| Drury Lane | |
|---|---|
 The four Drury Lane novels | |
| First appearance | The Tragedy of X |
| Last appearance | Drury Lane's Last Case |
| Created by | Ellery Queen (writing as "Barnaby Ross") |
| In-universe information | |
| Gender | Male |
| Occupation | Actor, unofficial detective |
| Nationality | American |
Drury Lane is a fictional detective created by Ellery Queen in the 1930s under the byline of Barnaby Ross. Later publications reverted to the Ellery Queen name. Lane is a deaf Shakespearean actor turned amateur sleuth.
Lane was born in New Orleans on November 3, 1871. His father was a travelling American tragedian, and his mother an English music hall comic. Drury was born prematurely in a theater, his mother dying in childbirth. He was raised by his father, and made his acting debut aged 7. He was sixteen when his father died.
Lane became a highly celebrated Shakespearean actor, noted author of theatrical studies and biographies, and both a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and an honorary member of the French Legion of Honour. In 1928, he retired from the stage, having developed deafness. [1] He became highly skilled in lip reading.
Upon his retirement, Lane decides to take up amateur sleuthing. He explains in The Tragedy of X, "I think I can bring to this pursuit a rather unique equipment. I have murdered on the stage countless times; emotionally I have suffered the agony of plotting, the torture of conscience. I have been, among others perhaps less noble, Macbeth, and I have been Hamlet. And like a child viewing a simple wonder for the first time, I have just realized that the world is full of Macbeths and Hamlets." [2]
Lane resides in "The Hamlet", a castle overlooking the banks of the Hudson River, and accompanied by a small Elizabethan village, populated by people clad in authentic period garb and all bearing Shakespearean names. He is aided by Quacey (also known as Caliban and Quasimodo), his "hunchbacked" butler and formerly his makeup artist. [3] Lane is also assisted by Inspector Thumm, and later by Thumm’s daughter Patience. [4]
Physically, he is tall and slender, with white hair and greyish-green eyes. Despite being in his 60s, facially he looks much younger. [5]
The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, often shortened to Hamlet, is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts Prince Hamlet and his attempts to exact revenge against his uncle, Claudius, who has murdered Hamlet's father in order to seize his throne and marry Hamlet's mother.
Macbeth is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those who seek power. Of all the plays that Shakespeare wrote during the reign of James I, Macbeth most clearly reflects his relationship with King James, patron of Shakespeare's acting company. It was first published in the Folio of 1623, possibly from a prompt book, and is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy.
Ellery Queen is a pseudonym created in 1928 by the American detective fiction writers Frederic Dannay (1905-1982) and Manfred Bennington Lee (1905-1971). It is also the name of their main fictional detective, a mystery writer in New York City who helps his police inspector father solve baffling murder mysteries. Dannay and Lee wrote most of the novels and short story collections in which Ellery Queen appears as a character, and these books were among the most popular American mysteries published between 1929 and 1971. Under the pseudonym Ellery Queen, they also edited more than thirty anthologies of crime fiction and true crime. Dannay founded, and for many years edited, the crime fiction magazine Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, which has been published continuously from 1941 to the present. From 1961 onwards, Dannay and Lee commissioned other authors to write thrillers using the pseudonym Ellery Queen, but not featuring Ellery Queen as a character; some such novels were juvenile and were credited to Ellery Queen Jr. They also wrote four mysteries under the pseudonym Barnaby Ross, which featured the detective Drury Lane.
David Garrick was an English actor, playwright, theatre manager and producer who influenced nearly all aspects of European theatrical practice throughout the 18th century, and was a pupil and friend of Samuel Johnson. He appeared in a number of amateur theatricals, and with his appearance in the title role of Shakespeare's Richard III, audiences and managers began to take notice.
Edmund Kean was a celebrated British Shakespearean stage actor born in England, who performed, among other places, in London, Belfast, New York, Quebec, and Paris. He was known for his short stature, tumultuous personal life, and controversial divorce.
Sarah Siddons was a Welsh actress, the best-known tragedienne of the 18th century. Contemporaneous critic William Hazlitt dubbed Siddons as "tragedy personified".
William Charles Macready was an English stage actor.
John Philip Kemble was a British actor. He was born into a theatrical family as the eldest son of Roger Kemble, actor-manager of a touring troupe. His elder sister Sarah Siddons achieved fame with him on the stage of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. His other siblings, Charles Kemble, Stephen Kemble, Ann Hatton, and Elizabeth Whitlock, also enjoyed success on the stage.
Maurice Herbert Evans was an English actor, noted for his interpretations of Shakespearean characters. His best-known screen roles include Dr. Zaius in the 1968 film Planet of the Apes and Samantha Stephens's father, Maurice, on Bewitched.
Ellery Queen is an American TV drama series, developed by Richard Levinson and William Link, who based it on the fictional character of the same name. The series ran for a single season on NBC from September 11, 1975, to April 4, 1976. Jim Hutton stars as the eponymous sleuth, along with David Wayne as his father, Inspector Richard Queen.
In his own time, William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was rated as merely one among many talented playwrights and poets, but since the late 17th century has been considered the supreme playwright and poet of the English language.
Hannah Pritchard was an English actress who regularly played opposite David Garrick. She performed many significant Shakespearean roles and created on stage many important female roles by contemporary playwrights.
Emma Waller was an English actress who achieved fame in America.
John Palmer was an actor on the English stage in the eighteenth century. There was also another John Palmer (1728–1768) who was known as Gentleman Palmer. Richard Brinsley Sheridan nicknamed him Plausible Jack.
William Creswick was an English actor. A popular tragedian on the London stage, he appeared with many leading actors of his day, including William Charles Macready, Edwin Booth and Fanny Kemble and was well known for his Shakespearean and melodrama roles in Britain, the U.S. and Australia.
Characters of Shakespear's Plays is an 1817 book of criticism of Shakespeare's plays, written by early nineteenth century English essayist and literary critic William Hazlitt. Composed in reaction to the neoclassical approach to Shakespeare's plays typified by Samuel Johnson, it was among the first English-language studies of Shakespeare's plays to follow the manner of German critic August Wilhelm Schlegel, and, with the work of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, paved the way for the increased appreciation of Shakespeare's genius that was characteristic of later nineteenth-century criticism. It was also the first book to cover all of Shakespeare's plays, intended as a guide for the general reader.
John Henderson (1747–1785) was an English actor who played many Shakespearean and other roles. He first acted in Bath, where he was known as "The Bath Roscius", and then in London. Had he not died young he would have been remembered as a worthy successor to David Garrick.
Richard "Dicky" Suett, was an English comedian who was George III's favourite Shakespearean clown, and star at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane for twenty-five years.
Mary Amelia Warner, best known by her stage name Mrs Warner, was an English actress and theatre manager.
John Michael Vandenhoff was an English actor. He performed in London theatres, and also in Edinburgh and Liverpool; he played leading roles including those in Shakespearean tragedy.
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