Of the farces ascribed to Cibber, only two, The Rival Queans and Bulls and Bears, are unquestionably his, and these two are not accessible. The Rival Queans, acted at the Haymarket, June 29, 1710, printed in Dublin in 1729, is without doubt by Cibber. But in the collected edition of his plays, published in 1777, the editors substituted a farce of the same name, which, however, deals with a different subject and is by another writer. Cibber’s farce was a burlesque of Lee’s Rival Queens; the piece that was substituted deals with the operatic situation in England.
An adaptation of Doggett’s Country Wake (1696), called Hob, or The Country Wake (1715), has been ascribed to Cibber, but Genest[1] doubts his authorship because it was brought out while Doggett was still on the stage.
Bulls and Bears, Cibber’s second undisputed farce, was acted at Drury Lane, December 2, 1715, but was apparently not printed.
Chuck (1736) seems to have been ascribed to him by either the author or the publisher without grounds, for in a list of plays “wrote by anonymous authors in the 17th century,” appended to the fourth edition of the Apology (1756), there is a note on this play to the effect that “the author or printer has set the name of Mr. Cibber to this piece.” This is not proof positive that Cibber did not write the play, for Cinna’s Conspiracy, which is unquestionably by him, appears in the same list. In The New Theatrical Dictionary (1742), it is stated that “this piece [Chuck] is extremely puerile, yet the author has thought proper to put Mr. Cibber’s name to it.” This again is not necessarily convincing argument against Cibber’s authorship, for he was capable of poor work, as his poems and some of his plays show.
On the whole, it seems probable that Hob and Chuck are not by Cibber. In any case, they are entirely without value, and it is therefore a matter of no importance to literary history whether their authorship is ever determined or not.
Coffey’s The Devil to Pay (1736) is stated in the catalogue of the British Museum to have been “revised by Colley Cibber.” But the work of revision was done by Theophilus Cibber, his son, and Cibber himself contributed only one song.[2]
In common with many of his contemporaries, Cibber attempted operatic pieces. His undisputed operas are Venus and Adonis (1715), Myrtillo (1716), Love in a Riddle (1729), and Damon and Phillida (1729), the last being merely the sub-plot of Love in a Riddle acted separately.[3] Two other operatic pieces, The Temple of Dullness (1745) and Capochio and Dorinna, have been ascribed to him.
Love in a Riddle (1729) seems to have been the cause of some unpleasantness. In the Life of Quin (1766) the following account of it is given:[4]
“This uncommon reception of The Beggar’s Opera induced Colley Cibber to attempt something the same kind the next year, under the title of Love in a Riddle, but how different was its reception from Gay’s production; it was damned to the lowest regions of infamy the very first night, which so mortified Cibber, that it threw him into a fever; and from this moment he resolved as soon as he conveniently could to leave the stage, and no longer submit himself and his talents to the capricious taste of the town.
“It was generally thought that his jealousy of Gay, and the high opinion he entertained of his own piece had operated so strongly as to make him set every engine in motion to get the sequel of The Beggar’s Opera, called Polly, suppressed in order to engross the town entirely to Love in a Riddle. Whether Cibber did or did not bestir himself in this affair, it is certain that Gay and Rich had the mortification to see all their hopes of a succeeding harvest blasted by the Lord Chamberlain’s absolute prohibition of it, after it had been rehearsed and was just ready to bring out.”