Event Comment: Benefit Jovan de Vallois and Mrs Woodward. At the Desire of several Persons of Quality and Distinction. [For a discussion of the stage, see Grub St. Journal, 17 April.]

Event Comment: Benefit Mrs Hamilton. At the Desire of several Ladies of Quality

Event Comment: Well rec'd: all but the 1st Chorus w[hic]h was Hiss'd. First Dance Hiss'd off. Mr Norris being ill, Mrs Dormond perform'd in his room, much applauded (Cross Diary). Acted but once. Books of the Opera to be sold at the Theatre. Receipts: #169 1s. 6d. (MacMillan)

Event Comment: A new Entertainment of Vocal and Instrumental Musick (after the manner of an Opera...the vocal part being compos'd by Mr Weldon, and the Instrumental by Mr Dieuport. [Text by Pierre Motteux.

Event Comment: Afterpiece: A New Italian Piece by Mons Sorin and Mr Baxter. At the Desire of several Persons of Quality

Event Comment: For one Night Only Concert. Prices: 4s., 2s. 6d., after which will be perform'd (Gratis) a new Farce of Three Acts. To begin at 7 p.m. Tickets to be had of Mrs Hooper. [A new play by Mrs Hooper.

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Hoper. The Second Night. Mrs Hoper's Prologue to the Town, By a Friend: @Tonight a Female author heads the stage@Warm'd by the grand productions of the age;@To shine among the modern Bards aspires,@As the Moon glisters midst the lesser fires:@Pants to be rank'd with Sapho, Phillips, Behn@And prove that women write as well as Men.@Bold in the drama's cause, attacks the fashion@Where Novelty appears the reigning passion,@With drooping spirits draws the Tragic Queen@Like your fine ladies troubled with the spleen:@Nor trusts her meaning to the strolling Elf@But represents the character herself.@ [Suggests her friends reproved her for turning player, but she thought it more honorable than going into debt.] @The Stage is innocent and brings no shame@Unless the players are themselves to blame@'Twas meant as Virtue's School;--Tis no disgrace@To act a virtuous part, in any Place.@ [Closes with appeal to audience to be charitable to "this firstling of her quill, to support her generously with applause. See Daily Advertiser.

Event Comment: Benefit Mrs Woffington. Mainpiece: By the late Mr Taverner, never acted there before. Tickets deliver'd out for the 19th of February, and 5 March will be taken this night

Event Comment: By Command of Their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess of Wales [who were present]. Mainpiece: Written by Beaumont and Fletcher. Afterpiece: Written by the Author of the Toy Shop. [For a letter on the disputes between the footmen and the gentlemen, see Grub St. Journal, 17 March.] [There is in the Bennett Collection, I, 93, in the Birmingham Library, an exceptionally curious advance notice for a performance to be given at Drury Lane soon after Easter of The Conscious Lovers and The Devil to Pay, with no cast for either play in the bill. The announcement appears to refer to the spring of 1737 and presumably appeared around the middle of March. It is intended for the benefit of a Widow under Misfortunes and the bill bears the heading: Gift and Pleasure. According to the announcement, the widow has been left Italian pictures, antiqees, jewels, and precious stones; and she intends, for the encouragement of her benefactors, to make a gift of all the objects, which will be placed in three hundred parcels. Tickets for the performance are advertised at five shillings, and no one is to be admitted without a ticket. The pit and boxes are to be put together at two tickets for each person, and the first and second galleries are placed together at one ticket for each spectator. The tickets are not to be left with the door-keepers as usual, but only shewn and kept. On the day following the benefit a raffle will be held, by Mr Foubert's Patent Mathematical Machine, at Hickford's Great Room in Brewers Street, Golden Square, and only holders of tickets will be admitted to the raffle, After this entry was set, an advertisement was found in the Daily Advertiser, 18 April 1738, announcing this performance for 13 May 1738. The Daily Advertiser on 5 May 1738, however, announced that the proposed performance had been cancelled.

Event Comment: Benefit Mr and Mrs L. Hallam

Event Comment: Benefit Mrs Pritchard. [Receipts: #61 6s., plus #141 8s. from tickets, amounting to a house of #202 14s. without Stage (Account Books, Egerton 2268), i.e., perhaps, without counting income from those invited by Mrs Pritchard to sit on the stage.] Note: The Amphitheatre used on the stage at Benefits will be enclosed and divided into distinct Boxes, with a ceiling and illuminated; in the same manner as those in Front of the House. Ladies are desired to send their servants by Three.--General Advertiser. [House charges were #60.

Event Comment: By Command of Their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess of Wales. Benefit Mrs Butler. [Tickets at Mrs Butler's House in Leicester Fields.

Event Comment: WWalpole to Sir Horace Mann: We have operas but no company at them; the Prince and Lord Middlesex Impresarii. Plays only are in fashion; at one house the best company that perhaps ever were together, Quin, Garrick, Mrs Pritchard, Mrs Cibber: at the other Barry, a favorite young actor and the Violette, whose dancing our friends don't like: I scold them, but all the answer is "Lord! you are so English."-Horace Walpole's Correspondence with Sir Horace Mann, II, 42

Event Comment: Benefit for Pritchard (Treasurer). Tickets delivered for the London Merchant will be taken. On April 12 that play was advertised for this evening--the part of George Barnwell to be performed (by particular desire) by Mrs Pritchard, Millwood by Mrs Furnival, and Lucy by Mrs Clive. Tickets to be had of Pritchard at his House in Duke's late Earl's Court, Bow St., Covent Garden; and of Hobson at the stage door. Tomorrow Lover's Melancholy, and a New Farce call'd The Club of Fortune Hunters for the Benefit of Mrs Macklin. Receipts: #180 (Cross); house charges, #63 (Powel); cash #85 6s. 6d.; tickets, #81 9s. (Clay MS)

Event Comment: The United Company. There is uncertainty concerning this date; it appears on Luttrell's copy (Huntington Library) of the separately printed Prologue and Epilogue, and the date may represent the time of his purchase rather than a date of performance. The Prologue and Epilogue are reprinted in Wiley, Rare Prologues and Epilogues, pp. 141-45. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, pp. 39-40): All the preceding Plays, being the chief that were Acted in Dorset-Garden, from November 1671, to the Year 1682; at which time the Patentees of each Company United Patents; and by so Incorporating the Duke's Company were made the King's Company, and immediately remov'd to the Theatre Royal in Drury-Lane. Upon this Union, Mr Hart being the Heart of the Company under Mr Killigrew's Patent never Acted more, by reason of his Malady; being Afflicted with the Stone and Gravel, of which he Dy'd some time after: Having a Sallary of 40 Shillings a Week to the Day of his Death. But the Remnant of that Company; as, Major Mohun, Mr Cartwright, Mr Kynaston, Mr Griffin, Mr Goodman, Mr Duke Watson, Mr Powel, Sr, Mr Wiltshire, Mrs Corey, Mrs Bowtell, Mrs Cook, Mrs Montfort. [Joined the new company]. Note, now Mr Monfort and Mr Carlile, were grown to the Maturity of good Actors. The mixt Company then Reviv'd the several old and Modern Plays, that were the Propriety of Mr Killigrew, as Rule a Wife, and have a Wife: Mr Betterton Acting Michael Perez; Don Leon, Mr Smith, Cacofogo, Mr Cartwright: Margaretta, Mrs Barry: Estiphania, Mrs Cook. Next, @The Scornful Lady.@The Plain Dealer.@The Mock Astrologer.@The Jovial Crew.@The Beggars Bush.@Bartholomew-Fair.@The Moor of Venice.@Rollo.@The Humorous Lieutenant.@The Double Marriage.@ With divers others. George Powell, Preface to The Treacherous Brothers (1690): The Time was, upon the uniting of the Two Theatres, that the Reviveing of the old stock of Plays, so ingrost the study of the House, that the Poets lay dorment; and a new Play cou'd hardly get admittance, amongst the more precious pieces of Antiquity, that then waited to walk the Stage. Cibber, Apology, ed. Lowe, I, 95-96): I shall content myself with telling you that Mohun and Hart now growing old [for, above thirty Years before this Time, they had severally born the King's Commission of Major and Captain in the Civil Wars), and the younger Actors, as Goodman, Clark, and others, being impatient to get into their Parts, and growing intractable, the Audiences too of both Houses then falling off, the Patentees of each, by the King's Advice, which perhaps amounted to a Command, united their Interests and both Companies into one, exclusive of all others in the Year 1682. This Union was, however, so much in favour of the Duke's Company, that Hart left the Stage upon it, and Mohun survived not long after

Event Comment: 1st piece: In 3 Scenes of Dialogue. 2nd piece: The Music compiled by Pepusch. [The playbill assigns Filch to Mrs Wilson and Mat o' th' Mint to Miss Morris, but "Miss Morris was merely a temporary substitute for Mrs Wilson who, it seems, is too far advanced in her pregnancy to dress en bomme" (Miming Chronicle, 4 June). But beginning with 7 June Mrs Wilson acted regularly until 3 Aug. Who acted Mat o' th' Mint on this present night has not come to light; the part was perhaps omitted.] 3rd piece: Ballet Tragi-comique. Composed by Signior Novestris [i.e. George Colman, the elder]. The Music by Gluck. With new Scenes, Dresses and Decorations. Machinist and Painter-Sg Rookereschi. Tailor-Sg Walkerino. Places for the Boxes to be taken of Rice at the Theatre. The Doors to be opened at 6:00. To begin at 7:00 [same throughout season]. Boxes 5s. Pit 3s. 1st Gallery 2s. Upper Gallery 1s

Event Comment: Mainpiece: A New Comedy [by Richard Cumberland] never performed. [Genest, V, 282, reports that Garrick was in the House this night and was agreeably surprised at the complimentary reference to him in the Epilogue: Who but has seen the celebrated strife Where Reynolds calls the Canvass into life: And, 'twixt the Tragic, and the Comic Muse, Courted of both, and dubious where to chuse, Th'immortal Actor stands?' A long retelling of the plot appeared in the Freeholder's Magazine for Dec., concluding: This comedy was received with great applause by the Audience. It is said to be written by Mr Cumberland, who has already oblig'd the Public with a musical piece, called the Summer's Tale. The Performers, particularly Mr Smith, Mr Woodward, Mr Yates, Mrs Green, Mrs Bulkley, and Mrs Yates, did great justice to their characters. The Prologue was spoken by Mr Smith, and the Epilogue, which alluded to the celebrated picture of Sir Joshua Reynolds, where Comedy and Tragedy are contending for Mr Garrick, by Mrs Yates." Receipts: #215 18s

Event Comment: Nothing said abour ye prolog: (Cross). The Music of the Funeral Procession compos'd by Dr Boyce. [See "William Boyce's 'Solemn Dirge' in Garrick's Romeo and Juliet Production of 1750," by Charles Haywood, Shakespeare Quarterly, Spring, 1960.] This day is Publish'd at 1s. 6d. Romeo and Juliet a Tragedy, revised and alter'd from Shakespear by Theophilus Cibber, First revised in September 1744, at the Theatre in the Haymarket; now acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. To which is added a Serio-Comic Apology for Part of the Life of Mr Theophilus Cibber, Comedian, written by himself. Interspers'd with memoirs and anecdotes relating to the Stage Managements, Theatrical Resolutions, &c. also cursory Observations on principal Players: particularly Mr Quin, Mr Ryan, Mrs Woffington, Mrs Ward, and Miss Bellamy; Mr Garrick, Mr Barry, Mrs Cibber, Mrs Clive, Mrs Pritchard, &c. Likewise Original Letters that passed between the late Sir Thomas DeVeil and Mr Theophilus Cibber relating to the Stage Act, Concluding with a copy of Verses, call'd the Contrite Comedian's Confession. Printed for C. Corbett, the Publisher, at Addison's Head, facing St Dunstan's Church, Fleet St; G. Woodfall, at the King's Arms, the corner of Craig's Court, Charing Cross. [See 11 Oct.] Receipts: #170 (Cross)

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Although this performance is not certainly the premiere, it is the earliest known acting of the play. This performance is on the L. C. lists at Harvard. See VanLennep, "Plays on the English Stage", p. 14. John Boyle, Fifth Earl of Orrery: Master Anthony too the sequel of Guzman was after Lord Orrery's Death brought upon the Stage, but being disrelish'd by the Audience appear'd only one Night. It is probable The Author had not supervis'd and corrected It sufficiently before he died (The Dramatic Works of Roger Boyle, ed. W. S. Clark II, II, 950). If these private notes, written some fifty years after the premiere, are correct, this performance may have been the premiere and the only day of acting it

Event Comment: The United Company. The date of the premiere is not known, although a reference in the text to 1690 suggests that the play may have been produced in that year; but the fact that it was not advertised in the London Gazette until 6-9 April and not entered in the Term Catalogues until May 1691 suggest that it posaibly appeared early in 1691. This play was discussed in Wit for Money, or Poet Stutter; A Dialogue between Smith, Johnson, and Poet Stutter; containing Reflections on some late Plays, and particularly on Love for Money, or The Boarding School. The British Museum copy of this pamphlet has a manuscript date of 23 April 1691. Downes, Roscius Anglicanus, p. 42: The Boarding School; Wrote by Mr Durfy, it took well being justly Acted. Earl of Ailesbury, mid-January 1690@1: My Lady Fenwick was a great intriguer, and had always castles in the air in her imagination to that degree, that I was present at a play where she was brought in. If I mistake not it was The Boarding School, and the famous comic, Mr Lee, in woman's clothes represented her to the life, and so exactly had her features and complexion that one could hardly have distinguished one from the other (Memoirs, [London, 1890], II, 390-91)