Arrah-na-Pogue, also known as Arrah-na-Pogue; or the Wicklow Wedding, is a play in 3 acts by Dion Boucicault. Along with The Colleen Bawn (1860) and The Shaughraun (1874), it is considered one of the three major Irish plays penned by Boucicault. [1] Set during the Irish Rebellion of 1798, the play popularized the street ballad The Wearing of the Green ; a rendition of which was included in the play with lyrics by Boucicault. [2] It has had an enduring place in the canon of dramatic literature on the stage internationally, and has been adapted into other media.
Arrah-na-Pogue premiered on November 7, 1864, at the Theatre Royal, Dublin. The cast included Boucicault, Samuel Johnson, John Brougham and Samuel Anderson Emery among others. [3] The work had its first staging in London's West End at the Princess's Theatre, London on 22 March 1865. [4]
The United States premiere of the play was presented in New York City at the Broadway theatre Niblo's Garden on July 21, 1865, where it ran for 68 performances. [5] It has been revived twice on Broadway; first as Niblo's Garden in 1869, and then at the Fourteenth Street Theatre in 1903. [6]
The play was mounted at the Abbey Theatre in 2010. [7] The play was performed Off-Broadway in New York City by the Storm Theatre Company at the Theatre of the Church of Notre Dame in 2012. [8]
The play's central character, Shaun the Post, was both an inspiration and object of parody for James Joyce's character Shaun the Postman in his 1939 novel Finnegans Wake . [9]
Dionysius Lardner "Dion" Boucicault was an Irish actor and playwright famed for his melodramas. By the later part of the 19th century, Boucicault had become known on both sides of the Atlantic as one of the most successful actor-playwright-managers then in the English-speaking theatre. The New York Times hailed him in his obituary as "the most conspicuous English dramatist of the 19th century,"; he and his second wife, Agnes Robertson Boucicault, applied for and received American citizenship in 1873.
John Brougham was an Irish and American actor, dramatist, poet, theatre manager, and author. As an actor and dramatist he had most of his career in the United States, where he was celebrated for his portrayals of comic Irish characters.
The history of Irish theatre begins in the Middle Ages and was for a long time confined to the courts of the Gaelic and "Old English" – descendants of 12th-century Norman invaders – inhabitants of Ireland. The first theatre building in Ireland was the Werburgh Street Theatre, founded in 1637, followed by the Smock Alley Theatre in 1662.
Over the centuries, there have been five theatres in Dublin called the Theatre Royal.
The Colleen Bawn, or The Brides of Garryowen is a melodramatic play written by Irish playwright Dion Boucicault. It was first performed at Laura Keene's Theatre, New York, on 27 March 1860 with Laura Keene playing Anne Chute and Boucicault playing Myles na Coppaleen. It was most recently performed in Dublin at the Project Arts Centre in July and August 2010 and in Belfast by Bruiser Theatre Company at the Lyric Theatre in April 2018. Several film versions have also been made.
The Shaughraun is a melodramatic play written by Irish playwright Dion Boucicault. It was first performed at Wallack's Theatre, New York, on 14 November 1874. Dion Boucicault played Conn in the original production. The play was a huge success, making half a million dollars for Boucicault.
The Irish Repertory Theatre is an Off-Broadway theatre company founded in 1988.
Samuel Anderson Emery (1814–1881) was an English stage actor, the father of the actress Winifred Emery and grandfather of the actress Margery Maude and the judge John Cyril Maude.
Edmund O'Flaherty, also known as William Stuart, was an Irish MP who hurriedly emigrated to the United States in 1854. In New York City, he was the business partner of the actor-managers Dion Boucicault and Edwin Booth. He leased and managed the Winter Garden Theatre with them. He also managed the New Park Theatre on Broadway from 1874 to 1876.
Beaufort is a small village that lies on the banks of the River Laune in County Kerry, in the southwest of Ireland. It consists of a post office, three public houses, one supermarket, parish hall, guest houses and thirty private houses. As of the 2016 census, the population was 251. Beaufort sits at the foot of Ireland's highest mountain Carrantuohill.
Benjamin E. Woolf was a British-born American violinist, composer, playwright, and journalist. His best-known works were the comic operas The Mighty Dollar and Westward Ho.
Aubrey Boucicault was a British born stage actor, playwright and matinee idol. He came from a famous family of actors and playwrights, his father being Dion Boucicault.
William Bodham Donne (1807–1882) was an English journalist, known also as a librarian and theatrical censor.
Arrah-na-Pogue is a 1911 American silent film produced by Kalem. It is based on the 1864 play of the same name by Dion Boucicault. It was directed by Sidney Olcott with Gene Gauntier, Jack J. Clark, JP McGowan and Robert Vignola. Gene Gauntier adapted a play written by Dion Boucicault, Arrah-na-Pogue, an Irish phrase that can be translated as "Arrah of the Kiss".
The Phantom is a two act melodrama written by Dion Boucicault. It was originally titled The Vampire when it was first performed at the Princess's Theatre in London in 1852. Boucicault renamed it The Phantom when he went to the United States, where it opened in Philadelphia in 1856. The play tells the story of two different encounters with a mysterious phantom.
Samuel Johnson was an actor-manager and Shakespearean actor of the 19th century and a member of Henry Irving's Company at the Lyceum Theatre, for which he played the comedic roles.
Ellen Scanlon, born Ellen Hanley, was an Irish murder victim. Born to a Limerick farming family in 1803, her murder at age 15 became the subject of books, plays, films, songs, and an opera, using the nickname given to her locally, "the Colleen Bawn,", which translates literally to "white girl," with "white" symbolically meaning purity, innocence, gentleness, or beauty. Thus the name can be interpreted as "the innocent maiden."
The Ulster Literary Theatre was a theatre company in Ulster from 1904 to 1934. It had a differently named precursor in 1902, and by 1915 it was named just the Ulster Theatre. It was founded by Bulmer Hobson and David Parkhill with patronage from Francis Joseph Bigger, who was also its first president.
Olympic Theatre was the name of five former 19th and early 20th-century theatres on Broadway in Manhattan and in Brooklyn, New York.
Shaun Glenville was an Irish actor who specialised in pantomime performances; he would play the dame while his wife Dorothy Ward would play the principal boy. The music hall historian Christopher Pulling called him one of the 'grand comedians of the music-halls'. He had a successful 62-year career and played in over 40 pantomimes.