In
1750, the patent theatres at Drury Lane and Covent Garden went head-to-head,
producing rival productions of Romeo and
Juliet in what came to be known as the Battle of the Romeos. According to
Chelsea Phillips' article in the latest issue of Theatre Survey, however, perhaps the incident should be known as
the Battle of the Juliets instead.
David Garrick had adapted Shakespeare's play for performances at Drury Lane with
Spranger Barry playing Romeo and Susannah Cibber as Juliet. Cibber left the
company in 1749, however, giving birth to her last child. When she returned to
the stage the next year, it was not to Drury Lane, but to the rival company at
Covent Garden, and joining her was none other than Barry.
What
made Cibber switch houses? We can't be sure, but Phillips points out that in
the spring of 1749 Cibber became ill, possibly as a result of her pregnancy or
possibly due to a persistent stomach problem that plagued her until her death
in 1766. The playwright Aaron Hill wanted Cibber to play the lead in his new
play Merope, and she was a natural
choice, since Cibber had launched her career as a tragic actress with Hill's
previous play Zara in 1736. Cibber
said she wanted the role, but didn't want to perform it until the following
season. Garrick, however, scoffed at the idea of a delay, and Hannah Pritchard
went on in the title role instead.
Cibber's
move to Covent Garden led Garrick to poach another tragic actress from that
theatre to join his own company at Drury Lane. George Ann Bellamy had been the
leading tragic actress at Covent Garden. In 1749, Bellamy gained notoriety when
she left in the middle of a performance to run off to Yorkshire with her lover,
George Montgomery Metham. The reason for the flight north might have been
Bellamy's own pregnancy, for after her child was born, she returned to Covent
Garden, where she played many of the same roles Cibber was known for, including
the heroines in Thomas Otway's tragedies Venice
Preserved and The Orphan.
With
Cibber now at Covent Garden, Bellamy was looking at the prospect of losing some
of her choicest roles. She had also recently expanded her repertoire, taking on
the role of Juliet at Covent Garden opposite Henry Lee. She had previously
played the role in Dublin, but this was the first time the Covent Garden
company had mounted Romeo and Juliet,
and Bellamy had shined in the play. Now she was facing losing that role to
Cibber, too. By July of 1750, both Cibber and Barry were contracted to appear
at Covent Garden and Garrick had managed to snag Bellamy for Drury Lane. The
two leading ladies had effectively swapped companies, and Cibber had taken her
Romeo with her.
Garrick
himself took on the role of Romeo opposite Bellamy's Juliet. Though he was
considered too short to play such a romantic leading role, he was determined to
go head-to-head against the new Romeo and
Juliet at Covent Garden, which Garrick saw as for all intents and purposes his play. It was his adaptation of
Shakespeare's text that they used, and he had personally coached both Cibber
and Barry in their roles. Garrick made further revisions to the play, including
adding an elaborate funeral procession for Juliet that became a staple well
into the nineteenth century. Perhaps the most important addition to Drury
Lane's new Romeo and Juliet, though,
was Bellamy, who like Juliet had herself precipitously forsaken everything for
her lover, as audiences well knew.
After
twelve nights of both patent theatres producing rival productions of the same
play, Cibber announced she was ill and would not be able to continue as Juliet.
Most audiences had already concluded that Drury Lane had the better production,
anyway. History has recorded the event as a victory for Garrick, but Phillips
hints that the credit might belong more to Bellamy.
