Event Comment: Mainpiece: Not acted these 3 years. With
new Dresses and Decorations. The Characters dressed in the Habits of the Times. [
Palmer Jun. was from the
hay.] "It is necessary to remind both
Macbeth and his Lady that there is a measured declamation, of which the natural utterance of passion knows nothing, and that words and syllables may be divided and subdivided till the fatigue of the ear overcome every other feeling...Between the first and second acts Ca ira was loudly called for from the pit and gallery. The clamour, after preventing the first part of the second act from being heard, subsided as unaccountably as it rose. The performers, in compliance with an admonition from the pit, began the act again, and proceeded without further interruption" (
Morning Chronicle, 20 Feb.). "In
Macbeth there was too much that was not
Shakespeare, too much bad taste and shabbiness in the costumes of the
witches, and all in all too much claptrap. He found it insufferable that
Banquo should take the part of his own ghost and felt that the audience should behold the specter only in Macbeth's terror, as was the case with the banquet guests. '
Mr Kemble has desired on several occasions to suppress the ghost,' Meister says, 'but has never had the courage to do so.'" (
J. H. Meister quoted in
J. A. Kelly, 134). For Kemble's eventual courage in this matter see
dl, 21 Apr. 1794.] Receipts: #425 6s. (383.2; 40.4; 2.0)