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burletta
(It. ‘little joke’).Type of Eng. mus. farce which had a vogue in late 18th/early 19th cent. First of its kind was Midas by Kane O'Hara, perf. Belfast 1760 and at CG 1964.
Charles Morton
(1819–1904),early and extremely able music-hall manager, who from his association with the early pioneering days of music-hall was known as ‘the father of the halls’. He opened the first ...
Dramatic Performances Act
British colonial act to control Indian theatre through a process of licensing, censorship, and banning of plays. After 1872, when Dinabandhu Mitra's incendiary Nil Darpan (Indigo Mirror) initiated ...
Edinburgh
The capital of Scotland, is an ancient settlement, archaeological evidence pushing its history back over 4,000 years. A fine defensive site, the growth of the city stretched from the castle to ...
Edward Bulwer-Lytton
(1803–73)English playwright, politician, and novelist. In Parliament Bulwer chaired the 1832 Select Committee which was responsible for a bill to allow any licenced theatre to play any kind of ...
Goodman's Fields Theatre
A minor theatre in the East End of London, which opened in 1729 against fierce opposition from the patent managers and their city backers. Actor-manager Henry Giffard rebuilt the theatre ...
Hallam family
The Hallams were a well-known theatrical family in early eighteenth-century London. Adam Hallam regularly maintained a booth in Bartholomew Fair and appears as a character tumbling from a platform in ...
Haymarket Theatre
Playhouse at one time located in the Haymarket, London, but not to be confused with the existing Theatre Royal, Haymarket. Originally the Queen's Theatre, it was built by John Vanbrugh ...
legitimate drama
—sometimes abbreviated to ‘legit’—term which arose in the 18th century during the struggle of the Patent Theatres Covent Garden and Drury Lane against the illegitimate playhouses springing up all ...
licensing acts Reference library
Jane Moody
The Oxford Encyclopedia of Theatre and Performance
The Stage Licensing Act (1737) transformed the regulation of theatre in Britain and established a system for dramatic ...
licensing acts Reference library
The Companion to Theatre and Performance
The Stage Licensing Act (1737) transformed the regulation of theatre in Britain and established a system for dramatic ...
Lord Chamberlain
A senior official of the royal household, immediately superior to the Master of the Revels, in charge of all Court entertainments. See LORD CHAMBERLAIN'S MEN.
minor theatres
London theatres of the first 40 years of the nineteenth century operating under a special licence. At the end of the eighteenth century playhouses in London holding a royal patent—Drury ...
patent theatres
The Theatres Royal, Drury Lane and Covent Garden, which operate under Letters Patent, or Charters, given by Charles II in 1662 to Thomas Killigrew for Drury Lane and Sir William ...
penny theatres
Also called ‘gaffs’, penny theatres were common in the poorer districts of many Victorian cities. Gaffs were a permanent feature for the nineteenth-century inhabitants of London's New Cut, ...
producer
American term for the man responsible for the financial side of play-production, for the buying of the play, the renting of the theatre, the engagement of actors and staff, and ...
Samuel Foote
(1720–77),actor and playwright: b. and grows up in Truro; educ. Worcester and Oxford (Worcester College); d. in Dover; buried in London (Westminster Abbey); memorial in Dover.
Samuel Phelps
(1804–78)English actor and manager. Phelps began his career as a strolling player, and then joined the York circuit in 1826. In 1837 he first appeared in London at the ...
Society of Authors
An organization founded in 1884 by W. Besant to promote the business interests of authors and fight for their rights, especially in copyright. It conducted a successful 28‐year campaign for Public ...
theatre Royal
Term applied to the two London theatres, Covent Garden and Drury Lane, which operate under Letters Patent granted by Charles II in 1662. These Patent Theatres originally had a monopoly ...
