Princess Mary’s connection with the drama dated from childhood, for before she had completed her sixth year we read of dramatic representations held in her presence and for her entertainment; and by an account in the Chapter House, Westminster, of the household expenses of the natural son of Henry VIII., who had been created Duke of Somerset and Richmond in June 1525, it appears[136] that “he had been several times entertained by the performances of players,” and that the council appointed for his care and custody had paid £3, 18s. 8d. for rewards to actors and minstrels. Mary ascended the throne in 1553, and a play was ordered on the occasion, but a month had barely transpired when she issued a proclamation, one object of which was to prevent the performance of plays calculated to advance the principles and doctrines of the Reformation. Mary kept up the theatrical and musical establishments of her father at an expense of between two and three thousand pounds a year in salaries only, independently of board, liveries, and incidental charges. The same establishment under Elizabeth, in the fourth year of her reign, was on a much more economical scale. But during her reign the stage found every encouragement, for her Majesty caused a stage to be erected at Windsor Castle for the regular performance of the drama, “with a wardrobe for the actors, painted scenes, and an orchestra consisting of trumpeters, luterers, harpers, ringers, minstrels,” &c.
On the 18th January 1561, an English tragedy in five acts, entitled “Ferrex and Porrex, or Gorbaduc,” was performed before Queen Elizabeth, being the joint composition of her cousins, Sir Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton. In her progress in 1564, Elizabeth was entertained at King’s College, Cambridge, with a play entitled “Ezechias,” and two years afterwards she witnessed a performance in Christ Church Hall, Oxford, of Edwards’s “Palamon and Arcyte.” At this period plays were occasionally exhibited on a Sunday in spite of the denunciations of the Puritans. Elizabeth herself visited a theatrical exhibition on Sunday, and in after years James I. allowed plays to be acted at Court on the same day. It appears that in 1586 a correspondence took place between the Court and the city of London regarding the fitness or unfitness of certain theatrical representations, especially on Sundays.
Among the Harleian MSS. is an interesting account of the entertainments given before Elizabeth and her Court in 1568, wherein we find a payment of £634, 9s. 5d. to Sir Thomas Benger, for materials and work “within the Office of the Revels,” between the 14th July 1567 and the 3rd March 1568, during which interval it appears “seven plays” and “one tragedy” were represented before her Majesty.[137] And, it may be added, that it was apparently part of the duty of the Master of the Revels to have the plays rehearsed to him before they were presented at Court.
In 1574 the grant of the first “Royal Patent” was conceded in this country to performers of plays, whereby the persons named in it were empowered, during the Queen’s pleasure, to use, exercise, and occupy the art and faculty of playing comedies, tragedies, interludes, and stage plays, as well for the recreation of the Queen’s subjects as for her own solace and pleasure, within the City of London and its liberties, and within any cities, towns, and boroughs throughout England. Associated with the theatrical amusements were the masks and shows, which were conducted on a very expensive and imposing scale, an account of which we have given elsewhere. And, as it has been often pointed out, many of these were specially provided to gratify the vanity of the Queen, to whom some marked and delicate compliment was generally made. In the summer of 1601, the Queen was at an entertainment given by the Lord Keeper, and on her way to the mansion she was entertained by a dialogue “betweene the Bayly and the Dary-mayd,” in which the following was supposed to be spoken by the bailiff of the Lord Keeper: “The Mistress of this fayre companie, though she knowe the way to all men’s hearts, yet she knowes the way to few men’s houses, except she love them very well.”
James I., some years before he succeeded to the English throne, evinced a strong disposition to favour theatrical amusements. In the Society of Antiquaries is preserved a manuscript which shows the extent and amount of his dramatic establishment, and from it we find that the annual fee of the Master of the Revels had been raised to £100, besides diet in Court, although each of the players was only allowed—as they had been from the time of Henry VIII.—£3, 6s. 8d. per annum.
Prince Henry had a company of players, and after his death, and on the marriage of the Elector Palatine of the Rhine to the Princess Elizabeth, the players transferred their services to the Prince Palatine, and “it is a new feature in theatrical history,” writes Collier,[138] “that on this occasion they produced a patent under the Great Seal very similar to that which James I. had granted about ten years before to Laurence Fletcher, William Shakespeare, and the other servants of the Lord Chamberlain.”
But it seems that the plays acted at Court did not always give satisfaction, for in one of John Chamberlain’s letters to Sir Dudley Carlton occurs this paragraph: “They have plays at Court every night, both holidays and working days, wherein they show great patience, being for the most part such poor stuff that, instead of delight, they send the auditory away with discontent.” And he adds, “Indeed our poets’ brains and inventions are grown very dry, insomuch that of five new plays there is not one that pleases; and therefore they are driven to furbish over their old, which stand them in best stead, and bring them most profit.”
The fondness of James for theatricals is further evidenced by the fact that in 1617, during his journey to the north, he was attended by a regular company of players, and a warrant issued for their payment is thus recorded in the registers of the Privy Council: “11th July 1617.—A warrant to the L. Stanhope, Treasurer of his Majestie’s Chambers, to cause payment to be made to certain players for three Stage Playes, that were acted before his Majestie, in his journey to Scotland, such summes of money as is usual in the like kinde.”
Prince Charles retained a company of musicians in his pay, besides his dramatic performers; and after his accession to the throne we find entries of payment for plays performed at Court at Christmas, and Twelfth-tide. It would seem that, at a very early date, players who called themselves the servants of any particular nobleman, usually wore his badge or livery. Accordingly in 1629 we find the King’s players allowed, every second year, four yards of bastard scarlet for a cloak, and a quarter yard of crimson velvet for a cape to it.
Charles II., again, was passionately fond of theatrical entertainments. On one occasion, when Sir William Davenant’s play of “Love and Honour” was first acted, his Majesty presented Betterton, the actor, with his coronation suit, in which the player performed the character of Prince Alonzo. The Duke of York followed his Majesty’s example by giving the suit which he had worn on the same occasion to Hains, who acted the part of Prince Prospero.