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The Town Before You
''The Town Before You'' is a 1794 comedy play by the British writer Hannah Cowley.Nicoll p.249 The original cast included William Thomas Lewis as Tippy, John Quick as Sir Robert Floyer, Joseph George Holman as Conway, Alexander Pope as Asgill, Joseph Shepherd Munden as Humphrey, John Fawcett as Fancourt, John Bernard as Acid and Isabella Mattocks as Mrs Fancourt and Jane Pope Jane Pope (1744 – 30 July 1818) was an English actress. Life Pope was the daughter William and Susanna Pope. Her father was a London theatrical wig-maker for the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. (There has been confusion over her date of birth with ... as Lady Horatia Horton. Summary Sir Robert Floyer, Mr. Quick; sir Simon Asgill, Mr. Powell; Asgill, Mr. Pope; Conway, Mr. Holman; Fancourt, Mr. Munden; Tippy, Mr. Lewish; Acid, Mr. Bernard; Humphrey, Mr. Fawcett. Lady Horatia, Mrs. Pope; lady Charlotte, Miss Chapman; lady Elisabeth, Miss Hopkins; Georgina, Miss Wallis; Mrs. Fancourt, Mrs. Mattocks; Mrs. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hannah Cowley (writer)
Hannah Cowley (14 March 1743 – 11 March 1809) was an English playwright and poet. Although Cowley's plays and poetry did not enjoy wide popularity after the 19th century, critic Melinda Finberg rates her as "one of the foremost playwrights of the late eighteenth century" whose "skill in writing fluid, sparkling dialogue and creating sprightly, memorable comic characters compares favourably with her better-known contemporaries, Goldsmith and Sheridan." Cowley's plays were produced frequently in her lifetime. The major themes of her plays – including her first, ''The Runaway'' (1776), and her major success, which is being revived, ''The Belle's Stratagem'' (1780) – revolve around marriage and how women strive to overcome the injustices imposed by family life and social custom. Early success Born Hannah Parkhouse, she was the daughter of Hannah (née Richards) and Philip Parkhouse, a bookseller in Tiverton, Devon. Sources disagree about some details of her married life, cit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Covent Garden Theatre
The Royal Opera House (ROH) is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply Covent Garden, after a previous use of the site. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The Royal Ballet, and the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House. The first theatre on the site, the Theatre Royal (1732), served primarily as a playhouse for the first hundred years of its history. In 1734, the first ballet was presented. A year later, the first season of operas, by George Frideric Handel, began. Many of his operas and oratorios were specifically written for Covent Garden and had their premieres there. The current building is the third theatre on the site, following disastrous fires in 1808 and 1856 to previous buildings. The façade, foyer, and auditorium date from 1858, but almost every other element of the present complex dates from an extensive reconstruction in the 1990s. The main auditorium seats 2,256 people, maki ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major settlement for two millennia. The City of London, its ancient core and financial centre, was founded by the Romans as '' Londinium'' and retains its medieval boundaries.See also: Independent city § National capitals The City of Westminster, to the west of the City of London, has for centuries hosted the national government and parliament. Since the 19th century, the name "London" has also referred to the metropolis around this core, historically split between the counties of Middlesex, Essex, Surrey, Kent, and Hertfordshire, which largely comprises Greater London, governed by the Greater London Authority.The Greater London Authority consists of the Mayor of London and the London Assembly. The London Mayor is distinguished fr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Comedy Play
Comedy is a genre of dramatic performance having a light or humorous tone that depicts amusing incidents and in which the characters ultimately triumph over adversity. For ancient Greeks and Romans, a comedy was a stage-play with a happy ending. In the Middle Ages, the term expanded to include narrative poems with happy endings and a lighter tone. In this sense Dante used the term in the title of his poem, the ''Divine Comedy'' (Italian: ''Divina Commedia''). The phenomena connected with laughter and that which provokes it have been carefully investigated by psychologists. The predominating characteristics are incongruity or contrast in the object, and shock or emotional seizure on the part of the subject. It has also been held that the feeling of superiority is an essential factor: thus Thomas Hobbes speaks of laughter as a "sudden glory." Modern investigators have paid much attention to the origin both of laughter and of smiling, as well as the development of the "play insti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Thomas Lewis
William Thomas Lewis (1748?–1811), known as "Gentleman" Lewis, due to his refined acting style, was an English actor. He was said to be "the most complete fop on the stage". In later life he went into theatrical management. Early days in Ireland The son of William Lewis, a linendraper on Tower Hill, London, later an actor and manager in Ireland, he was born at Ormskirk, Lancashire, in or about 1748 (there is disagreement about his birth date); he had a Welsh clerical background, and was rumoured to be a great-grandson of Erasmus Lewis. He was brought up in Armagh. A juvenile actor from very young, Lewis first appeared as "Mr. Lewis" in the playbill when he acted Colonel Briton in Susannah Centlivre's comedy ''The Wonder''. Under Willian Dawson, Lewis appeared (1770–71) at the Capel Street Theatre in Dublin. He rapidly became popular in the city. On 19 February 1771 he was Belcour in ''The West Indian'' by Richard Cumberland, a part he made his own. On 4 May 1772, at the C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Quick (actor)
John Quick (1748 – 4 April 1831) was a British comic actor. Life The son of a brewer, he was born in Whitechapel, London. At age 13 he left his home and joined Oliver Carr's theatrical company at Fulham, where he played Altamont in the ''Fair Penitent'', receiving three shillings as a share in the profits. For some years, in Kent and Surrey, he played Romeo, George Barnewell, Hamlet, Jaffier, Tancred, and other tragic characters, and in 1766 was at the Haymarket Theatre under the management of Samuel Foote, with Edward Shuter, John Bannister, and John Palmer. His performance, for Shuter's benefit, of Mordecai in ''Love à la Mode'' commended him to Covent Garden, where, on 7 November 1767, he was the original Postboy in Colman's ''Oxonian in Town''; on 14 December the First Ferret in the ''Royal Merchant'', an operatic version of the ''Beggar's Bush''; and on 29 January 1768 the original Postboy in Oliver Goldsmith's ''Good-natured Man''. At Covent Garden, with occasional vi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph George Holman
Joseph George Holman (1764–1817) was an English actor, dramatist and actor-manager. Early life Born in August 1764, he was son of John Major Holman of St. Giles's, Middlesex, an ensign and adjutant in the British service, who died when his son was two years of age. He was placed by an uncle at Barwis's school in Soho Square, where amateur acting was in vogue. With a view to the church as a career, he matriculated 7 February 1783 at The Queen's College, Oxford, but took no degree. At Covent Garden On 25 October 1784, at Covent Garden, as Romeo, Holman made his first appearance on the stage. An address was spoken by Thomas Hull (actor), Thomas Hull, who played Friar Lawrence. Holman's performances were attended by fashionable audiences, and he remained at Covent Garden until 1800. His original characters include Harry Thunder in John O'Keeffe (Irish writer), John O'Keeffe's ''Wild Oats'', 16 April 1791, Harry Dornton in Thomas Holcroft's ''The Road to Ruin (play), The Road to Ru ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander Pope (actor)
Alexander Pope (176322 March 1835) was an Irish actor and painter. Life He was born in Cork, Ireland. He was educated to follow his father's profession of miniature painting. He continued to paint miniatures and exhibit them at the Royal Academy as late as 1821; but at an early date he took the stage, first appearing in London as Oroonoko in 1785 at Covent Garden. He remained at this theatre almost continuously for nearly twenty years, then at the Haymarket until his retirement, playing leading parts, chiefly tragic. He was well known as Othello and Henry VIII. He played for the first time in Edinburgh on 15 June 1786, as Othello. Family He was married three times. His first wife, Elizabeth (1744–1797), a favourite English actress of great versatility, was billed before her marriage as Miss Younge. His second wife, Maria Ann Campion Maria Ann Campion (1777 - 18 June 1803) was a popular Irish actress and the second wife of Alexander Pope the actor. She was born in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph Shepherd Munden
Joseph Shepherd Munden (1758 – 6 February 1832) was an English actor. He had a long provincial experience as actor and manager. His first London appearance was in 1790 at Covent Garden, where he mostly remained until 1811, becoming a leading comedian. In 1813 he was at Drury Lane. He retired in 1824. Early life Munden was the son of a poulterer in Brook's Market, Leather Lane, Holborn. He ran away from home to join a strolling company. He was by the age of twelve in an apothecary's shop; subsequently he was apprenticed to Mr. Druce, a law stationer in Chancery Lane. In Liverpool he was engaged for a while in the office of the town clerk, also appearing on the stage as an extra. After some experience of repertory companies, Munden was engaged to play old men at Leatherhead. He began to make his mark at Canterbury under the manager Hurst, where in 1780 he was the original Faddle in Mrs. Burgess's comedy, ''The Oaks, or the Beauties of Canterbury''. In the company of Jose ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Fawcett (actor)
John Fawcett (29 August 1768 – 13 March 1837) was an English actor and playwright. John Fawcett was the son of York, Dublin and London actor John Fawcett (d. 1793) and his wife Sarah Plaw. His interest in following his father's career were thwarted by the latter, who sent him to St Paul's School in 1776, then placed him in a London apprenticeship with a linen draper, but young John ran away at the age of eighteen and joined Charles Mates' theatrical company at Margate. Appearing under the name of Foote, he debuted as Courtall in ''The Belle's Stratagem''. He then went to Tunbridge Wells, billed under his own name, and was recommended to Tate Wilkinson, whose York company Fawcett then joined, first appearing 24 May 1787. Though viewed as having promise, he proved a minor disappointment in dramatic roles but found success in comedic parts. On 5 May 1788, he married actress Susan Moore, who had previously been in a long-term relationship with recently-deceased fellow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Bernard (actor)
John Bernard (1756 in Portsmouth, England – 29 November 1828 in London)Franklin Graham (1902) ''Histrionic Montreal: Annals of the Montreal stage, with biographical and critical notices of the plays and players of a century'', John Lovell & Son, Montreal was an English actor and biographer. He was the author of ''Retrospections of the Stage'' (1830) and ''Retrospections of America, 1797-1811''.John Bernard (1830) ''Retrospections of the Stage'' Vol. 1, H. Colburn and R. Bentley, London He acted in a number of plays with Mary Ann Duff.Joseph Norton Ireland (1882) ''Mrs. Duff'', James R. Osgood and Co., Boston His son, William Bayle Bernard William Bayle Bernard (27 November 1807 – 5 August 1875), often referred to as "Bayle Bernard", was a well-known American-born London playwright and drama critic. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of English comic actor John Bernard, he c ..., was a playwright and critic, and edited editions of his ''Retrospections''. Referenc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Isabella Mattocks
Isabella Mattocks (1746 – June 25, 1826) was a British actress and singer. Early life Hallam (later Mattocks) was baptised in Whitechapel in 1746 by Lewis and Sarah Hallam Douglass. Her father and her uncle William were also actors.Jared Brown, ‘Hallam, Lewis (1714?–1756?)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200accessed 7 Feb 2015/ref> Her grandfather Thomas Hallam had been part of the Drury Lane company when he was killed in a dispute with fellow actor Charles Macklin during a performance. When her father and William decided to try acting in America they took three of Isabella's siblings, but she was left in the care of her aunt, Ann, and her husband John Barrington in England. In 1762 she made her debut in the adult role of Juliet. For most of her childhood except for a few years at school she played small parts in the productions of the Covent Garden company of actors. When she was sixteen she joined the company and in 1765 she marrie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
