THE THEATRES.
THE first short and unprofitable season of Mr. MACREADY'S manage- ment of Drury Lane terminated on Monday, with Mr. ANDERSON'S bold attempt at Othello; which seems to have been a creditable effort of painstaking propriety. The house was crowded ; and Mr. MACREADY, on appearing at the call of the audience, was greeted with acclamations loud and long-continued ; showing that, whatever his pecuniary loss, he bad lost nothing of public favour. The tone of his address, which is given below, is hopeful, and even sanguine, notwithstanding the frank confession that he had been "forced to a premature close," and the im- plied uncertainty of his continuing the management. "Ladies and gentlemen, the first season of our experiment.towards 'restor- ing to this theatre its legitimate dramatic representations' will conclude this evening. In my opening address, to which I whit to refer, I observed that 'circumstances compelled me to defer our opening beyond the customary period.' These same circumstances have continued to weigh unceasingly upon my most strenuous efforts, and have at length forced me to a premature close. These circumstances, it is fit to state, refer to the condition into which this property has been suffered to fall. Without at present reflecting further uplin the difficulties which, from this cause alone, have been accumulated upon me, I would merely observe, that, considerable as has been the amount of means and labour expended, they have hitherto been insufficient to place the theatre in what may not improperly be termed 'a working state '; and further time, exertion, and outlay, are needed to produce variety of performances with re- quisite celerity and completeness.
"Still, to those interested in the success of this undertaking, it may be gra- tifying to learn, that the results of the present season, under all its disadvan-
tages, afford no grounds fur despondency they have, indeed, tended to strengthen my hope, and give additiodal confidence to my faith in the vitality of our English drama, the noblest the world has known. The name of Risk- spere still retains the full potency of its charm, and we have proved that we have national music to satisfy the frequenters of a national theatre. "From the signs of the past I draw my auguries of the future; and if I should continue in the direction of this theatre, I shall, without bating one jot of heart or hope,' endeavour to work out to their fullest extent the purposes with which I entered on it—keeping ever in view, as the guide, of my pro- ceedings, that the exclusive patent of a theatre is a delegated trust for the in- terests of the drama and the advantage of the public.
"It is my duty, ladies and gentlemen, to return you the hest thanks of my brother performers; it is a grateful pleasure with theirs to offer you my own.'
Let us glance at those "signs of the past" from which Mr. MACREA.DY draws his " auguries of the future." The great card of the season was Acts and Galatea ; a classic spectacle, which probably owed more of its success to STANFLELD'S pencil and MACREA.DY'S taste than even to HANDEL'S music or Gar's poetry. JERROLD'S lively two-act piece, The Prisoner of War, and the farce of The Windmill, were the only other pieces that proved completely successful ; and both owed much to the peculiarities of Mr. and Mrs. KEELEY as performers. Of the two five. act plays, Gisippus, notwithstanding the surpassing beauty of the scenery and costumes, and the praises lavished upon the drama and the acting, was not permanently attractive; and Plighted Troth was a signal failure. The revivals of SHAKSPERE'S Two Gentlemen of Verona and Mrs. INCH- BALD'S Every One has his Fault were not popular ; and of those stock favourites Macbeth and Hamlet, the former, which seldom fails of draw- ing an audience by the combined attraction of LOCKE'S music and the stirring interest of the action, was backed up by the performance of Acis and Galatea as an afterpiece. Thus the catalogue of' triumphs is limited to musical spectacle and light comic pieces; which, though well suited to a larp theatre, where sound, show, and broad drollery can be best appreciated, are not precisely the kind of drama to promote and uphold which is the ostensible object of the patents held by Drury Lane and Covent Garden.
These remarks are assuredly not made in an invidious spirit, or with any intention of disparaging the present management of Drury Lane: they are called for as affording fresh evidences of the failure of the Great Theatres to accomplish the purpose for which their exclusive right to perform the "legitimate drama" is assumed to have been bestowed on the proprietors. Even under the management of such a man as .MACREADY—Vi hose personal character and private influence-a- whose zeal and devotion to the cause of the Shaksperian drama—whose experience, energy, and taste in stage-direction, have contributed not only to extend his own reputation as an actor, but to raise his profes- sion in public estimation—Drury Lane has been unsuccessful. An universal blight has fallen on theatrical affairs: in the Provinces and in the Metropolis the prospects are alike dreary. The theatres of Dublin, Edinburgh, and Plymouth, each of them conducted by expe- rienced managers, respected in their vocation, have been closed within the last three months, avowedly for want of encouragement ; empty benches yawned on the efforts of the performers, and empty treasuries returned hollow sounds to the application of lessees. Since Mr. and Mrs. MALONE Rummy, of the Liverpool Theatre, are engaged at the Haymarket, we may conclude that Liverpool is no exception to the general rule. Even the Haymarket, which, under the management of Mr. WEBSTER, has been the most profitable of the London houses, has of late been less prosperous than usual, in consequence of its two huge rivals monopolizing all the best acting talent ; and though the Surrey Minors and Sadler's Wells may have continued to flourish, the Minors round Covent Garden, not excepting even the Adelphi, have shared the general depression.
The revelation of the state of affairs behind the curtain at Covent Garden, which the insolvency of the late lessee has made public, tat enforce the lesson taught by the previous experiences of Messrs. Paws, Posama., Butur, and FLutramen, at Drury Lane, that the readiest road to rain is through the portals of a patent theatre. To all outward appearance, the three seasons during which Covent Garden was under the management of Madame VESTRIS were brilliantly successful ; the last season, notwithstanding one or two failures, preeminently so, by reason of Miss ADELALDE Keiantar's popularity. But what are the facts ? Let the following statement of the receipts and expenditure of the respective seasons answer.
Receipts during the first season £48,673 17 6 Expenditure in the same period 52,903 1 2
The season was 199 nights, averaging 244/. a night, whilst the ex- penditure was 266/.; showing a nightly loss of 221.
Second season—Total Receipts 149,227 6 4
Expenditure 51,440 4 7 Being 221 nights, showing a loss of 10/. a night Third season, ending April 29—Receipts 142,535 17 0 Expenditure 55,691 8 9 The season was 165 nights, averaging 216/. a night, whilst the expenses were 2581.; showing a nightly loss of 41/. 14s. Total losses during the three seasons £13,286 16 2 Thus it appears, that the most successful of the three seasons was productive of an average nightly loss of 101.; and that the past season, notwithstanding Miss KEMBLE'S triumphant career, averaged a loss of 41/ 14s. nightly. The sums sank by the late management in proper- ties—such as machinery, wardrobe, furniture, this last alone being no inconsiderable item in these days of stage-upholstery—are estimated at from 12,000/. to 14,000/. Madame VESTRIS, to be sure, has a taste as costly as elegant ; which she indulged sometimes to a degree of super- fluity, by providing costly realities to adorn pageants when cheaper semblances would have answered the purpose ; but, though this pro- fusion must have greatly increased the outlay, it could scarcely have been the sole or principal cause of the heavy losses recorded. The style in which plays are produced by Mr. MACREA.Dy is little less costly ; though he more judiciously combines economy with splen- dour. The spectacles of Acm and Galatea and Gm:ppm both showed evidences of design as complete works of scenic art, each impressing the mind as an entire whole, made up of various parts having a proper relation to each other and to the general plan. In this particular Mr. Macarasnr's management is unrivalled. Spectacle has become an essential accessory, if not a principal, in stage representations, whether on a large or a small theatre. This is only one effect, and not the worst, of the patent monopoly. The aggran- dizement of the theatres, by increasing the size and rent of the build- ing and the nightly expense of the establishment, makes a larger au- dience indispensable to cover the current expenses, and prevent the vast area from appearing half-empty. Something wonderful must be an- nounced to force full houses, and all means were resorted to for crush- ing rivalry : performers of repute were engaged by one house that the other might not have the attraction of their names ; and thus an accu- mulation of talent was made at a vast expense and with no proportion- ate return, since it often happened that one actor stood in another's way, while yet the company was imperfect from the like procedure on the part of the opposition-concern. The deficiency of completeness in the representation of any one of the various kinds of performances that each of the Great Houses professed to give, led to the " star" system ; from which it was hoped, by puffing into prodigious importance some one performer, to make the world believe in the advent of a new marvel: the vaunted wonder must needs be paid exorbitantly, and so the cost of the " star" was added to that of three or four incomplete companies for tragedy, comedy, opera, and pantomime. Still it was only now and then, as in the instance of EDMUND KEAN, that the star shone for more than a season or two. All sorts of absurdities have been resorted to by turns,—live elephants and horses, dogs and monkies, lions and tigers—real water, real fire, real armour—obese Falstaffs, Negro Othellos, Juliets warranted juvenile : all the humbug of show- manship, in short, has been practised to lure people to fill the huge Patent Theatres. Yet all the while, lessees followed one another to the manager's last resting-place, the King's Bench, in quick succession ; and renters annually deplored the "decline of the drama," and the in- crease of Minor Theatres, who invaded their patent privilege.
These are the effects of monopoly on those who should have profited by it in a pecuniary sense: what has it done for the drama ? The im- mense size of the two Great Houses has degraded tragedians to ranting gesticulators or solemn stalking-horses of Roman robes, and comedians to mere mountebanks and buffoons ; it has banished poetry from the stage, and intellectual audiences from the theatres. Nothing will do now but "strong effects " ; and the actor who can rave loudest, stamp hardest, stare fiercest, and grimace widest, takes the town by storm, until the "sound and fury" wearies from the very monotony of violence. So accustomed are audiences to be "fillipped with a three-man beetle," that any tragic coups de theatre less potent are accounted insufficient : stage-indignation is discharged double-shotted, bursts of pathos explode like a mine, tenderness sighs like a blast-furnace, and hugs with the gripe of a boa-constrictor ; stage-laughter goes into convulsions, the roar of
.grief is stunning, common earnestness is boisterous, and angry parley fairly splits the ears. In fine, the school of acting is completely vulgarized ; coarseness passes for strength, impudence for gayety, and over-elaboration for finish.
So much for the effect of the patent monopoly on actors : what has it done for the dramatists, on whom it depends to make the stage "hold the mirror up to nature "? The petition of all the popular dra- matists against the monopoly of the Patent Theatres, presented by Lord MastoN to the House of Commons this week, is sufficient answer to that question ; or if not, we have only to point to the present condition of dramatic literature, and the five-act failures and French farces that the Great Theatres produce. The depressed state of theatrical affairs is commonly attributed to the altered taste of the public, and to "late dinners" ; which have an in- fluence, doubtless, though of limited extent. If there is any thing really worth seeing at the theatre, be it a new actor, a splendid spectacle, or a striking play, the house is crowded : but we have home resources that our forefathers had not, and a much greater variety of amusements to tempt us abroad. The theatre has ceased to be a mere fashion : vi- siters must be attracted by novelty and excellence combined—or what passes for excellence. The masses, too, who frequent the galleries, have a taste ; and, whatever the entertainment, it must be the best of
its kind, be it Jack Sheppard or Macbeth—The White Cat or Jim Crow—to -induce them to pay their money ; for they can be entertained gratis at the next public-house while enjoying their pot and pipe, or the coffee-shop with its supply of periodicals invites the steady and sober.
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