LONDON THEATER CHRONOLOGY--1660-1800

1564 Birth of William Shakespeare, playwright

1576 First theater in London--Shoreditch

1616 Death of Shakespeare

1630 Birth of Charles II

1631 Birth of John Dryden, playwright and critic

1639 Drury Lane Theatre chartered

1642 Possible birth date of Nell Gwyn, actress. See 1650.

1647  Birth of John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester.     

1649 Execution of King Charles I

1650 Birth of Jeremy Collier, political activist and moralist opposing theaters

Birthdate (February 2) claimed by Nell Gwyn, actress. See 1642.

The first English coffee house opens--in Oxford, not London

March 3--Birth of Thomas Otway

1656 Mrs. Edward Coleman appears as Iolanthe in Davenant, The Siege of Rhodes, possibly the first actress on the English stage (semi-private performance at Rutland House).

1657 Birth of Christopher Rich, lawyer, theater manager

1658 Probable birthdate of Elizabeth Barry
 

1660s

1660 May 1--Parliament votes to ask Charles II to return as king

May 25--Charles II lands in England

1663 May 7 Drury Lane opens. First production is a revival of The Humorous Lieutenant (originally produced in 1620), by Beaumont and Fletcher (or just Fletcher)

Birth (approx) of Anne Bracegirdle, actress

1664 December--First Reports of plague in London

Debut of Nell Gwyn as actress

Birth of John Vanbrugh

Sir Robert Howard and John Dryden, The Indian Queen

1665 June--Deaths from the Plague begin to become numerous

1665 December--Deaths from plague largely over

1666 September 2--Great Fire of London

1667 Dryden, Secret Love

January 24, Gwyn plays Florimel to Pepys' keen delight

1668 Dryden named poet laureate
 

1670s

1670 Birth (approx) of Thomas Doggett, actor, theater manager

Dryden, The Conquest of Granada

1671 Birth of Colley Cibber

Villiers (Buckingham), The Rehearsal

The "Duke's Players" move to Dorset Garden Theater

(February) Nell Gwyn retires from the stage

Drury Lane burns

1674 March--Reopening of Drury Lane Theater, Beaumont and Fletcher's The Beggar's Bush

1675 Wycherley, The Country Wife

September--Otway, Alcibiades, Duke's Theatre, Dorset Garden

Debut of Elizabeth Barry in Alcibiades

1676 Etherege, The Man of Mode

June--Otway, Don Carlos, Dorset Garden: Otway's first hit

1677 Behn, The Rover

1678 Dryden, All for Love

Nahum Tate, Brutus of Alba, Dorset Garden

1679 Behn, The Feigned Courtesans. Dedicated to Nell Gwyn.

1679-1680 Plays by Nathaniel Lee banned by Government
 

1680s

1680 February--Otway, The Orphan

Otway, The Soldiers' Fortune

1681 Tate and Dryden, adaptation of King Lear, Dorset Garden

1682 Otway, Venice Preserved

Lee, The Princess of Cleves

Dryden, The Duke of Guise

1683 Otway, The Atheist

Birth of Anne Oldfield, actress

1685 Death of Charles II

G.F. Handel, composer, born

Birth of Aaron Hill, playwright, manager, and editor of a theatrical paper

June 30--birth of John Gay

 

April 14--Death of Otway

1686 Behn, The Lucky Chance

1687 Death of Nell Gwyn

1688 "Glorious Revolution"--James II deposed, replaced by William III and

Mary II

Bracegirdle a member of the United Company

1689 Death of Behn

Behn, The Widow Ranter

1690s

1690 Colley Cibber's first performance as actor

Dryden, Amphytrion

Possible birth date of Charles Macklin, actor, who died 1797. See 1699.

1691-2 Vanbrugh, in the Bastille, begins writing his first play,

The Provok'd Wife (see 1697)

1692 Southerne, The Wives' Excuse

Lord Mohun and others, trying to abduct Anne Bracegirdle, kill Mountfort, the actor

1694 Christopher Rich becomes manager of the United Company

Congreve, William, The Double Dealer

1695 Congreve, Love for Love

1696 Vanbrugh, The Relapse

Cibber, Love's Last Shift

Pix, Mary, The Spanish Wives

Collier outlawed for opposition to William III

1697 Pix, The Innocent Mistress

April--Vanbrugh, The Provok'd Wife

Collier's A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage

1699 Probable birth date of Charles Macklin, actor, manager, playwright

Debut of Anne Oldfield at Drury Lane

1700s

1700 Death of John Dryden

Congreve, The Way of the World

Anne Oldfield's first major role, Alinda in The Pilgrim

1703 Vanbrugh designs the Queen's Theater, Haymarket

1704 Cibber, The Careless Husband

1705 Steele, Richard, The Tender Husband

Blenheim Palace, designed by Vanbrugh, begun

Actresses Anne Bracegirdle and Anne Oldfield compete in the same roles and plays

1707 Birth of Henry Fielding, playwright, manager, journalist and novelist

Farquhar, The Beaux' Stratgem, Haymarket

Bracegirdle retires

1709 Birth of Samuel Johnson, playwright, editor of Shakespeare, and critic
 

1710s

1710-1712 Drury Lane Theater managed by Colley Cibber, Thomas Doggett, and Robert Wilks

Elizabeth Barry retires.

1712 Button's Coffee House opens

1713 Birth of Charlotte Cibber, later Charke

1714 Christopher Rich opens a new theater one month before his death

1715 Death of Nahum Tate.

1716 Birth of Frances Chamberlain, later Sheridan, playwright

1717 Birth of David Garrick, actor, theater manager, playwright
 

1720s

1721 Death of Thomas Doggett

1725 October 11--London debut of Charles Macklin, at Lincoln's Inn Fields Theater, as Alcander in Dryden and Lee's Oedipus

1726 Death of Jeremy Collier

Death of John Vanbrugh

1728 Birth of Oliver Goldsmith, playwright and critic

Gay's Beggar's Opera

1730 Birth of William Smith, actor and manager

February 3--Marriage of Charlotte Cibber to Richard Charke.

April 8--Stage debut of Charlotte Charke, as "Mademoiselle" in The Provok'd Wife

October 23--Death of Anne Oldfield

1733 Debut of Charles Macklin at Drury Lane: "Brazen" in The The Recruiting Officer

1734 Aaron Hill begins publishing a theatrical paper, The Prompter, continued into 1736

1735 Macklin kills fellow actor Thomas Hallam in a backstage dispute about a wig

1736 Fielding becomes a dramatic producer with Pasquin

1737 Licensing Act--not abolished until 1968!

March 2. Johnson and Garrick set off to try London life together. "Davy Garrick is to be with you early next week and Mr. Johnson to try his fate with a tragedy." (G. Walmsley, letter, in James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D

1738 Johnson's poem, "London," is published
 

1740s

1741February 11--Macklin's first performance as Shylock

1744 Birth of John Palmer, actor.

1746 Macklin's King Henry VII

1747 Drury Lane reopens, under Garrick's management. Samuel Johnson provides a Prologue for the occasion.

1748 Fielding opens a puppet theater

1749 Death of Handel
 

1750s

1750 Death of Aaron Hill

1751 Birth of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, playwright and theater manager

1753 Birth of Elizabeth Inchbald, actress, playwright, and novelist

1754 Death of Henry Fielding

September 7--Birth of Elizabeth Ann Linley, singer, later the first wife of Richard Brinsley Sheridan.

1757 Birth of John Kemble, actor

Death of Colley Cibber
1758 Garrick's adaptation of Shakespeare's Winter's Tale, Florizel and Perdita

1759 Macklin's Marriage a la Mode
 

1760s

1760 January 2--Goldsmith begins his series of "Citizen of the World" essays, describing contemporary London from the perspective of an (imaginary) Chinese philosopher visiting London. Essay #22 is called, "The Chinese Goes to See a Play."

1762 Debut of John Palmer, in Foote's The Orator, Haymarket

1763 F. Sheridan's The Discovery--Drury Lane

Sheridan's The Dupe--Drury Lane

1767 First performances of Elizabeth Linley, aged twelve, at Covent Garden and in Bath, with her brother Thomas. Picture

1768 Goldsmith's The Good Natured Man

First appearance of Sarah Siddons, as Ariel in her father's production of The Tempest

1770s

1771 June 26--Samuel Foote's The Maid of Bath, inspired by Elizabeth Linley, (Haymarket)

1772 September 4--Elizabeth Inchbald's debut, as Cordelia to her husband Joseph Inchbald's Lear in King Lear

1773 Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer

1774 Death of Goldsmith

Sarah Siddons attracts notice in a performance at Cheltenham as Belvidera in Venice Preserv'd

1775 April 19--War with American colonies begins

R.B. Sheridan's The Rivals--Covent Garden

Sheridan's The Duenna--Covent Garden

David Garrick retires; Sheridan becomes manager of Drury Lane theater

1779 Sheridan's The Critic

Death of David Garrick

1780s

1782Sarah Siddons' first London success: Isabella in The Fatal Marriage

at Drury Lane

1784 Death of Johnson

1785 Sarah Siddons' first Lady Macbeth.

1789 July 14--Bastille is stormed in Paris, the first stage of the French Revolution

May 7--Macklin's last performance, as Shylock (incomplete)

1790s

1792 Death of Elizabeth Linley Sheridan.

1794 Richard B. Sheridan opens a new theater

1797 Death of Charles Macklin

1798 Death of John Palmer
 

1800 and after

1809 Sheridan's new theater destroyed by fire

1812 June 29--Sarah Siddons's farewell performance, as Lady Macbeth,

1816 Death of Richard Brinsley Sheridan

1817 June 23--Final appearance of John Kemble

1821 Death of Elizabeth Inchbald

1823 February--Death of John Kemble

1831 June 8--Death of Sarah Siddons