Their Majesties' Servants. Annals of the English Stage (Volume 1 of 3). Doran John
follies in the gallery at Whitehall.
Those follies ceased to be; Oliver had passed away, and Richard had laid down the greatness which had never sat well upon him. Important changes were at hand, and the merry rattle of Monk's drums coming up Gray's Inn Road, welcomed by thousands of dusty spectators, announced no more cheering prospect to any class than to the actors. The Oxford vintner's son, Will Davenant, might be seen bustling about in happy hurry, eagerly showing young Betterton how Taylor used to play Hamlet, under the instruction of Burbage, and announcing bright days to open-mouthed Kynaston, ready at a moment's warning to leap over his master's counter, and take his standing at the balcony as the smooth-cheeked Juliet.
Meanwhile, beaming old Rhodes, with a head full of memories of the joyous Blackfriars' days, and the merry afternoons over the water, at the Globe, leaving his once apprentice, Betterton, listening to Davenant's stage histories, and Kynaston, not yet out of his time, longing to flaunt it before an audience, took his own way to Hyde Park, where Monk was encamped, and there obtained, in due time, from that far-seeing individual, licence to once more raise the theatrical flag, enrol the actors, light up the stage, and, in a word, revive the English theatre. In a few days the drama commenced its new career in the Cockpit, in Drury Lane; and this fact seemed so significant, as to the character of General Monk's tastes that, subsequently, when he and the Council of State dined in the city halls, the companies treated their guests, after dinner, with satirical farces, such as "Citizen and Soldier," "Country Tom," and "City Dick," with, as the newspapers inform us, "dancing and singing, many shapes and ghosts, and the like; and all to please his Excellency the Lord General."
The English stage owes a debt of gratitude to both Monk and Rhodes. The former made glorious summer of the actors' winter of discontent; and the latter inaugurated the Restoration by introducing young Betterton. The son of Charles I.'s cook was, for fifty-one years, the pride of the English theatre. His acting was witnessed by more than one old contemporary of Shakspeare, – the poet's younger brother being among them, – he surviving till shortly after the accession of Charles II. The destitute actors warmed into life and laughter again beneath the sunshine of his presence. His dignity, his marvellous talent, his versatility, his imperishable fame, are all well known and acknowledged. His industry is indicated by the fact that he created one hundred and thirty new characters! Among them were Jaffier and Valentine, three Virginiuses, and Sir John Brute. He was as mirthful in Falstaff as he was majestic in Alexander; and the craft of his Ulysses, the grace and passion of his Hamlet, the terrible force of his Othello, were not more remarkable than the low comedy of his Old Bachelor, the airyness of his Woodville, or the cowardly bluster of his Thersites. The old actors who had been frozen out, and the new who had much to learn, could not have rallied round a more noble or a worthier chief; for Betterton was not a greater actor than he was a true and honourable gentleman. Only for him, the old frozen-outs would have fared but badly. He enriched himself and them, and, as long as he lived, gave dignity to his profession. The humble lad, born in Tothill Street, before monarchy and the stage went down, had a royal funeral in Westminster Abbey, after dying in harness almost in sight of the lamps. He deserved no less, for he was the king of an art which had well-nigh perished in the Commonwealth times, and he was a monarch who probably has never since had, altogether, his equal. Off as on the stage, he was exemplary in his bearing; true to every duty; as good a country gentleman on his farm in Berkshire as he was perfect actor in town; pursuing with his excellent wife the even tenor of his way; not tempted by the vices of his time, nor disturbed by its politics; not tippling like Underhill; not plotting and betraying the plotters against William, like Goodman, nor carrying letters for a costly fee between London and St. Germains, like Scudamore. If there had been a leading player on the stage in 1647, with the qualities, public and private, which distinguished Betterton, there perhaps would have been a less severe ordinance than that which inflicted so much misery on the actors, and which, after a long decline, brought about a fall; from which they were, however, as we shall see, destined to rise and flourish.
CHAPTER III
THE "BOY ACTRESSES," AND THE "YOUNG LADIES."
The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, is the "sacred ground" of the English drama since the restoration of monarchy. At the Cockpit (Pit Street remains a memory of the place), otherwise called the Phœnix, in the "lane" above-named, the old English actors had uttered their last words before they were silenced. In a reconstruction of the edifice near, rather than on, the old site, the young English actors, under Rhodes, built their new stage, and wooed the willing town.
There was some irregularity in the first steps made to re-establish the stage, which, after an uneasy course of about four years, was terminated by Charles II., who, in 1663,15 granted patents for two theatres, and no more, in London. Under one patent, Killigrew, at the head of the King's Company (the Cockpit being closed), opened at the new theatre in Drury Lane, in August16 1663, with a play of the olden time – the "Humourous Lieutenant" of Beaumont and Fletcher. Under the second patent, Davenant and the Duke of York's Company found a home – first at the old Cockpit, then in Salisbury Court, Fleet Street, the building of which was commenced in 1660, on the site of the old granary of Salisbury house, which had served for a theatre in the early years of the reign of Charles I. This little stage was lapped up by the great tongue of fire, by which many a nobler edifice was destroyed, in 1666. But previous to the fire, thence went Davenant and the Duke's troop to the old Tennis Court, the first of the three theatres in Portugal Row, on the south side of Lincoln's Inn Fields, from which the houses took their name.
In 1671, Davenant being dead, the company, under the nominal management of his widow, migrated to a house designed by Wren, and decorated by Grinling Gibbons. This was the Duke's Theatre, in Dorset Gardens. It was in close vicinity to the old Salisbury Court Theatre, and it presented a double face – one towards Fleet Street, the other overlooking the terrace which gave access to visitors who came by the river. Later, this company was housed in Lincoln's Inn Fields again; but it migrated, in 1732, to Covent Garden, under Rich. Rich's house was burnt down in 1808, and its successor, built by Smirke, was destroyed in 1856. On the site of the latter now stands the Royal Italian Opera, the representative, in its way, of the line of houses wherein the Duke's Company struggled against their competitors of the King's.
The first house of those competitors in Drury Lane was burnt in 1672, but the King's Company took refuge in the "Fields" till Wren built the new house, opened in 1674. The two troops remained divided, yet not opposed, each keeping to its recognised stock pieces, till 1682, when Killigrew, having "shuffled off this mortal coil,"17 the two companies, after due weeding, formed into one, and abandoning Lincoln's Inn to the tennis-players, Dorset Gardens to the wrestlers, and both to decay, they opened at the New Drury, built by Sir Christopher, on the 16th of November 1682. Wren's theatre was taken down in 1791; its successor, built by Holland, was opened in 1794, and was destroyed in 1809. The present edifice is the fourth which has occupied a site in Drury Lane. It is the work of Wyatt, and was opened in 1812.
Thus much for the edifice of the theatres of the last half of the seventeenth century. Before we come to the "ladies and gentlemen" who met upon the respective stages, and strove for the approval of the town, let me notice that, after the death of Oliver,18 Davenant publicly exhibited a mixed entertainment, chiefly musical, but which was not held to be an infringement of the law against the acting of plays. Early in May 1659, Evelyn writes: – "I went to see a new opera, after the Italian way, in recitative music and scenes, much inferior to the Italian composure and magnificence; but it was prodigious, that in a time of such public consternation, such a vanity should be kept up or permitted." That these musical entertainments were something quite apart from "plays," is manifest by another entry in Evelyn's diary, in January 1661: – "After divers years since I had seen any play, I went to see acted 'The Scornful Lady,' at a new theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields."
Of Shakspeare's brother Charles, who lived to this period, Oldys says: – "This opportunity made the actors greedily inquisitive into every little circumstance, more especially in Shakspeare's dramatic character, which his brother could relate of him. But he, it seems, was so stricken in years, and possibly his memory so weakened by infirmities (which might make him
The second and final patents were dated – Killigrew's, 25th April 1662; Davenant's, 15th January 1663.
April (2d edition). The exact date is 8th April, as given by Downes.
Killigrew died after, not before, the union of the two companies. Chalmers expressly says that he lived to see them united, and gives March 1683 as the time of his death.
Davenant performed "The Siege of Rhodes" two years before Cromwell's death, namely, in 1656. [See Mr. Joseph Knight's Preface to his recent edition of the "Roscius Anglicanus."] Cromwell also permitted the entertainment named "The Cruelty of the Spaniards in Peru" to be represented, from political motives.