Three special cases, those of Two Angry Women of Abington, Part II, and Thome Strowd, Part II, of the Admiral’s men, and A Woman Killed with Kindness of Worcester’s men, demonstrate that in some instances production was begun before the writing was completed. The book of Two Angry Women was paid for in full on February 12, 1599, although gowns had been paid for on January 31st and “divers thinges” on February 12th. Payment in full is recorded for Thome Strowd on May 5, 1601, although suits had been bought on April 27th. Lastly, Heywood received £3 as final payment on A Woman Killed with Kindness on March 6, 1603, although costumes had been paid for on February 5th and March 7th.
The entire conception of play producing reflected here is one of continuous presentation. As soon as a poet turned over his play to the actors, they would introduce it into the repertory with very little delay. There is no indication that special occasions provided the moment for unveiling a new play or that long-range planning for a season was part of the Elizabethan or Jacobean scheme. Immediate concerns, the nature of which we know too little, probably dictated the day-to-day program of the theatrical fraternity. Responsive to the vicissitudes of political, hygienic, and economic conditions, the players within their strictly traditional guild organization maintained an empirical, nontheoretical, professional attitude.
Let us turn back to the winter season of 1595–1596 to trace the introduction of new plays into the repertory. Four days after the opening of the season, on August 29th, Longshank was presented. Six days later, on September 5th, it was followed by Crack Me This Nutte, another play followed on September 17th (The New World’s Tragedy), and still another on October 2nd (The Disguises). For the rest of this season there were premieres on October 16th (Wonder of a Woman), October 30th (Barnardo and Fiametta), November 14th (A Toy to Please Chaste Ladies), November 28th (Henry V), and in 1596 on January 3rd (Chinon of England), January 16th (Pythagoras), January 23rd (Seven Days of the Week, Part II), and February 12th (Blind Beggar of Alexandria). The longest interval between the production of new plays was thirty-five days, November 28th to January 3rd, though the intervening performances numbered only twenty. The shortest interval, of six days, occurred twice, at the beginning and near the end of the season. Obviously the lack of regularity, apparent in other aspects of production, also existed in the frequency with which new plays were presented.
Nor does the study of the year-to-year pattern reflect any greater regularity. For example, in December, 1594, three new plays were presented, in December, 1595, none, in December, 1596, four. The presentation of so many new plays in the latter year was owing without doubt to the absence of any new plays in November, 1596. Consequently, though we cannot determine a fixed number, we can calculate the average number of new plays introduced into the repertory in one year.
Over the three-year period 1594–1597 the actors of the Admiral’s company had an average interval of 14.7 days or roughly two weeks between the opening of new plays. While the interval ranged from two days to fifty-seven, the mean interval was 13 days. Thus it would be accurate enough to say that the company produced a new play every two weeks during the playing season. For the years 1597–1603 we have evidence of the number of new plays produced each year but not of the number of performances given. Consequently, to correlate all the evidence it is necessary to calculate not only the average intervals between premieres of new plays but also the average number of plays produced from 1594 to 1597. The Diary reports the lists of performances continuously from June 5, 1594, to July 28, 1597, a total of three years and fifty-three days. Since 1596 was a leap year, the entire period consisted of 1,149 days during which fifty-four new plays were produced, averaging one play for every 21.3 days. Thus, about seventeen new plays were presented each year by the Lord Admiral’s men.
Chambers, describing the repertory of the Admiral’s men from 1597 to 1603, estimates that they added seventeen new plays in 1597–1598, twenty-one in 1598–1599, twenty in 1599–1600, seven in 1600–1601, fourteen in 1601–1602, and nine in 1602–1603. If we exclude the figures for 1602–1603, a season shortened by the death of Elizabeth, an average for the five years comes to 15.8 new plays each year. The unusually meager count of seven plays for 1600–1601 may reflect, as Chambers suggests, a reliance on the older repertory after Edward Alleyn’s return to the company. Or it might indicate that the company toured extensively that year.
Until now we have considered only one company. Fortunately Henslowe served as banker for Lord Worcester’s men from August 17, 1602, to March 16, 1603, a period of 212 days. During that time they commissioned twelve new plays. A simple equation based on the ratio of 12 plays to 212 days as x plays are to 365 days yields us twenty plays as the total this company would have reached if they had continued to produce new works at the same rate for the rest of the year. However, since the period covered by the accounts was the most active part of the theatrical year, it is likely that the total would have been nearer to seventeen. Furthermore, the average interval between the openings of new plays by the Worcester’s men comes to 16.6 days. Allowing for the uncertainty of the length of this particular season, calculated as it is on expense payments, not actual performances, this average is in line with the earlier figure of 14.7 days between openings. Thus two of the three important public playhouses in London each presented about seventeen new plays a year, grouping them in two seasons so that a new play was presented every fourteen or fifteen days.
The evidence for the third of these companies, the Lord Chamberlain’s men, is scanty; to determine whether or not it followed the system of the other two companies is hazardous at best. As Greg aptly noted more than half a century ago, “We know practically nothing of the internal workings of the Lord Chamberlain’s company.”[9] Yet, here and there, links between this company and the others suggest that in general all of them followed the same repertory practices.
Between June 5th and 15th, 1594, the Lord Admiral’s and Lord Chamberlain’s men played together at Newington Butts. Henslowe’s performance list does not clarify whether they functioned as one company or two. In fact, only the excellent deduction of Greg, who followed Fleay in this, made it clear that the combination ceased after that date, for the list of subsequent performances proceeds without a break. Of the ten performances, five were of plays now generally ascribed to the Chamberlain’s men.
Fleay, extolling the virtues of the Chamberlain’s men at the expense of the Admiral’s, asserts that he has been unable to trace at any time “more than four new plays produced by [the former company] in any one year.”[10] This conclusion might stem from a recollection of a note by Malone: “It appears from Sir Henry Herbert’s office-book that the King’s company between the years 1622 and 1641 produced either at Blackfriars or the Globe at least four new plays every year.” He goes on: “ ... the King’s company usually brought out two or three new plays at the Globe every summer.”[11] Both statements indicate that no less than four plays were produced annually. A study of Herbert’s list of licenses supports them. From July, 1623, to July, 1624, licenses for thirty-five plays are recorded. Four may be discarded for our present purposes.[12] Of the remaining thirty-one, eleven were licensed for the Palsgrave’s company, seven (six new and one old) for the Prince’s men, eight (six new and two old) for the King’s men, four (three new and one old) for the Lady Elizabeth’s servants, and one for the Queen of Bohemia’s company. G. E. Bentley very persuasively accounts for the greater number of plays licensed for the Palsgrave’s men by pointing out that the fire at their playhouse, the Fortune, on December 9, 1621, deprived them of their prompt-books and that in 1623–1624 they were striving to repair the damage to their repertory.