Drury Lane

“ And Drury Lane incidents were of a world so incongruously remote from the house in Eaton Square and her grace's clever aquiline ivory face—and his lordship with his quiet bearing and his unromantic and elderly, tired fineness. And yet he was going to undertake to do a thing which was of the order of deed the sober everyday mind could only expect from the race of persons known as "heroes" in theatres and in books. ”

“ A Polish countess proved to be a Drury Lane ballet-girl; a magnificent lady turned out to be a lady’s maid; and real ladies stooped to copy the fashions set by the counterfeits. But space fails to permit us to do more than refer to the dainty Petersham, the curled Geramb, the Four-in-hand and the Tandem clubs, the dandies who ruled when the men were at the wars, and the men who came back with the Don Cossacks and the allied sovereigns, and showed themselves in Hyde Park, as a proof that heroes were again upon the throne of fashion. ”

“ To drop, or appear to drop, machinery and yet keep, or at least gain, intensity, the interesting intensity separated by a gulf from a mere unbought coincidence of aspect or organ, is really to do something. In spite of which, at the same time, what I perhaps most retain, by the light of the present, of the sense of that big and rather dusky night of Drury Lane is not so much the felt degree of anyone's talent as the fact that personality and artistry, with their intensity, could work their spell in such a material desert, in conditions intrinsically so charmless, so bleak and bare. ”

“ The Drury Lane company, a hundred years ago, included Garrick, Powell, Holland, King, Palmer, Parsons, Bensley, Dodd, Yates, Moody, Baddeley, all men of great but various merit. Among the ladies were Mrs. Cibber, Mrs. Yates, Mrs. Clive, Mrs. Abington, Mrs. Pritchard, Miss Pope, Mrs. Baddeley, and some others—a galaxy the like of which, in any one company, could nowhere be found in these later days. In that season of a hundred years ago, a new actress, Mrs. ”

“ From this house he migrated to Drury Lane, where he was first seen, 6 Oct. 1813, as Vortex in ‘A Cure for the Heartache.’ He remained at Drury Lane until his retirement in 1833, filling up his summer vacations at the Haymarket, Lyceum, and other houses. At Drury Lane, where he was in the receipt of seven pounds a week, he was frequently the substitute for Munden, Dowton, Terry, and Charles Mathews, to none of whom, however, was he equal in talent. ”

“ Here was Craven House, here was Clare House; here lived the Earl of Stirling, the Marquis of Argyll, and the Earl of Anglesey. Here lived for a time Nell Gwynne. Pepys says:
"Saw pretty Nelly standing at her lodgings door in Drury Lane in her smock-sleeves and bodice, looking upon one. She seemed a mighty pretty creature."
The Lane fell into disrepute early in the eighteenth century. The "saints of Drury Lane," the "drabs of Drury Lane," the starving poets of Drury Lane, are freely ridiculed by the poets of that time. ”

“ O why should our dull retrospective addresses
Fall damp as wet blankets on Drury Lane fire?
Away with blue devils, away with distresses,
And give the gay spirit to sparkling desire!
II.
Let artists decide on the beauties of Drury,
The richest to me is when woman is there;
The question of houses I leave to the jury;
The fairest to me is the house of the fair.
p. 26III.
When woman’s soft smile all our senses bewilders,
And gilds, while it carves, her dear form on the heart,
What need has New Drury of carvers and gilders? ”

“ In the neighbourhood of Drury Lane it is different; there is no fresh air there, and the only flowers one sees are those bought at Covent Garden. Everywhere on a summer night (she “has no smile of light” in Drury Lane) , you are surrounded by men, women, and children, so that you can scarce pick your way. In Parker Street and Charles Street, and such-like places, the houses seem as if they never had been cleaned since they were built, yet each house is full of people—the number of families is according to the number of rooms. ”

“ Drury Lane will always be interesting to the theatrical loiterer, from the number of stars that have irradiated from its horizon. If the wise Solon had lived in our times, he would no doubt have felt a local attachment to this neighbourhood; for he frequented plays even in the decline of life. ”

“ The number of children engaged in a pantomime at Drury Lane generally exceeds two hundred. The girls are more numerous than the boys. It is a curious fact that in engaging these children the manager prefers the quiet and dull to the smart and lively. Your smart lad and girl are given to ‘larking’ and thinking of their own cleverness. The quiet and dull are more ‘teachable,’ and can be made to seem lively without flinging off discipline. ”

“ He died in 1697, aged nearly 89 years. He was intimate with Evelyn, Ray, and other naturalists, and delighted in gardening. The garden of Craven House ran in the direction of the present Drury Lane; so that where there is now a bustle of a very different sort, we may fancy the old soldier busying himself with his flower-beds, and Mr. Evelyn discoursing upon the blessings of peace and privacy. [250]
The only other personage of celebrity whom we know of as living in Drury Lane, is one of another sort; to wit, Nell Gwynn. The ubiquitous Pepys speaks of his seeing her there on a May-morning. ”

“ An important person at Drury Lane is the wardrobe-woman. She has entire control of thousands of dresses, and keeps a staff continually employed mending and altering, for after each performance something requires attention. ”

“ Stowe says, "Drury Lane, so called, for that there is a house belonging to the family of the Druries.1 This lane turneth north towards S. Giles in the field. From the south end of this lane in the high street, are divers faire buildings, hostelries, and houses for gentlemen, and men of honor, &c."
Nightingale tells us, "The west end of Wych Street was formerly ornamented by Drury House, built by Sir William Drury, an able commander in the Irish wars, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and who unfortunately fell in a duel with Sir John Burroughs, through a foolish quarrel about precedency. ”

“ About ten years later, Young left the Covent Garden company and 25l. a week, for Drury Lane and 50l. a night, to play in the same pieces with Kean. The salary proved that the manager thought him equal in attractiveness to Kean; and Kean was, undoubtedly, somewhat afraid of him. Young’s secession was as great a loss to the company he had been acting with, as Compton’s has been to the Haymarket company. In both cases, a perfect artist withdrew from the brotherhood. ”

“ Drury Lane, when Nelly was living there, was a kind of Park Lane of the present day, made up of noblemen's mansions, small houses, inns and stable-yards. Nor need the similitude be thus restricted; for the Piazza of Covent Garden was then to Drury Lane what Grosvenor Square is at present to Park Lane. Squalid quarters indeed have always been near neighbours to lordly localities. When Nelly lodged in Drury Lane, Covent Garden had its Lewknor Lane, and Lincoln's Inn Fields their Whetstone Park. ”

“ In the Christmas of 1855 he provided almost all the scenery for the holiday entertainments both at Drury Lane and at Covent Garden. In December 1862 his brush was employed to excellent advantage on the Princess's Theatre pantomime of ‘Riquet with the Tuft.’ At Drury Lane during the next few years he furnished the mounting for several important Shakespearean revivals, notably for ‘King John,’ ‘Henry IV, Part I,’ and ‘Macbeth,’ as well as for an elaborate production of ‘Comus.’ Between 1868 and 1879 his services appear to have been exclusively devoted to Drury Lane. ”

“ In 1796, after being arrested for a debt incurred by the proprietors, Kemble resigned the management of Drury Lane, but returned to it in the season of 1800–1. At the close of the season of 1801–2 his connection with Drury Lane ceased. His salary at Drury Lane as actor and manager had been 56l. 14s. per week. At the time of his withdrawal he was seeking to secure a fourth share of the Drury Lane property. The following year he began to negotiate through Mrs. Inchbald for the purchase of a share of Covent Garden, and while negotiations were in progress went abroad. ”

“ Let us pass from the professional critics to the judgment of private individuals of undoubted ability to form and give one (we have only to premise that Master Betty played alternately at Covent Garden and Drury Lane) . And first, Lord Henley. Writing to Lord Auckland, on December 7, 1804, he says, ‘I went to see the Young Roscius with an unprejudiced mind, or rather, perhaps, with the opinion you seem to have formed of him, and left the theatre in the highest admiration of his wonderful talents. ”

“ Kean (of whom report has spoken so highly) made his appearance at Drury-Lane in the character of Shylock. For voice, eye, action, and expression, no actor has come out for many years at all equal to him. The applause, from the first scene to the last, was general, loud, and uninterrupted. Indeed, the very first scene in which he comes on with Bassanio and Anthonio, shewed the master in his art, and at once decided the opinion of the audience. ”

“ In 1818, he began with burlesque—‘Amoroso, King of Little Britain,’ written for amateurs, and taken by Harley, unknown to the author, to Drury Lane. In 1872, after fifty-four years of work, Mr. Planché executed the better portion of ‘Babil and Bijou,’ which, compared with ‘Amoroso,’ is as the Great Eastern steamer to a walnut-shell. We heartily welcome all chroniclers of an art that lives only in the [Pg 143] artist, and never survives him in tradition. Our own collection begins with Downes, and Mr. Planché’s emerald-green volumes will find room there. ”

“ In the meantime Drury Lane is closed by order of the Lord Chamberlain, [A] on the ground that in seeking to take from the actors one-third of their benefit receipts the management have proceeded illegally. Soon the new forces of Swiney take possession of the Haymarket, and for a short time London has but one playhouse. Mayhap Mr. Rich is chagrined, or perhaps he is not ill-pleased, and in any case he extracts great comfort from a manifesto published in his behalf by the treasurer of Drury Lane, sweet-named Zachary Baggs. ”

“ On 13 March 1821 she played at Drury Lane the Duenna in Sheridan's comic opera, this being announced as her first appearance in a character of that description. With rare candour she owned herself too old for the part in which she was accustomed to appear. She appeared at Drury Lane the following season. For very many years she lived in retirement, and, all out forgotten, died at her lodgings in Chelsea 3 Aug. ”

“ Charles Young adorned the English stage from 1807 to 1832. Because he acted with the Kembles he is sometimes described as being of the Kemble school. In a great theatre the leading player is often imitated throughout the house. There was a time when everybody employed at Drury Lane seemed a double of Mr. Macready. Charles Young, however, was an original actor. It took him but five years to show that he was equal in some characters to John Kemble himself. This was seen in 1812, in his Cassius to Kemble’s Brutus. ”

“ Clive (and Macklin) among the principal players stayed with the ineffective proprietor of Drury Lane, John Highmore. Jealous that Highmore and not he gained control of Drury Lane after former shareholders either died or sold out, Theophilus Cibber demanded, among other things, that Highmore share profits with his players rather than pay fixed salaries. He then led the Drury Lane players in revolt in the autumn of 1733 to the New Haymarket where they played without a license until March of the 1733-1734 season, at which time they returned to Drury Lane under the new management of Fleetwood. ”

“ For twenty-nine years he played at this house, the Haymarket, or Drury Lane, acting at first young lovers in comedy, and afterwards characters in dramas, but seldom apparently in his long career being troubled with a part of primary importance. ”

“ INJUNCTION AGAINST THE BIRDS ON THE TREES—DRURY LANE SEASON OF 1859—DÉBUTS OF VICTOIRE BALFE, MONGINI, AND GUARDUCCI—MY CONTRALTO MARRIES A DUKE—THE DUKE AND DUCHESS AT NAPLES.
EFFORTS were now made to obtain the lease of Her Majesty's theatre, but it was so entangled with legal difficulties that it was resolved, on my advice to remain another year at Drury Lane. I therefore set to work to secure a very powerful company for the London season of 1859. ”

“ Falconer and Chatterton are meanwhile busy with a thousand details, but they wisely leave the management of the stage to their lieutenant-general, who has the honour of Old Drury at heart.
When a spectator takes his seat in front of the curtain, he is hardly aware that he is about to address himself to an entertainment, for the production of which nearly nine hundred persons—from the foremost man down to the charwoman—are constantly employed and liberally remunerated. ”

“ After four seasons at Drury, she went on a triumphant career to Dublin. There she acquired all she had hitherto lacked, and when, in the season of 1765-66, she reappeared at Drury Lane, as Cherry, [26] upon terms granted by Garrick, which were no longer considered extravagant, so conspicuous was her talent, the playgoing world was in a fever of delight. Her career, from 1755 to 1798, lasted forty-three years, and, though like Betterton, Time touched her person, it never weakened her talent. ”

“ Garrick came off so well in his contest with Quin, that he probably had no fears of trying the fall to which he was challenged, with Barry. For this struggle Spranger Barry passed over to Drury Lane, to wrestle with David on his own ground. Drury may be called peculiarly his, for, by purchasing a share in the patent, he now commenced that career of management which lasted during his theatrical life, and the brilliancy of which was spoken of in every part of the world where an interest was felt in the intellectual enjoyments of the people. ”