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Season of 1707-08 Is One of the Strangest and Most Interesting of the T Whole Eighteenth Century

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Season of 1707-08 Is One of the Strangest and Most Interesting of the T Whole Eighteenth Century Season of 1707-1708 he season of 1707-08 is one of the strangest and most interesting of the T whole eighteenth century. The strained and unstable situation created in October 1706 manifestly could not last, but what would replace it? The management of Drury Lane changed significantly for the first time since 1693 when Sir Thomas Skipwith gave away his share to Colonel Henry Brett (a decision he subsequently regretted and managed to rescind).1 For the pre- sent, Christopher Rich was saddled with an energetic and innovation-minded partner—and one who was friendly with the actors, Colley Cibber in par- ticular. Whether Brett and Rich could coexist, and whether Brett could keep the performers happy, remained to be seen. The Queen’s Theatre, meanwhile, was marking time during the autumn under the management of Owen Swiney, awaiting the results of Vanbrugh’s machinations. It offered un- adorned plays, feebly opposed by Drury Lane’s tattered remnant of a com- pany, which held a temporary monopoly on opera as well as on the presenta- tion of song and dance in plays. Vanbrugh had been convinced by 1704 that big money was to be made in opera—and particularly in opera of the new Italian variety. The highly profi- table success of Arsinoe and Camilla at Drury Lane in 1705 and 1706 had confirmed him (and many others) in this delusion. What Vanbrugh really wanted was a single-company monopoly on all theatrical entertainments. He had settled for a genre split in 1706, but wanted the musical half, not the dramatic half. He was clearly determined to seize control of the opera, even at the price of losing the right to perform plays. Probably not coincidentally, Rich found his singers in a state of open mutiny by mid-autumn 1707 (see entries for 15, 18, and ca. late November). Without any agreement and long before the Lord Chamberlain issued formal orders, Vanbrugh was tendering offers to singers and lining up an opera orchestra. Among his notes is a document labelled “Heads of ye Proposall for ye year for ye several Perform- 1 For the transfer to Brett, see 6 October. 372 SEASON 1707-1708 373 ers”: “To sing at ye Theatre in ye Haymarket twice a week for a year, to commence at Christmas 1707.”2 Vanbrugh was counting on Lord Chamber- lain Kent’s cooperation, clearly signalled in Kent’s order of 1 December 1707 permitting fourteen important orchestral musicians “to perform in the Operas at the Queens Theatre in the Haymarkett” (LC 5/154, p. 288). The infighting was protracted and bitter, with the opera performers walking out of adver- tised performances at Drury Lane in November and Rich successfully pre- venting them from participating in an advertised performance at the Queen’s Theatre on 9 December. Rich must have known that the Lord Chamberlain was against him, and the combination of a weak acting company (see 11 Octo- ber) and rebellious singers made his position untenable. He managed, how- ever, to stall and argue long enough to force highly advantageous terms out of Vanbrugh and Kent. What Rich gained from the Lord Chamberlain’s order of 31 December (LC 5/254, pp. 299-300) was a monopoly on the performance of plays—some- thing he had lost at the time of the 1694 actors’ rebellion and had long de- spaired of ever regaining. Theatre historians call Kent’s decree the “Order of Union” because it enforced the amalgamation of the two acting companies and returned all actors to Drury Lane. This was indeed a byproduct of Van- brugh’s successful politicking, but the decree was conceived and motivated not in terms of joining the acting companies but as a genre separation that would definitively disentangle opera from straight plays. If Vanbrugh were correct in his idea of the profitability of opera, then he would be able to coin money out of a private goldmine, free of annoying competition from another musical company. The actors must have been far from pleased at being summarily returned to the employment of Christopher Rich, but no doubt they were promised protection by Kent and they could hope that Brett would be a mitigating influence. No actor protests are recorded, however sour the actors’ private opinions of Rich. Vanbrugh quickly discovered that the results of his brilliant maneuver- ing were not at all what he intended. Singers capable of performing credi- tably in opera were in short supply, and since they were not under contract to anyone they were free to demand any salaries that fancy or rapacity might suggest. Vanbrugh had acquired his monopoly, but without singers the Queen’s Theatre would have to remain dark. In early January he argued, cajoled, made counter-offers, and begged the Lord Chamberlain’s assistance in pressuring the performers to accept reasonable terms—to no end. A sub- stantial cross-section of Vanbrugh’s correspondence and many of his foul pa- pers are preserved in various libraries and have been published in Vice Chamberlain Coke’s Theatrical Papers (excerpts printed under date below). In them one can trace Vanbrugh’s dawning realization that he would be forced to accept grossly inflated salaries and that receipts would come no- where near covering them. By early April he concluded that only massive 2 Coke Papers, no. 15. 374 SEASON 1707-1708 subsidy from the Queen could set the operation on a sound financial basis. He begged persistently for such help, but entirely without results: Anne may not have been ill-disposed, but her interest in theatre was scant and her interest in opera perhaps even less. By early May Vanbrugh had given up and bailed out. He made an honorable effort to pay as many bills as he could, but sala- ries had been set at levels double what the company’s receipts could meet. Vanbrugh’s letter about the fiasco to the Earl of Manchester on 27 July 1708 points to several causes of the disaster: the mid-season start; the Lord Cham- berlain’s “Supposition that there wou’d be Immence gain” keeping him from opposing the singers’ demands for “Extravagant Allowances”; similar beliefs on the part of “the Towne” causing them to refuse to “come into Any Sub- scription.” Vanbrugh was honest, intelligent, and well-intentioned, but he was also misguided and drastically under-capitalized. If the public could be persuaded to accept far higher prices or would subscribe for tickets to expen- sive new productions, then perhaps the books could be balanced. Owen Swiney had some capital and thought he could make the opera pay; Van- brugh was extremely relieved to hand the whole operation over to him, claiming only the annual rent due for use of his theatre. In retrospect, the opera company’s flop in the spring of 1708 seems to- tally predictable. Opera was performed only twice a week, but with a com- pany able to perform only opera there was simply not enough repertory to keep the audience interested for forty to fifty nights (Vanbrugh’s projected total). The terms of the union-cum-genre-separation (and the resulting na- ture of Vanbrugh’s company) made production of semi-opera impossible: he had no actors for spoken parts. Arsinoe might have been resurrected, but be- yond that no all-sung operas existed in English. The only way to expand the repertory was to gamble on mounting new works, which was not only risky but extremely expensive. In the event, Vanbrugh was so short of cash that he never tried a second new opera but simply terminated his season when he ran out of money. The company gave only five performances after the first of April. Little is known of affairs at Drury Lane in the spring of 1708. The situa- tion cannot have been comfortable: old lawsuits between Rich and previously disgruntled actors continued in the courts (see 22 January 1708). Outwardly the company went about its business quietly and competently. The one managerial document that survives is an agreement of 31 March 1708 in which Brett appointed Wilks, Cibber, and Estcourt co-managers. One of the clauses in this grant is a provision that the patentees would take between one-third and one-half of benefit receipts from the proceeds earned by actors and actresses with salaries under 50s. per week (which meant, in practice, from most actors’ benefits). Wilks, Cibber, and Estcourt appear to have agreed cheerfully enough to this gouging of their less fortunate colleagues, but when the Drury Lane management attempted to implement the provision the next season, the result was bitter protest and the silencing of the com- pany. SEASON 1707-1708 375 Vanbrugh’s fiasco must have been widely known among Londoners, for the failure of his opera company was manifest. Probably only theatrical in- siders knew the state of affairs at Drury Lane, and there is no way to tell how soon word of the new benefit arrangements leaked out—quite possibly not until the spring of 1709. Brett’s agreement with the actors boded ill for any hope that he would restrain Christopher Rich. And Rich’s stormy history as patentee suggested that restoring his monopoly could only lead to trouble. DRURY LANE (acting company through 10 January 1708) Rich’s patent company—what was left of it—managed to mount 42 perform- ances between mid-October and mid-January. They gave 24 different plays, virtually all of them repertory warhorses (The Committee, Rule a Wife, The Spanish Fryar), plus a recent success (The Recruiting Officer), and nine nights of semi-opera (when Rich could persuade his recalcitrant singers to perform).
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