On this day in
1814, Edmund Kean appeared as Shylock on the stage of the Theatre Royal, Drury
Lane.
It would launch
Kean's career, but it was not the first time he had appeared on a London stage.
Writing 72 years later in the October issue of The Theatre, Percy Fitzgerald recalled Kean's "most extraordinary
career." According to Fitzgerald, Kean "had been literally
reared on the stage" and had "performed the young Arthur to Mrs. Siddon's
Constance" in William Shakespeare's King
John.
Childhood
appearances with Sarah Siddons were not the actor's only experience in London
prior to his Drury Lane triumph. Fitzgerald recounts an appearance at the
Theatre Royal, Haymarket on 30 July 1806, when Kean appeared as
"Clown" in the farce Fortune's Frolic. Playing the
role of Dolly in that production was "Mrs. Gibbs" whom I take to be Maria Gibbs, née Logan, who made her London debut at the Haymarket in 1783.
After his
appearance as "Clown" Kean returned to touring the provinces, and it
was in Dorchester that he was rediscovered. Robert William Elliston invited him
back to London to act in one of the "minor theatres." Fitzgerald
writes that a certain "Dr. Drury" recommended Drury Lane hire
Kean instead, and one "Mr. Arnold" came out to see the actor for
himself. On 14 November 1813, Kean acted in The Mountaineers with "few people in the pit and gallery and
three persons in the boxes." In spite of the small house, Kean
determined to play his best, and his efforts were rewarded. He was given the
opportunity to appear at Drury Lane, a pleasure mixed with sorrow, as his son
Howard was very ill at the time.
Soon after Kean
received news he would have a London engagement, Howard died. "His grief
was such that he did not care for the brilliant opening," Fitzgerald
writes. Kean had to stay longer in Dorchester than he anticipated in
order to attend to the business of his son's death. When he arrived in London,
he appeared "defiant, suspicious, jealously independent, very poor, almost
to squalor" and the committee at Drury Lane saw him as a "listless,
shabby postulant." They apparently rebuked Arnold and tried to use
Kean's bargain with Elliston as an excuse to void their own agreement with him.
Kean engaged in "desperate exertion" to free himself from his
engagement to perform at a minor theatre, and according to Fitzgerald, "it
was said Elliston was rather glad to be free."
After a "single rehearsal, it was pronounced that it would be a certain failure,"
Fitzgerald writes. The day of his performance was "wet and
miserable" and Kean that night "arrived soaked through" at his
shared dressing room. His fellow performers noticed something curious
about the way Kean dressed himself for Shylock: "he was putting on a black
wig instead of the traditional red one." In the eighteenth century,
Shylock had generally been played as a clown. (After all, Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice is in fact a
comedy.) The actor Charles Macklin had pushed back against that tradition, but
the red wig had remained. What was wrong with this guy? Didn't he even know
which costume he was supposed to wear? The stage manager at the performance gave
Kean up as "hopeless," Fitzgerald says.
The cast of The Merchant of Venice that night
boasted some of the actors who had premiered S.T. Coleridge's drama Remorse the previous year. Alexander
Rae, who had played Ordonio in Coleridge's tragedy, appeared as Bassanio, and
Sarah Smith, who originated the role of Teresa in Remorse, came on in the choice role of Portia. Smith was once
considered the most promising actress in Britain, but by 1814 she had turned
out to be a disappointment. Thus, Kean had few fellow actors in the cast who
could compete with his performance. After the first act, people began to realize
that Kean's Shylock was "a great success." He went home
afterward and reportedly said of his son Charles Kean, "Charley, my boy,
you shall go to Eton!"
