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
Performance Comment: King Lear-Kemble; Duke of Burgundy-Caulfield; Duke of Cornwall-Benson; Duke of Albany-Whitfield; Earl of Gloster-Packer; Earl of Kent-Aickin; Edgar-Wroughton; Edmund-Barrymore; Gent. Usher-R. Palmer; Esquire-Dignum; Physician-Jones; Attendant-Fawcett; Captain-Maddocks; Herald-Cooke; Old Man-Hollingsworth; Gentleman-Phillimore; Goneril-Mrs Cuyler; Regan-Mrs Ward; Cordelia-Mrs Siddons.Afterpiece Title: The Deserter