Like It. At Drury Lane, on April 30, 1785, the incomparable Mrs. Siddons chose Rosalind for her benefit performance and played the rôle four times that season. Boaden said of her: 'Rosalind was one of the most delicate achievements of Mrs. Siddons. The common objection to her comedy, that it was only the smile of tragedy, made the express charm of Rosalind.' The other important Rosalind was that of Mrs. Jordan, to the Orlando of Kemble, at Drury Lane, April, 1787. Campbell informs his readers that here alone in her professional career, Mrs. Siddons found a rival who beat her out of a character. Mrs. Jordan 'had the naïveté of it to a degree that Shakespeare himself, if he had been a living spectator, would have gone behind the scenes to have saluted her for her success in it.'
In America, As You Like It was first performed at New York, at the John Street Theatre, July 14, 1786. Mrs. Kenna played Rosalind and Hallam, Touchstone. It was again played at the same theatre on June 21, 1796, with Joe Jefferson (the grandfather of the Joseph Jefferson of Rip Van Winkle fame) as Le Beau. There was only one other important production of this comedy in America during the eighteenth century: that of January 29, 1798, when the Park Theatre, New York, was opened.
The great stage popularity of As You Like It really began in the nineteenth century and has continued to the present day. More than sixty important revivals were witnessed in the nineteenth century. We find, likewise, a gradual change from the stock company method of production, which assigned the leading roles to well-known actors, to the 'star' method which emphasizes one, or at most two, of the characters. The latter was illustrated in Kemble's performance of Jaques at Covent Garden, October, 1805, with Miss Smith as Rosalind. The comedy now alternates as a 'star' play, with sometimes a great
