Event Comment: By Permission of the Lord Chamberlain. Benefit for Waldron, prompter. Mainpiece [1st time; TC 5, by Francis Godolphin Waldron. Larpent MS 1094; not published]: Founded on Shakespeare and Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen, by the Continuator of Ben Jonson's Sad Shepherd. With new Music composed by Dr Arnold. Copies of the Songs will be delivered gratis at the Theatre. Afterpiece [1st time; C 3, by Francis Godolphin Waldron, abridged from his The Maid of Kent. Larpent MS 1095; not published]: Written by the Author of Heigho for a Husband. Tickets and Places for the Boxes to be had of Waldron, No. 54, Drury-lane, and of Rice, at the Theatre

Event Comment: [Cooper, who was from the Stockport theatre, is identified in Genest, VII, 263.] Afterpiece: 1st Time at this Theatre [1st acted at cg, 23 Apr. 1783]. "We do not think Cooper's caution, on approaching the platform [in I. iv], either natural or characteristic...Of course he would not peep about, as if appalled at his own shadow...It has been usual with performers in this scene to walk to and fro, on the stage, and certainly the effect is improved by it" (Monthly Mirror, Dec. 1795, p. 48). Receipts: #221 9s. 6d. (220.14.6; 0.15.0)

Event Comment: Opera: With Chorusses under the Direction of Kelly. Ballet: Paul et Virginie [advertised in Morning Chronicle, 1 Jan.] is still unavoidably postponed on account of the indisposition of Mme Hilligsberg. The Subscribers are most respectfully entreated to be careful to whom they give their Tickets, as many improper persons have lately presented themsleves for admission into the Theatre with those Tickets; and the Subscribers are requested to observe that, in future, persons of this description will be conducted directly to the indentical Boxes to which such Tickets belong, instead of being admitted into any other part of the Theatre. The Public are entreated to understand that neither Ladies in Undress Hats or Bonnets, nor Gentlemen in Boots, will be admitted into the Pit of the Opera

Event Comment: "The represention announced for last night at this Theatre was Twelfth Night; but as Mrs Jordan found herself too ill to perform, new bills were issued, and the substitute was to be The Siege of Belgrade. About the middle of the day, however, Mrs Jordan found herself well enough to perform, and the other bills were circulated, importing that the play was to be Twelfth Night. But, in the afternoon, Mrs Jordan found herself too ill to perform, and a message was sent again to the theatre, signifying the melancholy disappointment. It was then too late to make any other change, and Twelfth Night was represented, Mrs Goodall reading the part of Viola. There was considerable difficulty in collecting the performers, after these repeated changes. Barrymore could not be found, and Caulfield dressed for Orsino; but when he was ready to appear Barrymore arrived, and took the part. It was then discovered that Phillimore was absent, and Caulfield was doomed to dress once more, for Phillimore's character; but soon after Phillimore came to the house. Mrs Kemble being indisposed, Miss Mellon undertook her part of Maria ...The Audience (a large one) indeed grumbled a little at this kind of dramatic hocus pocus, but on the whole, were not churlish in their testimonies of satisfaction" (True Briton, 13 Jan.). Receipts: #222 19s. (160.4.0; 58.11.6; 4.3.6)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mme Mara. 2nd piece: Compressed into 2 Acts. The Words of the new Song to be had at the Theatre. Morning Herald, 21 May: Tickets to be had of Mme Mara, No. 57, Edgeware-road. Account-Book: Paid the Duke of Bedford one years Rent for the Theatre due Ladyday 1794 #456 4s.; Account-Book, 10 June: Paid the Duke of Bedford one years Rent due Ladyday 1795 #456 4s. Receipts: #339 10s. (250.1.6; 2.2.0; tickets: 87.6.6)

Event Comment: 3rd piece [1st time; MF 2, by George Brewer]: The Musick by Dr Arnold. Books of the Songs to be had at the Theatre. Morning Herald; 6 July 1796: This Day is published Bannian Day (1s.). 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 had of Rice, at the Theatre. [On this evening the following performers appeared both at dl and at the hay: Suett, Caulfield, Trueman, R. Palmer, Burton, Miss Leak, Miss Heard

Event Comment: Afterpiece: 9th Time [i.e. in continuation of the reckoning for the previous season]. A New Room has been prepared on the Bow Street side of the Theatre for the Accomodation of the Frequenters of the Boxes at Half Price. They will be admitted into the New Room at Half past Seven, and from thence into the Theatre at the end of the Third Act, as usual. Boxes 6s. Second Price 3s. Pit 3s. 6d. Second Price 2s. Gallery 2s. Second Price 1s. Upper Gallery 1s. Places for the Boxes to be had of Brandon (only) at the Office in Hart-street. The Doors to be opened at 5:30. To begin at 6:30 [see 7 Nov.]. No Money to be returned. Receipts: #281 1s. 6d. (278.5.6; 2.16.0)

Event Comment: Servants admitted to keep Places as usual, and Ladies and Gentlemen are requested to order them to attend at the Theatre not later than Five o'Clock. For such Places as are ordered to be kept by the Place Keepers of the Theatre. One Shilling is to be paid at the time of taking them, and no Place Keeper or Box Keeper is to demand, or to receive, any further Gratuity on any pretence whatever. Every Place Keeper to wear a Number. It is respectfully desired that Information may be given to Brandon. at the Box-office, of any Irregularity or Imposition, which will be immediately redressed. Receipts: #125 17s. (124.11; 1.6)

Event Comment: Mainpiece: Not acted these 6 years [acted 7 Oct. 1791]. Middleton, after performing the first scene of Nerestan, retired abruptly into the wardrobe, pulled off his coat, and telling the dresser he should be back in ten minutes, left the theatre; he did not return, however, according to his appointment, and Davenport read the remainder of the character: a fit of insanity is supposed to have seized him" (Monthly Mirror, Jan. 1797, p. 55). [Middleton did not appear on the stage again until 27 Feb. 1797.] Afterpiece [1st time: P 2 (?), by James Wild and John Follett. MS of Songs only: Larpent MS 1148; synopsis of action in Pocket Magazine, Dec. 1796, p. 412]: With entire new Scenery, Machinery, Music, Dresses. The Overture and Music by Reeve. The Scenery painted by Phillips, Blackmore, Hollogan, Thorne, Byrn. The Machinery, Trick and Changes of Scenery invented and executed by Cresswell and Sloper. The Dresses by Dick, Mrs Egan. Books of the Songs to be had at the Theatre. "Among the changes are a trunk into a gingerbread nut-man's wheel-barrow--a poor man's hut into an old oak, with a group of Gypsies boiling their kettle under it--one of the clowns into a thick candle, and the candle afterwards into a green-house tub, with a large shrub in it" (Oracle, 20 Dec.). Receipts: #193 5s. 6d. (183.4.6; 10.1.0)

Event Comment: [Miss D'Evelyn is identified in MS list in Kemble playbills of new performance for this season.] Complaints having been made of the Box-Keepers and Door Keepers of this Theatre applying for Christmas Boxes, it is requested by Proprietors that no such Application may be attended to; and any person belonging to the Theatre persevering in the Practice will be immediately discharged. Receipts: #197 1s. 6d. (133.8.6; 61.11.6; 2.1.6)

Event Comment: Benefit for Fawcett. 1st piece: Not acted some years [acted 30 Oct. 1790]. 2nd piece [1st time: ENT 1]. 3rd piece: By Permission of George Colman, Esq., and for that Night only. Tickets and Places to be had of Fawcett at his house, No. 10, Golden Square, and of Brandon, at the Theatre. "To the Public, May 16, 1797. In consequence of repeated Forgeries of Tickets on Benefit Nights, particularly those of Miss Wallis, Mr Incledon, Mr Holman, and Mrs Mattocks, it has been found necessary to offer a large Reward for the Discovery of the Person or Persons concerned in this unjust and cruel Practice. Mr Fawcett, therefore, thinks it his Duty to warn his Friends and the Public from purchasing Tickets for his Night of Strangers, especially those Persons who sell them in the Avenues of the Theatre, as all such will be stopt at the Doors, and if forged the Persons offering them for Admittance will be drawn into a disagreeable dilemma" (printed slip attached to Kemble playbill). Receipts: #462 5s. (189.12; 8.13; tickets: 264.0)

Event Comment: Benefit for Fawcett. 3rd piece: By permission of T. Harris, Esq.; never acted at this theatre. True Briton, 29 Aug.: Tickets to be had of Fawcett at his house, No. 10, Golden-square

Event Comment: Under the Patronage of H. R. H. the Prince of Wales, H. R. H. the Duke of York, and H. R. H. the Duke of Clarence. Benefit for a Fund for the Relief of the Wounded Seamen, and also for the Widows and Orphans of the Brave Men who fell in the late Glorious Action, under Admiral Lord Viscount Duncan [see 16 Oct.]. The Tickets for the Boxes are issued under the Direction of a Committee consisting of the following Noblemen and Gentlemen, who have obligingly undertaken to attend to the arrangement of the Evening: The Duke of Leeds, The Duke of Bedford, The Earl of Guildford, The Earl of Thanet, The Right Honorable the Lord Mayor [Brook Watson], Mr Alderman Combe, M. P., Mr Alderman Skinner, John Julius Angerstein, Esq. Tickets and Places for the Boxes not disposed of by the Committee to be had of Fosbrook at the Box Office, Little Russell-Street, and at the Bar of Lloyds Coffee House. Ladies and Gentlemen having Privilege of the Theatre are requested by the Stewards to waive the use of it for this Evening. [Address by Richard Cumberland (European Magazine, Nov. 1797, p. 339). True Briton. 23 Nov. 1797, prints a letter from the Chairman of Committee of Subscribers to the performers of the theatre, thanking them for not "accepting the usual emolument on the night of performance."] Receipts: #631 8s. (357.17.6; 57.4.6; 1.11.0; money extra left at the doors: 2.14.6; tickets: 212.0.6) (charge: #161 0s. 6d.)

Event Comment: By Command of Their Majesties. This Evening the Doors to be opened at 5:30. To begin at 6:30. Account-Book: Paid the Duke of Bedford one years rent for the Theatre, the back of the Theatre, the houses in Bow Street, Hart Street, the Piazza, and Playhouse Passage, as expressed in the Receipt, due Lady Day 1796, #456 4s. Receipts: #459 9s. 6d. (452.5.6; 7.4.0)

Event Comment: "We suggest the necessity of curtailing the entertainments...The Purse ought to have been entirely omitted. There is a want of alertness between the acts which is much better managed at the Winter Theatres. Rosina did not begin till half past eleven o'clock. We advise the Female Performers not to disguise their faces with so much rouge. If it is in some measure necessary at the Winter Theatres, where the chief part of the audience are at a distance from the Stage, we conceive in this small House it is less necessary" (Times, 30 Aug.)

Event Comment: 2nd ballet: 1st time; composed by Barre; the Music by Bossi. "Mme Hilligsberg, who possesses the first rank among the dancers of London, is a woman of distinguished merit: she succeeds with peculiar happiness in sportive and jocose expressions, and she is bewitchingly graceful as a Welch or Scotch country girl. Her figure is very handsome; but her arms are somewhat long and thin. The third dancer is Mme Laborie; she possesses an agreeable figure, much animation and native gracefulness. She might become a first-rate dancer [if] she did not trust too much to her natural talents, and bestowed more attention on the art" (Goede, 265). "Les Deux Jumelles, ou la Meprise, pouvoient tres bien faire le sujet d'unjoli divertissement; mais pour un grand ballet, il a fallu y appeller le secours des dieux, & faire descendre ce que nous appelons une gloire de nuages qui se developpent assez mal: c'est la faute du machiniste ou du charpentier. D'ailleurs, cette gloire ne sert a rien, puisque l'Amour vient dans un assez mauvais cabriolet, pousse par des hommes qu'on voit un peu trop distinctement, & s'en retourne de meme a reculons. Nous avons vu souvent le char de l'Amour aller en avant; mais il est rare qu'on le voie reculer, & cette meme gloire eprouve autant de difficulte pour remonter qu'elle en avout eue pour descendre, laissant le spectateur tres convaincu de son inutilite" (Anthony LeTexier, L'Ami des Meres, 1799, I, 192-93). The subscribers are most respectfully intreated to be careful to whom they give their Tickets, as many improper persons have lately presented themselves for admission into the Theatre with those Tickets; and the subscribers are requested to observe that, in future, persons of this description will be conducted directly to the identical Boxes to which such Tickets belong, instead of being admitted into any other part of the Theatre. And the public are intreated to understand that neither Ladies in Undress Hats or Bonnets, nor Gentlemen in Boots will be admitted into the Pit of the Opera

Event Comment: Benefit for Fawcett. 3rd piece [DO 2. Larpent MS 1251; not published]: Never acted at a Public Theatre [1st acted privately at Brandenburgh House, Hammersmith, 28 Feb. 1798]; Written by her Serene Highness the Margravine of Anspach. The Music partly by the Margravine, and partly by Sarti, Guglielmi, Paisiello, and Saphio. Grand Overture, La Chasse, by Reeve. The Scenery painted by Phillips, Lupino, Hollogan, &c. The Machinery by Sloper. The Dresses by Dick and Mrs Egan. Morning Chronicle, 17 Apr.: Her Serene Highness the Margravine of Anspach having, with unprecedented Kindness and Liberality, lent Mr Fawcett the Manuscript of the above magnificent and interesting Opera, he begs leave to state that nothing shall be wanted on his Part to render it as acceptable to the Public as it was to the Nobility who had the pleasure of seeing it at the Brandenburgh house Theatre. Ibid, 4 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Fawcett, No. 41, Frith-street, Soho. Receipts: #532 6s. 6d. (239.1.6; 2.9.0; tickets: 290.16.0)

Event Comment: By Authority of the Lord Chamberlain. Benefit for Mrs Hunter, late of Covent-Garden Theatre. [Epilogue by Miles Peter Andrews.] Tickets to be had of Mrs Hunter, No. 12, Leicester-street, Leicester-square; and of Rice at the Theatre, where Places for the Boxes may be taken. Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. 1st Gallery 2s. 2nd Gallery 1s

Event Comment: In Thomas Jordan's Royal Arbour of Loyal Poesie (p. 12) is a piece entitled: A Prologue to the King, August 16, 1660

Event Comment: See Herbert, Dramatic Records, p. 117. The King's Company. The Prologue is in Thomas Jordan's A Royal Arbour of Loyal Poesie (1664). Andrew Newport to Sir Richard Leveson, 15 Dec.: Upon our stages we have women-actors, as beyond seas (HMC, 5th Report, Part I, 1876, p. 158). For a discussion of actresses who may have played Desdemona on this day, see Wilson, All the King's Ladies, pp. 6-8. Possibly Clun acted Iago. See An Elegy Upon the Most Execrable Murther of Mr Clun, 1664

Event Comment: The Prologue, with the date of performance given as 28 May 1661, is in Thomas Jordan's A Royal Arbour of Loyal Poesie, 1664. See also Wiley, Rare Prologues and Epilogues, p. 326. This is possibly George Jolly's company. See also 23 March 1660@1

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the Opera, where there was a new play (Cutter of Coleman Street), made in the year 1658, with reflections much upon the late times; and it being the first time, the pay was doubled, and so to save money, my wife and I went up into the gallery, and there sat and saw very well; and a very good play it is. It seems of Cowly's making. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, p. 25): This Comedy being Acted so perfectly Well and Exact, it was perform'd a whole Week with a full Audience. John Dennis, Dedication to The Comical Gallant, 1702: The only Play that ever Mr Cowley writ, was barbarously treated the first night, as the late Mr Dryden has more than once informed me, who has told me that he went to see it with the famous Mr Sprat, now Bishop of Rochester, and that after the Play was done, they both made a visit to Mr Cowley. Langbaine (English Dramatick Poets, p. 81): This Play met with some Opposition, at its Representation under this new Name, from some who envyed the Authors unshaken Loyalty to the Prince, and the Royal Cause, in the worst of Times. BM Add. Mss. 34217, fol. 31b, in Hotson (Commonwealth and Restoration Stage, p. 247): @The Cutter of Coleman street had more fame@Before the Author chang'd its name@And shewd himselfe an Englishman right@By mending of things to spoyle them quite@And bee's more to blame because he can tell@(No better) to make new strings soe well.

Event Comment: [The edition of 1662 suggests that this was a ballet, the text offering description or synopses of the entries. Edition of 1662: Being part of that Magnificent Entertainment by the Noble Prince, DelaGrange, Lord Lieutenant of Lincolns Inn. Presented to the High and Mighty Charles II, Monarch of Great Britain, France and Ireland. On Friday 3 of January 1662. Evelyn, Diary: After Prayers I went to Lond: invited to the solemn foolerie of the Prince de la Grange at Lincolne Inn: where came also the King, Duke, &c.: beginning with a grand Masquev and a formal Pleading before the mock-princes (Grandes), Nobles & Knights of the Sunn: He had his L. Chancelor, Chamberlaine, Treasurer, & other royal officers gloriously clad & attended, which ended in a magnificent Banquet: one Mr John? Lort, being the young spark, who maintained the Pageantrie. Pepys, Diary: While I was there, comes by the King's life-guard, he being gone to Lincoln's Inn this afternoon to see the Revells there; there being, according to an old custom, a prince and all his nobles and other matters of sport and charge. John Ward (notebooks, 6 Jan.): I saw a Leopard and the same day as strange a sight which was the mock prince of Lincolnes' Inne his Nobels his Knights of the Garter and his other officers (Shakespeare Quarterly, XI [1960], 494)