Event Comment: "[In
Pizarro] the effeminacy of
Alonzo's dress, better adopted for a ball-room than for scenes of warfare; the magnificence of the
Spanish dungeon, in a country where the Spanish invaders were fain to put up with tents for their own accomodation; the vile manner in which the scene is bungled together, where
Cora leaves her infant child to the fury of the pitiless storm, whilst a hut st
ands most invitingly in sight; the absurd introduction of Cora's song to the accompaniment of thunder
and lightning--but, above all, the disgraceful additions made by
Mr Sheridan himself, with the farcical termination of this sublime tragedy, by an
Irish howl over the dead body of
Rolla;--all these glaring defects, sufficient to damn any writer of less notoriety than Sheridan, still continue to outrage good-sense,
and the feelings of every spectator of taste
and discernment...We are firmly of opinion that the crowded houses this play still continues to draw are principally to be attributed to the masterly acting of the elder
Kemble" (
Dramatic Censor, I, 23-24). Receipts: #429 9s. (388.1; 40.1; 1.7)