Event Comment: Benefit for Foley, Mortimer, and Saunderson. Receipts. #200 (Cross)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mortimer, Baker &c. (Cross); for Robinson and Goodwin (MacMillan). Receipts: #140 (Cross)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; MD 3, by George Colman, ynger]: The Scenery and Dresses are entirely new. The Musick composed by Storace.The Scenes designed and executed by Greenwood and Capon [the Gothic library was painted by Capon (Oracle, 21 Mar. 1796)]. The Dresses by Johnston, Gay and Miss Rein. Books of the Songs to be had in the Theatre. [When Colman published his play he prefaced it with an acrimonious attack on Kemble, in which he accused him of deliberately trying to make the play a failure. But almost without exception the contemporary reviews excused Kemble's performance on the grounds of his obvious indisposition, and agreed that the play itself was unsatisfactory. "The play failed, and we are sorry to say did not merit to succeed...Kemble, who was tormented With an incessant cough, said he could not but be sensible that much of the displeasure of the house proceeded from his deficiency in a principal character...The whole audience with one voice cried out, 'No, no, Kemble-it is not your fault'" (Oracle, 14 Mar.). "The dialogue is extremely heavy, and there is little or no incident to relieve the tedium of more than four hours representation...Sir Edward Mortimer is a being distracted, with no adequate cause; a prey to remorse, which he of all men was the last to feel from the principles that make up his being. This therefore is the radical moral defect of the piece. But there is another which, though not equally strong, is equally fatal: there is no progression of interest, there is no involution of plot, there is no development of character" (Star, 14 Mar.). Other notices of the opening night were much in the same vein. Subsequently Colman revised the play, and it held the stage for many years. "The curtailments which have been made shorten the representation near an hour and a half, and the alterations are many and judicious" (Morning Herald, 21 Mar. 1796). Morning Herald, 23 July 1796: This Day is published The Iron Chest (2s.). Receipts: #471 9s. (468.13; 2.16)

Event Comment: A new short Introductory Piece before a play [The Meeting of the Company]. This new Prelude call'd The Meeting of the Company or Bayes' Art of Acting by D. G. Esq--it is full of fine Satyr & an Excellent Lesson to all performers, it was receiv'd with very great Applause (Hopkins Diary). [MacMillan's note from Kemble differs slightly in the wording. The salaries this season were #94 7s. 8d. per day; #566 6s. per week. Kemble's note as to total receipts is short by 8 pence.] Prices: Box 5s. Pit 3s. Gallery 2s. Upper Gallery 1s. [Unfavorable review of Meeting of the Company in The Westminster Magazine (Sept., p. 472). The actor Aickin referred to this season is J. Aickin. Francis Aickin left dl before the beginning of this season. He was dismissed by Garrick in May. See Booden, Private Correspondence of David Garrick, I, 651-55.] Paid Renters #8; Advanced Mr Watson (box office keeper) #10; Ditto to Mr Mortimer (box office keeper) #15 (Treasurer's Book). [The funds to the box office keepers was operating cash which was returned 29 May 1775. Payment to Renters was same for each acting night until the eighty-eighth night (9 Jan. 1775) when it dropped to #4 nightly, since half of the stock holders (the Old Renters) were paid up by that time. The remaining 100 nights of the season plus 11 Oratorio nights yielded #448 to the Renters. No further mention of this item of expense will be made this season.] Total to Renters #1,152. Receipts: #212 14s. 6d. (Treasurer's Book)