Event Comment: Tickets delivered for King Richard the Third [Account-Book: by Brandon, Arnold, Little, Brice, Blurton, Bonsor, Hay, Haseler, Lloyd, Berecloth, Savory, Noble, Linton, Castelle, Atkins] will be admitted. Receipts: #484 14s. 6d. (51.0.6; 3.14.0; tickets: 430.0.0)

Event Comment: [Afterpiece in place of Richard Coeur de Lion. advertised on playbill of 1 May.] Receipts: #186 18s. 6d. (147.19.6; 36.2.0; 2.17.0)

Event Comment: Mainpiece: Not acted these 12 years. [Address by Richard Cumberland (London Chronicle, 13 Oct.).] Receipts: #130 9s. (124.1; 6.8)

Event Comment: Benefit for Mrs Siddons. [Epilogue by Richard Brinsley Sheridan.] Times, 9 Apr.: Tickets to be had of Mrs Siddons, No. 49, Great Marlborough-street. Receipts: #508 8s. 6d. (296.10.0; 58.2.0; 3.12.0; tickets: 150.4.6) (charge: #212 3s. 6d.)

Event Comment: Mainpiece [1st time; CO 3, by James Cobb. Text: T. N. Longman and O. Rees, 1800. Miss Waters is identified in the Songs]: The Scenes, Music, Machinery, Dresses, and Decorations are all entirely new. The Music composed by Mazzinghi and Reeve. The Scenery painted by Richards, Phillips, Lupino, Hollogan, Backmore, &c. [based on drawings of Indian scenery by Thomas Daniell]. The Machinery and Decorations by Cresswell, Sloper, Goostree, &c. The Dresses by Dick and Mrs Egan. Books of the Songs, also describing the Scenes and Spectacle of the Return from the Tiger Hunt, to be had at the Theatre, price six pence. "The whole [forms] an exhibition of the utmost grandeur...The expense attending the decoration must have been immense...The dailogue is certainly not of the first description of writing, but it forms, on the whole, a very safe vehicle for some of the best music the English stage has for some time been able to boast"(Morning Herald, 13 Nov.). Account-Book, 27 Dec.: Paid Cuthbert for Wheels, &c. for the Elephants #13 18s. Receipts: #364 7s. 6d. (363.19.6; 0.8.0)

Event Comment: King Richard the Third, and also Moggy and Jemmy [both advertised on playbill of 17 Jan.], are obliged to be deferred. Receipts: #124 6s. 6d. (70.7.0; 52.6.0; 1.13.6)

Event Comment: By Permission of the Lord Chamberlain. Benefit for the large Infant Orphan Family of a Man of Fashion [Sir Richard Perrott]. The mother of these helpless, unprotected infants, in contemplating the benevolence of a humane Public, throws herself with implicit confidence on the commiserating patronage of those who are ever ready to afford it for the relief of suffering innocence. Tickets to be had of Lady Perrott, No. 28, Spring-street, Portman-square [and see 18 Sept. 1797]

Event Comment: Benefit for Wild, prompter. 2nd piece [1st time: M. INT 1]. 3rd piece: As it was originally performed upwards of 50 nights in the Year 1789. Being a Selection of favorite Scenes form the following celebrated Pantomimes: Harlequin Sorcerer, Mother Shipton, Choice of Harlequin, Druids, Friar Bacon, Harlequin Freemason, Omai, Magic Cavern, and Harlequin Rambler. The machinery of the Peacock by Sloper. With the original Scenery painted by Lambert, Dall, Carver, Hodgins and Richards. The Music selected from Dr Arne, Dr Arnold, Dr Fisher, M.? Arne, Vincent, Dibdin and Shield. Morning Chronicle, 4 May: Tickets to be had of Wild, No. 46, Drury-lane. Receipts: #399 19s. 6d. (205.18.0; 16.4.6; tickets: 177.17.0)

Event Comment: [Mainpiece in place of King Richard the Third, advertised on playbill of 28 Sept.] Receipts: #274 17s. (177.3; 97.6; 0.8)

Event Comment: Afterpiece [1st time; CO 2, by Thomas Knight]: With new Music, new Scenes and Dresses. The Music composed by Mazzinghi and Reeve. The Scenes painted by Richards and Phillips. Books of the Songs to be had in the Theatre. Account-Book, 5 Feb. 1800: Paid Knight for Turnpike Gate #125; Reeve and Mazzinghi for music in same #50. Morning Chronicle, 29 Nov. 1799: This day is published The Turnpike Gate (1s. 6d.). Receipts: #288 17s. (281.2.6; 7.14.6)

Event Comment: On 23 Nov. 1659 John Page, the Treasurer of the Middle Temple, entered in his records: Music, four nights at 30s., and acting The Clown four nights at 10s. (See A Calendar of the Middle Temple Records, ed. Hopwood, p. 167. See also Bentley, Jacobean and Caroline Stage, V, 1314.

Event Comment: On this date John Rogers petitioned the King concerning his right to keep the peace at the playhouses. In Herbert, Dramatic Records, p. 84, three companies, those at the red bull, cockpit, and salisbury court, are named as currently performing

Event Comment: A draft of a proposed order, i Hotson, Commonwealth and Restoration Stage, p. 201, specifies the companies acting at this time: Forasmuch as wee are advertis'd, that divers persons, and Companies have assembled, and doe dayly assemble themselves together at the Play-Houses called the red bull, in St. Johns Street, the cockpit in Drury Lane, and a certaine Play-House in Salisbury Court, and at other places within our Citty of London and County of Middlesex, without the least Colour of Authority, and doe there act, performe and shew in publique, Comedies, Tragedies, and other Entertainments of the Stage

Event Comment: See Herbert, Dramatic Records, p. 116. The King's Company. According to John Dennis, in the Dedication to The Comical Gallant (1702), when this play was revived in the times of Charles II, Wintershall acted Slender

Event Comment: Edward Gower to Sir R. Leveson, 20 Nov. 1660: Yesternight the King, Queen, Princess, &c. supped at the Duke of Albemarle's, where they had the Silent Woman acted in the cockpit (HMC, 5th Report, 1876, p. 200). The King's Company. Pepys, Diary, 20 Nov. 1660: This morning I found my Lord in bed late, he having been with the King, Queen, and Princess, at the cockpit all night, where General Monk treated them; and after supper a play, where the King did put a great affront upon John? Singleton's musique, he bidding them stop and bade the French musique play, which, my Lord says, do much outdo all ours. The prologue was printed in 1660: The Prologue to His Majesty at the first Play presented at the cock-pit in Whitehall, Being part of that Noble Entertainment which Their Majesties received Novemb. 19. from his Grace the Duke of Albemarle. [The Prologue has been reprinted by Wiley, Rare Prologues and Epilogues, pp. 11-12. Bodleian Wood 398 has a MS note: By Sir Jo. Denham.

Event Comment: According to the diary of the Reverend John Ward, ed. Charles Severn (London, 1839), Ward saw The Alchymist at this time. The Folger MS V.a. 292, of Ward's journal, gives it as performed between 1 and 25 Sept. 1662. See Shakespeare Quarterly, XI (1961), 336. See also Dec. 1660

Event Comment: Sixtus Petri Arnoldinus saw bear-baiting and bull-baiting at "the playhouse standing in St John's Street." See 16 Aug.; Zwager, p. 288

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: To the Opera, where there was a new play (Cutter of Coleman Street), made in the year 1658, with reflections much upon the late times; and it being the first time, the pay was doubled, and so to save money, my wife and I went up into the gallery, and there sat and saw very well; and a very good play it is. It seems of Cowly's making. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, p. 25): This Comedy being Acted so perfectly Well and Exact, it was perform'd a whole Week with a full Audience. John Dennis, Dedication to The Comical Gallant, 1702: The only Play that ever Mr Cowley writ, was barbarously treated the first night, as the late Mr Dryden has more than once informed me, who has told me that he went to see it with the famous Mr Sprat, now Bishop of Rochester, and that after the Play was done, they both made a visit to Mr Cowley. Langbaine (English Dramatick Poets, p. 81): This Play met with some Opposition, at its Representation under this new Name, from some who envyed the Authors unshaken Loyalty to the Prince, and the Royal Cause, in the worst of Times. BM Add. Mss. 34217, fol. 31b, in Hotson (Commonwealth and Restoration Stage, p. 247): @The Cutter of Coleman street had more fame@Before the Author chang'd its name@And shewd himselfe an Englishman right@By mending of things to spoyle them quite@And bee's more to blame because he can tell@(No better) to make new strings soe well.

Event Comment: The King's Company. See Herbert, Dramatic Records, p. 118. John Wright (Historia Histrionica [1699], p. 3): [Hart] Acted the Dutchess in the Tragedy of The Cardinal, which was the first Part that gave him Reputation

Event Comment: Some time (probably not long) before this date Aglaura [by Sir John Suckling] was acted by the King's Company. Pepys, Diary: Thence to Mr Wotton, the shoemaker's, and there bought a pair of boots, cost me 30s., and he told me how Bird hath lately broke his leg, while he was fencing in Aglaura, upon the stage, and that the new theatre of all will be ready against term

Event Comment: See HMC, Report III, Appendix, p. 215a; Hotson, pp. 214-15; B. M. Wagner, "John Rhodes and Ignoramus," Review of English Studies, V (1929), 43-48. See also Nicoll, Restoration Drama, pp. 302n, 423. This appears to be the Duke's Company

Event Comment: Pepys, Diary: Thence to Islington, and so to St John's to the Red Bull, and there saw the latter part of a rude prize fought