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Roger Kemble (1 March 1721 – 6 December 1802) was an English theatre manager, strolling player and actor. In 1753, he married Irish actress Sarah "Sally" Ward (1735–1806) at Cirencester in Gloucestershire, and they had thirteen children, who formed the Kemble family of 19th-century actors and actresses.
Roger Kemble was born in Hereford, a grand-nephew of Fr John Kemble, a recusant priest, who was hanged in that city in 1679. Kemble first entered the theatre by joining Smith's company at Canterbury in 1752. While he was there it was agreed that he would marry Fanny Furnival and although she appeared as "Mrs Kemble" it is thought that they never married. Furnival and Kemble then moved to Birmingham under the management of John Ward, [1] whose daughter Kemble would eventually marry.
Upon Ward's retirement, Roger took on his first management position by taking over the management of the theatre at Leominster in 1766. He formed a traveling theatrical company soon after his marriage to Sarah Ward, and subsequently she and their children toured with the company for the next fifteen years.
Five of Kemble's children and many of his grandchildren became famous actors. The oldest of their twelve children, Sarah Siddons, became the most famous. She first appeared as Ariel in The Tempest with her father's company in Coventry in 1766. In 1767 the actor William Siddons joined the company whom Sarah married in 1773, returning to the stage as Mrs. Siddons.
As primarily a theatre manager, Roger Kemble never became as famous as his children, although he scored a success at London's Haymarket Theatre where in 1788 he appeared as Falstaff in Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1 and in the Miller of Mansfield.
There is a plaque commemorating Kemble's Hereford birthplace at 28-29 Church Street and Kemble Road in London's Forest Hill is named after him.
Dorothea Jordan was an Anglo-Irish actress, as well as a courtesan. She was the long-time partner of Prince William, Duke of Clarence, and the mother of 10 illegitimate children by him, all of whom took the surname FitzClarence. She was known professionally as Dorothea Francis and Dorothea Jordan, was informally Dora Jordan, and she was commonly referred to as Mrs Jordan and Mrs FitzClarence.
Sarah Siddons was a Welsh actress, the best-known tragedienne of the 18th century. Contemporaneous critic William Hazlitt dubbed Siddons as "tragedy personified".
Charles Kemble was a Welsh actor of a prominent theatre family.
George Stephen Kemble was a successful English theatre manager, actor, and writer, and a member of the famous Kemble family. He was described as "the best Sir John Falstaff which the British stage ever saw" though he also played title roles in Hamlet and King Lear among others. He published plays, poetry and non-fiction.
Frances Anne Kemble was a British actress from a theatre family in the early and mid-nineteenth century. She was a well-known and popular writer and abolitionist whose published works included plays, poetry, eleven volumes of memoirs, travel writing, and works about the theatre. She lived for many years in the United States, primarily in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Lenox, Massachusetts.
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.
Kemble is the name of a family of English actors, who reigned over the English stage for many decades. The most famous were Sarah Siddons (1755–1831) and her brother John Philip Kemble (1757–1823), the two eldest of the twelve children of Roger Kemble (1721–1802), a strolling player and manager of the Warwickshire Company of Comedians, who in 1753 married an actress, Sarah Ward. Roger Kemble was born in Hereford, and was a grand-nephew of Father John Kemble, a recusant Catholic priest, who was hanged in that city in 1679. Three younger children of Roger, Stephen Kemble (1758–1822), Charles Kemble (1775–1854), and Elizabeth Whitlock (1761–1836), were also actors, while Ann Hatton was a novelist.
The Old American Company was an American theatre company. It was the first fully professional theatre company to perform in North America. It also played a vital role in the theatre history of Jamaica. It was founded in 1752 and disbanded in 1805. It was known as the Hallam Company (1752–1758), the American Company (1758–1785) and the Old American Company (1785–1805). With a few temporary exceptions, the Company enjoyed a de facto monopoly of professional theatre in the United States until 1790.
Tate Wilkinson was an English actor and manager.
George Frederick Cooke was an English actor. As famous for his erratic habits as for his acting, he was largely responsible for initiating the romantic style in acting that was later made famous by Edmund Kean.
Dame Madge Kendal was an English actress of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, best known for her roles in Shakespeare and English comedies. Together with her husband, W. H. Kendal , she became an important theatre manager.
Mary Ann Davenport [née Harvey] was a British Shakespearean actress.
The history of the Theatre Royal, Edinburgh involves two sites. The first building, on Princes Street, opened 1769 and was rebuilt in 1830 by Thomas Hosmer Shepherd. The second site was on Broughton Street.
Ellen Kean was an English actress. She was known as Ellen Tree until her marriage in 1842, after which she was known both privately and professionally as Mrs Charles Kean and always appeared in productions together with her husband.
The Warwickshire Company of Comedians, also known as Mr Ward's Company of Comedians and after 1767 as Mr Kemble's Company of Comedians, was a theatre company established by John Ward in Birmingham, England in the 1740s, touring throughout the West Midlands region and surrounding counties over subsequent decades. Unusual in the 18th century as a provincial company producing performances to London tastes and standards, it is particularly notable as the origin of the Kemble family theatrical dynasty, which was to dominate the English stage in the late-18th and early 19th centuries. Sarah Siddons and John Philip Kemble in particular, who were Ward's grandchildren and whose careers began in the company, were the leading actress and actor of their time, and are still considered among the greatest performers in English theatrical history.
Sarah Bartley (1783–1850) was a British actress who began her career when she was 16.
Priscilla Kemble was an English actress. The English actor John Philip Kemble was her third and last husband.
Fanny Robertson, born Frances Mary Ross, was an actress and later the manager of the provincial theatres of the Lincoln Circuit.
Mary Elmy born Mary Morse was a British actress who appeared in roles at leading theatres in Dublin and London. She led a long life and she was noted for her role of Gertrude appearing with Spranger Barry in Hamlet.
Elizabeth "Fanny" Furnival or "Mrs Kemble" was a British actress and singer who appeared in theatres in London and Dublin. She notably took the role of Hamlet in 1741. She lost a vendetta with George Anne Bellamy. She appeared as "Mrs Kemble" but Roger Kemble married another.
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