Papers from Lilliput

by J. B. Priestley

ON A CERTAIN PROVINCIAL PLAYER

IT has been said that literature must use its gift of praise or it will come to nothing. Those of us who keep up a little dribble of ink, though we aspire to be very Swifts, must ultimately bestow our commendation somewhere: our praise is the last, greatest and kindliest weapon in our poor armoury. If we can applaud where most men have kept silent, so much the better: we are fine fellows, using our little tricks to sweeten the world. So much preamble is necessary because I wish to bring forward, in this season of burning questions, the figure of a poor player who died over one hundred and fifty years ago and whose very name is now only known to a few. True, it can be found in many places, but who goes to them? For my part, I have rescued him from the pages of The Eccentric Mirror, a quaint production of four volumes, ‘reflecting (I quote the title-page) a faithful and interesting delineation of Male and Female Characters, Ancient and Modern, Who have been particularly distinguished by extraordinary Qualifications, Talents, and Propensities, natural or acquired.’ There, among fat men, giants, freaks and eccentrics, I found our hero, Bridge Frodsham, a country actor, once known as the ‘York Garrick.’ He comes rather late in the series of characters, and is only there at all because the compiler was probably running short of better material, such as fat men, murderers, misers, and the like. Even then, Frodsham is scurvily treated; he is set down simply as a very good specimen of the conceited, self-opinionated young fool; the greatness that was in him is entirely missed; and it has been left for us, at this late hour, to give him his meed of praise. But let us turn to the details of his story, which I shall filch for the most part from The Eccentric Mirror, and thereby get myself some return for the four shillings and sixpence I paid for it.

Bridge Frodsham was born at the town of Frodsham, in Cheshire, in the year 1734. As you may guess, he belonged, like a true hero, to an ancient family. His education was begun at Westminster, but owing to some youthful imprudence he ran away and joined a company of strolling players. It was not long before he had drifted to York, where he became the leading actor at the little make-shift theatre. He was not, it appears, without talent, for he soon became the darling of the theatre-going crowd, such as it was, of that city. York knew no better actor than Frodsham, who was acclaimed in all the local pot-houses, where he was something of a boon companion. Hear the author of The Eccentric Mirror on this very theme:

‘Such was the infatuation of the public at York, and indeed so superior were Frodsham’s talents to those of all his coadjutors that he cast them all into the shade. This superiority was by no means a fortunate circumstance for Frodsham. It filled him with vanity and shut up every avenue to improvement; nor had he any opportunity for observation, as no actors of any high repute were ever known to tread the York stage, and he was never more than ten days in London.’

Even in this passage, short as it is, you will have remarked a certain air of patronage, a suspicion of asperity, and you will be on your guard; for this London hack, this biographer of dwarfs and infant prodigies, who dotes on filthy misers and becomes lyrical in praise of Daniel Lambert, is trying to rob our sturdy provincial of his greatness. For greatness he certainly achieved, and not at York, mark you, among his pot-house followers, but in London, during a short visit of ten days or so. He had been given a fortnight’s holiday, which he determined to spend in London, to the great distress of the people of York, who thought that once Garrick saw Frodsham, the Yorkshire stage was doomed to lose its bright particular star. They did not know their man, as you shall see. Fate had decided that for once Garrick should meet his match, or more than his match, in a fellow actor; and it is Frodsham’s conduct in this encounter that gives him some title to our applause. For my own part, I applaud more readily because it happened to be the great Garrick who was so disconcerted by the unknown player from the country. We have all our little prejudices, and one of mine chances to be against the swollen fame of Garrick. I am no great hater of mummer-worship, and am always ready to believe what I read of Betterton, Mountford, Kemble, Kean, Macready, and I know not how many more old actors; but somehow I have always been suspicious of Garrick. No doubt I could invent, if necessary, half-a-dozen respectable reasons, but suffice it to say that I have always felt that he was over-rated, that things went too easily with him, that for all his sense of humour he took himself too seriously; I see him as a strutting, perky little figure. I may be wrong, and it is quite possible that I do Garrick an injustice, but that matters little, in no way detracting from the newly burnished fame of our friend from York.

At the time when Frodsham determined to take a holiday in London, Garrick was at Drury Lane, and at the very height of his fame. Adulation was his daily food, and no flattery was too gross for him to swallow. A chorus of praise from high and low followed him everywhere; he could do nothing wrong; and, it goes without saying, he could make the fortune of a fellow actor with a nod of his head.

Judge then of Garrick’s surprise when, one day, a card was left at his house in Southampton Street, ‘Mr. Frodsham, of York,’ unaccompanied by any humble request or letter of adulation. This cool conduct on the part of one who turned out to be nothing but a country player so excited Garrick’s curiosity that, on the day following, Frodsham was admitted into the great man’s presence. Not unnaturally, he imagined that Frodsham had come to solicit an engagement, but after some slight conversation, during which the young stranger showed astonishing coolness, Garrick, finding that no such request was made, determined to cut short the interview by offering his visitor an order for the pit for that evening, when he was to play Sir John Brute, one of his favourite parts. At the same time, he asked Frodsham if he had seen a play since his arrival in London.

‘O yes,’ replied Frodsham, ‘I saw you play Hamlet, two nights ago,’ and remarked further that it was his own favourite part.

At this, Garrick, not without irony, said that he hoped Frodsham had approved of the performance.