised for To-morrow, at the Theatre-Royal in Covent Garden, no Entertainments will be given here on that night; it being the wish of the Proprietor of this Theatre to promote, by any means in his power, the success of the above charitable purpose

Event Comment: [Extra night] Benefit for General Lying-In Hospital, Bays-water. Under Patronage of Her Majesty. The Proprietor of Theatre has liberally given Use of House on the above Occasion [i.e. he levied no charge]. The Orchestra under direction of Mountain. Principal Oboe by W. Parke. The Curtain to rise exactly at 7:00. Tickets to be had of Mess. Longman and Broderip [music publishers, No. 13, Haymarket]; at Hospital, Bayswater; and of Brandon at Theatre. Receipts: none listed

Event Comment: 2nd piece [1st time; D 3, by Henry Neuman, based on Der Opfertod, by August Friedrich Ferdinand von Kotzebue. Text (R. Phillips, 1799) assigns no parts]. Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. 1st Gallery 2s. 2nd Gallery 1s. The Doors to be opened at 6:00. To begin at 7:00 [same throughout season]. Places for the Boxes to be taken of Rice, at the Theatre. The Theatre, since the last Season, has been newly Decorated. [Beginning with 19 June the playbill: Printed by T. Woodfall, Drury Lane; on 4 Sept.: No. 104, Drury Lane.] Morning Chronicle, 27 June 1799: This Day is published Family Distress (2s.). Gentleman's Magazine, May 1800, pp. 406-8, prints a letter from "J. B." in which strong exception is taken to Kotzebue in general, and this play in particular. "Theatrical entertainments have an extensive influence upon the manners of Society. When well regulated, and the pieces for representation well selected both as to matter and manner, they may be esteemed friendly to morality, and improvers of public taste. But what shall we say when both these ends are disregarded; when moral virtue is banished from the scene, and purity of taste is destroyed by affected language and pantomimical decorations? Improvements in almost every art and science have been within a few years, rapid and important. But that is not the case with the stage; nor can it be, while Kotzebue and his friends usurp the venerable boards of Shakespeare." The writer then, in sarcastic terms, outlines the plot of Family Distress. [Pope and Miss Chapman were both from cg.

Event Comment: Benefit for C. Kemble. Mainpiece: By permission of the Proprietors of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Morning Chronicle, 8 Aug.: Tickets to be had of C. Kemble, No. 126, Great Russel-street, Bloomsbury

Event Comment: The King's Company. The date of the first performance is not known, but its listing in the Term Catalogues, November 1681, suggests late October as a likely latest date for its premiere. If Mithridates was acted in mid-October at the opening of Drury Lane, Sir Barnaby Whigg may well be the first new play offered by the King's Company in the autumn. A Song in Act I, Blow Boreas Blow, with music apparently by Henry Purcell, is in A Third Collection of New Songs...Words by Mr D'Urfey, 1685, and in Dramatic Works of Henry Purcell, Purcell Society, III (1917), xiv-xv

Event Comment: With new Scenes and Clothes. The House is entirely new fitted up, made more commodious and warm, and the Play will punctually beghn at Six o'Clock

Event Comment: Benefit Mrs Stevens. Second Piece: a New Pantonimical Something. Third Piece: The Practice of a new Serious Scene to be Introduc'd. Shewing the various and hazardous Adventures he met with to get his Wife Joan; particularly, his last memorable Battle and Victory over a great and monstrous Pig, by which she was to be devour'd chain'd to a Rock. 7 p.m

Event Comment: Ijmdon Daily Post and General Advertiser, 27 March: We hear . . . that to perfect the Performance, Mr Handel designs to introduce, to-morrow Night (in the Oratorio of Deborah) a large new Organ, which is remarkable for its Variety of curious Stops; being a new Invention, and a great Improvement of that Instrument

Event Comment: RRev. T. Newton to David Garrick, 18 Jan.: I was almost angry with you, to see your name last week in the bills for Costar Pearmain. I am not fond of your acting such parts as Fondlewife, or even Clodio, nor should be of the Lying Valet, if it was not of your own writing. You who are equal to the greatest parts, strangely demean yourself in acting any thing that is low and little; and not only I, but really all who admire you and Wish you well, that is all who know you, are grieved and wonder at it. If I was an actor surely I would rather wish to be a Raphael than a Hogarth; or if I was a poet, I would choose infinitely rather to be a Milton than Hudibras.--Boaden, Private Correspondence of Garrick, I, 5-6. [Morning Herald 28 June 1787 suggests that Yates was Winifred apShenkin.

Event Comment: Today, will be reviv'd an Opera. The Musick compos'd by Mr Handel. With Dances and other Decorations entirely new. Pit and Boxes to be put together; and no Person to be admitted without Tickets, which will be deliver'd this Day at the Office in the Haymarket, at Half a Guinea each. Gallery 5s. 6 p.m. Note. The Subscribers to the Opera are desir'd to send for their Silver Tickets to the Opera-Office in the Hay-Market. [This customary notice will not be included further. According to Loewenberg, Annals of Opera, I, 102, this is the new opera Rossane, Lampugnani's first composition, at the house for which he was the new resident composer. Musicologists have not arrived at the identity of this piece, Burney and Loewenburg attributing it to Lampugnani, Schoelcher and Deutsch to Handel. See Deutsch, Handel, p. 572, where he reviews the evidence.

Event Comment: Went off with applause (Cross). Afterpiece: a New Pantomime after the Manner of the Italian Comedy, with New Scenes, Habits, Decorations. Nothing under Full Prices will be taken. No Gentleman can possibly be admitted behind the Scenes or into the Orchestra, on account of the Machinery and Music. The Music composed by Dr Boyce. The Songs will be printed, and deliver'd at the doors. Receipts: #200 (Cross)