Richard III (1927) Yale/Appendix B

by William Shakespeare

Layout 2

APPENDIX B

The History of the Play

The date of composition of the play, from internal critical evidence, is about the year 1593. The first Quarto appeared in 1597, and editions were frequent thereafter.

The popularity of Richard III on the Elizabethan stage appears to have been great, judging from the number of contemporary references and the frequent parodies of the line "A horse! a horse! My kingdom for a horse!" ^[1] Richard Burbage (c. 1567–1619) probably was the creator of the rôle; in any event there are important contemporary references to his interpretation of Richard. In the Return from Parnassus (1601), Pt. 2, IV. iii. Burbage is portrayed as examining a Cambridge student in the art of acting, making him declaim the opening soliloquy of Richard III. Manningham's Diary for March 13, 1602, refers to an anecdote "vpon a tyme when Burbidge played Richard III." Bishop Corbet's Iter Boreale (written before 1635) particularly notes the fame of Burbage's Richard:

"For when he would have sayd 'King Richard dyed,'
And call'd—'A horse! a horse!—he Burbidge cry'de.”

In 1619 a Funeral Elegy on Burbage came out, a poem extant in more than one version, containing a reference to his Richard.

"And Crookback, as befits, shall cease to live."

Other contemporary references may be found in J. Munro, The Shakespeare Allusion Book, 1909. On the other hand, we possess today no account of an Elizabethan performance of this tragedy, and but one dated reference to a performance before the closing of the theatres in 1642. In Sir Henry Herbert's Office Book for the year 1633 there is a note to the effect that Richard III was played at St. James' on November 17, before Charles I and Henrietta Maria. In a prologue prefixed to the 1641 edition of Chapman's Bussy D'Ambois, one of the actors is recommended because "as Richard he was liked."

When the theatres were reopened after the Restoration, although many of Shakespeare's plays (freely revised or adapted, it is true) were played, there is no record of Richard III. The character of Richard, however, continued to appear in plays by other dramatists, notably in John Crowne's Henry the Sixth, The Second Part, or The Misery of Civil War (1681), and John Caryl's The English Princess, or The Death of Richard the Third (1667). Thomas Betterton (c. 1685–1710), the famous actor of this period, played the Richard of The English Princess. Samuel Pepys saw this play on March 7, 1667: "a most sad, melancholy play, and pretty good; but nothing eminent in it, as some tragedys are." In Crowne's drama Betterton played the Earl of Warwick.

On July 9, 1700, Colley Cibber's famous revision of Richard III was produced at Drury Lane, a version of the tragedy destined to hold the stage until today.^[2] Cibber (1671–1757) himself played Richard in his own version at various revivals up until 1783, and once thereafter (1739). There is not space here to include an analysis of Cibber's version; the text of it may be found in Oxberry's collected British Drama. In Furness' Variorum edition of Richard III, page 604, will be found a table of the number of lines retained by Cibber, his borrowings from other Shakespearean plays, and his own additions, all of which totalled some thousand odd lines.^[3]

The following revivals of Richard III, previous to Garrick's London début are recorded by Genest: Dec. 6, 1715, Drury Lane; March 11, 1721, Lincoln's Inn Fields, with Ryan as Richard. The latter continued to play the part until 1740, challenging rivalry with Cibber of the Drury Lane company in the rôle. In 1732 Ryan and the Lincoln's Inn company moved to Covent Garden. Drury Lane revived the play in 1734 and 1739 with Quin as Richard.

On October 19, 1741, at Goodman's Fields, David Garrick (1717–1779) appeared for the first time on the London stage, choosing for his début the character of Richard the Third. Possibly no first night in the history of the English stage has created a greater sensation than this of Garrick's. It was a triumph, establishing him at once as the foremost actor of the day, a position he retained throughout his life. The secret of Garrick's success, apart from the genius with which he was endowed, was the naturalness of his acting. The playing of tragic rôles had become conventionalized into declamation, rant, artificial gestures and poses. For these defects Garrick substituted an "easy and familiar, yet forcible style in speaking and acting."^[4] Garrick played Richard seventeen times that season, and fourteen times the next season at Drury Lane. He continued to play the part at intervals throughout his whole career, his last appearance as Richard being on June 5, 1776, the occasion of his retirement from the stage. During this year Mrs. Siddons, the great tragic actress, played Lady Anne twice to Garrick's Richard.

Throughout the whole of this time the tragedy (in Cibber's version) remained a public and professional favorite. Many other well-known actors, besides Garrick, appeared as Richard, among them Quin (famous also as a Falstaff), Ryan, Spranger Barry, Mossop, and Thomas Sheridan. In 1746 Garrick challenged Quin to an alternating duel in the character, Quin appearing one night as a representative of the old flamboyant school of tragedy, and Garrick the next to uphold the naturalistic school. The public verdict:was overwhelmingly for Garrick. Charles Macklin (1699–1797), an actor of considerable fame and actual merit before the vogue of Garrick, played Richard four times at the age of eighty-five.

In 1789 John Philip Kemble (1757–1823) first appeared in the character of Richard. Kemble was not a believer in naturalistic acting and returned to the school of "high-erected deportment, expressive action, solemn cadence, (and) stately pauses." Kemble's dignity, however, was free from the faults of the ranting pre-Garrick period. "The declamation of Mr. Kemble seemed to be fetched from the schools of philosophy—it was always pure and correct."^[5] Kemble played Richard at Drury Lane at intervals until 1802, and at Covent Garden until he left the stage in 1817. Mrs. Siddons usually played Queen Elizabeth to her brother's Richard, and another brother, Charles, played Richmond at the revival of 1811. The next year Charles played Richard.

George Frederick Cooke (1756–1812) after playing Richard several times in the provinces, appeared, October 31, 1800, at Covent Garden in the character. When Kemble played in the company with Cooke, the rôle of Richmond was assigned to Kemble. Cooke was the first actor of prominence to play Richard in America. He chose for his début on the American stage the tragedy of Richard III, opening in New York on Nov. 21, 1810. He was greatly admired in America, although Lamb has described his Richard as a "butcher-like representation."

In 1805 the "infant Roscius," William Betty, then fourteen years of age and described by his contemporaries as "the tenth wonder of the world," played Richard. Lord Byron had an unfavorable opinion of Master Betty, which he expressed in English Bards and Scotch Reviewers.

To Kemble we owe the inauguration of elaborate scenery and the first attempts at accuracy in historical costume in Richard III, but the version of Cibber continued to be the text, although Kemble shortened somewhat the Cibber play.

Edmund Kean (1787-1833) attained the greatest fame of any actor of the nineteenth century in Richard. He played it for the first time in London at Drury Lane in 1814, his conception of the character modelled upon the interpretation of George Frederick Cooke, but in reality Kean was so unlike Cooke physically, being small and energetic, that there was little resemblance between the two interpretations. Lord Byron was one of Kean's enthusiastic admirers, as was the poet Keats. It was of Kean's Richard that Coleridge said it was like "reading Shakespeare by flashes of lightning." Kean was a continuer of the Garrick, instead of the Kemble, tradition, to which he added his own peculiar fire and vivacity. As J. P. Kemble pointed out, if one liked the style of Kean, one would not like the style of Kemble. There is, however, no question of the greater popularity of the style of Kean.^[6] The contemporary newspapers are extravagant in their praises: "one of the finest pieces of acting we have ever beheld, or perhaps that the stage has aver known"; and "as the curtain fell the audience rose as one man, cheered lustily, applauded wildly, declaring by word and action this new actor was great indeed." Kean twice played Richard in America in 1820 and 1825. Much of the "traditional" stage-business followed today was originated by Kean.

Kean had but one rival in the part for several years, Junius Brutus Booth (1796–1852) at Covent Garden. He first appeared as Richard Feb. 12, 1817, and although he had his followers, his fame has been eclipsed by the popular glory of his great rival.

The next important Richard was William Charles Macready (1793–1873) who produced the tragedy in London at Covent Garden in 1819, to great applause, thus challenging the supremacy of Kean. Drury Lane responded to the challenge and the two Richards appeared nightly at the rival houses. Genest says of Macready, referring to the revival May 23, 1823: "He was very inferior to Kean, till the ghosts appeared . . . he was then superior." Leigh Hunt said: "Mr. Kean's Richard is the more sombre and perhaps deeper part of him; Mr. Macready's the livelier and more animal part—a very considerable one nevertheless."

On March 12, 1821, Macready attempted the practical restoration of Shakespeare's text, leaving in, however, some of Cibber's lines that had become identified in the popular mind with Richard III.^[7] But this partial restoration did not find favor and was abandoned after the second performance of it. In his later revivals in 1831, 1836–7, Macready returned to the Cibber text.

On February 20, 1845, Samuel Phelps (1804–1878) produced Richard III at Sadler's Wells, where it ran for about four weeks. Great attention was paid by Phelps to scenery and historical detail. The text used was Shakespeare's with, however, certain cuts. Once more, nevertheless, upon the revival of the tragedy in the season of 1862–3, Phelps returned to the Cibber version.

Perhaps the most elaborate production of Richard III yet given was that by Charles Kean (1811–1868) at the Princess Theatre on February 20, 1850. The playbill lists one hundred and twenty-one performers and a formidable array of "authorities" on historical details. All this parade of scholarship did not prevent Charles Kean from using the Cibber version, for which decision he argues at length upon the playbill. Barry Sullivan (1821–1891), in a modified Cibber version, was perhaps the most conspicuous of the lesser actors of the period from Charles Kean to Sir Henry Irving.

Henry Irving (1838–1905) restored Shakespeare's text at the Lyceum on January 29, 1877, with later revivals December 19, 1896, and Feoruary 27, 1897. Irving made only the cuts necessary to render the tragedy one of a length suitable for the modern stage, ending with Richard's fall and his second utterance of "a horse a horse, my kingdom for a horse!" Tennyson particularly admired Irving's "Plantagenet look." His interpretation was primarily intellectual.

But two English successors of Irving remain to mention, Sir Herbert Tree (1853–1917) and Sir Francis Robert Benson (1858–). Tree's production was noted for its gorgeous pageantry and the emphasis upon the melodramatic note in Richard; Benson's for its general adequacy. Both followed the text of Shakespeare. Finally a word must be said, before turning to the history of the play in America, of the Shakespearean productions at the Old Vic, where an excellent stock company has performed all of Shakespeare's plays.

The first recorded performance of a Shakespearean play in America is that of Richard III, Cibber version, March 5, 1750, at the theatre in Nassau Street, New York. The Richard was an American, Thomas Kean. The play was repeated the next season. Robert Upton is the second interpreter of Richard in America, January 23,1752. There is a record of Richard III played by an American company in Annapolis in 1752.

In the same year an English company was brought over by Lewis Hallam, with the financial assistance of his brother William. After playing in the Southern Colonies, this English company played Richard III on November 12, 1753, at New York. The Richard was a Mr. Rigby, about whose interpretation theatrical history is silent. Another performance of the tragedy was given by Hallam's company on February 7, 1759.

At Philadelphia Richard III was performed at the Southwark Theatre n 1766, and on December 14, 1767, one week after the opening of the new John Street theatre at New York the tragedy was performed. Richard trod the boards several times more before the Congress, on October 24, 1778, recommended the suspension of all amusements. The majority of these performances were given by Lewis Hallam.

Major Williams, of the British army of occupation, played Richard at New York in 1779. The tragedy continued, after the Revolution, to be one of the most popular of Shakespeare's plays, the most noteworthy of these earlier players being John Hodgkinson, at New York (1793–4) and James Fennel, at Philadelphia's Chestnut Theatre (April 21, 1795). A company at Boston and strolling companies elsewhere in New England likewise included Richard III in the repertory. Thomas A. Cooper (1776–1849) completes the list of players of this rôle at the close of the eighteenth century.

The arrival of George Frederick Cooke at New York in 1810 began a new era on the American stage. His Richard was closely imitated by the American actor, John Duff (1787–1831). Between the two visits of Edmund Kean to America (1820 and 1825), came Junius Brutus Booth, who made his first appearance in the part of Richard at the New Park Theatre on October 5, 1821. Junius Booth continued to play Richard for the thirty subsequent years of his career.

Edwin Forrest (1806–1872), the first American born actor of importance, appeared as Richard at the Bowery Theatre, New York, on January 23, 1827. Forrest played Richard as a noble prince, maintaining that a man cf Richard's intellectual power would have the skill to conceal his deformity. He published a slightly altered form of Cibber's text.

Before and after the visit of Charles Kean in 1836 and again in 1840, the tragedy underwent some strange vicissitudes upon our stage. Several "child-actors" appeared as Richard, among whom were boys and girls of eleven and less. Ellen Bateman, for example, played Richard at the age of four. More than one woman likewise essayed the character. Charlotte Crampton gave a performance of the tragedy, in which, during the last act, she exhibited a troup of trained horses, thus repeating what had already been done at the London Astley's where Richard III was once turned into a spectacular circus. Other actors were fond of using the character of Richard for displaying their powers of mimicry of legitimate players.

It was Edwin Booth (1883–1893) who brought back to our stage the dignity appropriate to this tragedy. As early as 1852 he had made his début as a player in the character of Richard at San Francisco, and appeared for the first time at New York on May 4, 1857. Booth used the Cibber version until 1878, when the distinguished dramatic critic, William Winter, prepared for Booth a version based upon a rearrangement and cutting of Snakespeare's text.

There is not space to consider all the Richards seen in America. A mere enumeration of such names as the Wallacks, John Edward McCullough, Laurence Barrett, Robert Bruce Mantell, and Richard Mansfield will give some hint of the extensive history of this play upon our stage. But in conclusion a word must be said for the production by Arthur Hopkins of John Barrymore as Richard at New York on March 6, 1920. This was perhaps the best opportunity the present generation has had to judge of the acting merits of this tragedy.^[8]

---

1. Peele, The Battle of Alcazar (1594); Marston, Scourge of Villainie (1598); Heywood, Edward the Fourth (pub. 1600); Chapman, Eastward Hoe (1605); Marston, Parasitaster, or the Fawne (1606), What You Will (1607); Heywood, Iron Age (1611); Brathwaite, Strappado for the Divell (1615); Fletcher and Massinger, Little French Lawyer (c. 1620).
2. Robert Mantell, the contemporary actor, has recently used the Cibber version.
3. For the classic condemnation of Cibber's version, see Hazlitt, The Characters of Shakespear's Plays, essay on Richard III.
4. Davies: Memoirs of the Life of David Garrick, 1780.
5. James Boaden: Memoirs of the Life of John Philip Kemble. 1825. See also Leigh Hunt: Critical Essays on the Performers of the London Theatres, 1807, for an analysis of Kemble's acting.
6. The best description of the acting of Kean is to be found in W. Hazlitt: The Characters of Shakespear's Plays, essay on Richard III.
7. Reminiscences, 162. Ed. by Sir Frederick Pollock. 1875.
8. For a full account of this play, see The Stage History of Shakespeare's King Richard the Third, by Alice I. Perry Wood, Columbia University Press, New York, 1909. The present editor has drawn some of his information from this complete study.