Stage history and reception
Ascertaining the exact number of performances of Bellamira presents some problems. It is a fact that Bellamira was performed by the United Company in the Drury Lane Theatre on 12 May 1687. Bellamira may also have been performed in the Dorset Garden Theatre. However, as it was a standard play, without fancy scenery or machinery, the Drury Lane Theatre is the most likely place of performance. [1] According to The London Stage, 12 May, however, may not be regarded as the première. [2] It is uncertain how many performances followed in the season of 1687/88, and there may have been a revival of the play in the season of 1690/91. [3]
At least two sources testify that Bellamira was not a failure in spite of obvious criticism from parts of the audience. The first testimony is that of Thomas Shadwell, who, in his Tenth Satyr of Juvenal (1687), which is dedicated to Sedley, thanks Sir Charles for his patronage, adding: "Your late great obligation in giving me the advantage of your Comedy, call’d Bellamira, or the Mistress, has given me a fresh subject for my Thanks ... I am heartily glad that your Comedy (as I never doubted) found such success, that I never met with any Man of Sence but applauded it" (The Complete Works of Thomas Shadwell, ed. Montague Summers, Vol. V, p. 291). The phrase "advantage" here presumably means that Sedley offered Shadwell, a Whig out of favour and debarred from the theatre in the mid-1680s, the third night's income to support him. If this is correct, Bellamira was performed more often than two times. [4]
The second source of the play's success is that it went into print within six weeks after the première. [5] However, instant publication does not necessarily speak in favour of a play's success, since even prompt copies of unsuccessful plays were sent to the printer. [6]
Evidence about the success of Bellamira is not consistent, however. In his Preface to Bellamira, Sedley himself refers to a rather cool reception of his comedy. He seems to have attributed this to a latent element of obscenity. In Sedley's view, female spectators with their increasing demand for morals and manners on the stage, showed a particular dislike of this kind of lasciviousness in comedy. [7]
Contemporary authors who spoke in favour of Bellamira again include Shadwell and George Etherege. Shadwell defended Bellamira from the charge of obscenity. [8] Etherege, who served as diplomat at the Imperial Court in Ratisbon between 1685 and 1689 and was bored there, apparently found reading Bellamira a welcome change. [9]
Bellamira saw no further editions after 1687. This means that it cannot have been a smash hit. Nor does it occur in the list of the most successful plays between 1660 and 1747 which were still performed after 1900. And yet, Bellamira was adapted by Robin Chapman and broadcast on 18 March 1975 by Thames Television under the title "Way of the World: Bellamira". [10]
The motif of sterility and disease in the play
In Bellamira, a profit-seeking attitude has infected every aspect of life and ruined each relationship. Materialistic motives lead to arranged marriages devoid of feelings and love. The society delineated here is an ageing society not only morally deficient but also literally diseased: Bellamira is a veteran courtesan; Merryman an elderly drunkard; Cunningham a crumbling syphilitic wretch; Dangerfield an old-fashioned, impotent soldier in retirement. In addition to this picture of ageing and disease, the imagery of sterility receives special emphasis in the play: the device of the eunuch becomes the very symbol of the play, and thus, characteristics such as incompleteness and lack of fulfilment dominate the play. While characters like Dangerfield and Merryman suffer from physical impotence, others like Lionel are emotionally sterile. In his raving, Lionel commits a crime by raping the girl he professes to love. Keepwell, too, who is ruled by a courtesan, seems less than a man. The pervasive animal imagery underlines this impression: Pisquil, the real eunuch, is called "Humane Gelding," Dangerfield "gelt" by Bellamira, and Merryman refers to him as "Gib’d Cat," that is, gelded cat. In a final piece of irony, the lean Cunningham refers to himself as a "Capon," that is, gelded cock.
"Restoration comedy" is English comedy written and performed in the Restoration period of 1660–1710. Comedy of manners is used as a synonym for this. After public stage performances were banned for 18 years by the Puritan regime, reopening of the theatres in 1660 marked a renaissance of English drama. Sexually explicit language was encouraged by King Charles II (1660–1685) personally and by the rakish style of his court. Historian George Norman Clark argues:
The best-known fact about the Restoration drama is that it is immoral. The dramatists did not criticize the accepted morality about gambling, drink, love, and pleasure generally, or try, like the dramatists of our own time, to work out their own view of character and conduct. What they did was, according to their respective inclinations, to mock at all restraints. Some were gross, others delicately improper.... The dramatists did not merely say anything they liked: they also intended to glory in it and to shock those who did not like it.
The Country Wife is a Restoration comedy written by William Wycherley and first performed in 1675. A product of the tolerant early Restoration period, the play reflects an aristocratic and anti-Puritan ideology, and was controversial for its sexual explicitness even in its own time. The title contains a lewd pun with regard to the first syllable of "country". It is based on several plays by Molière, with added features that 1670s London audiences demanded: colloquial prose dialogue in place of Molière's verse, a complicated, fast-paced plot tangle, and many sex jokes. It turns on two indelicate plot devices: a rake's trick of pretending impotence to safely have clandestine affairs with married women, and the arrival in London of an inexperienced young "country wife", with her discovery of the joys of town life, especially the fascinating London men. The implied condition the Rake, Horner, claimed to suffer from was, he said, contracted in France whilst "dealing with common women". The only cure was to have a surgeon drastically reduce the extent of his manly stature; therefore, he could be no threat to any man's wife.
Thomas Shadwell was an English poet and playwright who was appointed Poet Laureate in 1689.
Thomas Betterton, the leading male actor and theatre manager during Restoration England, son of an under-cook to King Charles I, was born in London.
In a historical context, a rake was a man who was habituated to immoral conduct, particularly womanizing. Often, a rake was also prodigal, wasting his fortune on gambling, wine, women, and song, and incurring lavish debts in the process. Cad is a closely related term. Comparable terms are "libertine" and "debauchee".
Sir George Etherege was an English dramatist. He wrote the plays The Comical Revenge or, Love in a Tub in 1664, She Would If She Could in 1668, and The Man of Mode or, Sir Fopling Flutter in 1676.
Sir Charles Sedley, 5th Baronet, was an English noble, dramatist and politician. He was principally remembered for his wit and profligacy.
Mary "Moll" Davis, also spelt Davies or Davys, was a courtesan and mistress of King Charles II of England. She was an actress and entertainer before and during her role as royal mistress.
Lisle's Tennis Court was a building off Portugal Street in Lincoln's Inn Fields in London. Originally built as a real tennis court, it was used as a playhouse during two periods, 1661–1674 and 1695–1705. During the early period, the theatre was called Lincoln's Inn Fields Playhouse, also known as The Duke's Playhouse, The New Theatre or The Opera. The building was rebuilt in 1714, and used again as a theatre for a third period, 1714–1732. The tennis court theatre was the first public playhouse in London to feature the moveable scenery that would become a standard feature of Restoration theatres.
Elizabeth Polewheele, playwright, was one of the first women to write for the professional stage in Restoration London.
Mary Saunderson (1637–1712), later known as Mary Saunderson Betterton after her marriage to Thomas Betterton, was an actress and singer in England during the 1660s and 1690s. She is considered one of the first English actresses.
The Duke's Company was a theatre company chartered by King Charles II at the start of the Restoration era, 1660. Sir William Davenant was manager of the company under the patronage of Prince James, Duke of York. During that period, theatres began to flourish again after they had been closed from the restrictions throughout the English Civil War and the Interregnum. The Duke's Company existed from 1660 to 1682, when it merged with the King's Company to form the United Company.
The Mulberry-Garden is a comedy by Restoration poet and playwright Sir Charles Sedley (1639-1701) and was published in 1668
Cave Underhill (1634–1710?) was an English actor in comedy roles.
William Pinkethman was an English comic actor, a low comedian with a droll style, and theatre manager. He was considered an imitator of Anthony Leigh.
Anthony Leigh was a celebrated English comic actor.
Henry Harris was an English stage actor and theatre manager. Initially a painter he was a founder member of the new Duke's Company in 1660 following the Restoration which established itself at the old Salisbury Court Theatre before moving to the new Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre shortly afterwards. Due to his background Harris may have been a set designer and painter during his early years with the company. However, by 1661 he was acting, and his first recorded role was in William Davenant's The Siege of Rhodes that summer. He quickly established himself as the second actor in the troupe after Thomas Betterton.
Friendship in Fashion is a 1678 comedy play by the English writer Thomas Otway. It was first staged by the Duke's Company at the Dorset Garden Theatre in London. It was part of the trend of Restoration Comedy that flourished during the era.
She Would If She Could is a 1668 comedy play by the English writer George Etherege. It was originally staged at the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre by the Duke's Company. The play's novelty lies in its shedding of the romantic verse element to attain a unified tone. The play deals with the lustfulness of Cockwood couple; the title referring to Lady Cockwood looking for an opportunity to cheat Sir Oliver Cockwood.
A True Widow is a 1678 comedy play by the English writer Thomas Shadwell. It was first staged by the Duke's Company at the Dorset Garden Theatre in London. The names of the original cast are unknown. The prologue was written by Shadwell's colleague John Dryden. It was published the following year and dedicated to Charles Sedley.
