On the Stage: Studies of Theatrical History and the Actor's Art, Volume 1S. Low, Marston, Searle, and Rivington, 1883 - Acting |
Other editions - View all
On the Stage: Studies of Theatrical History and the Actor's Art;, Volume 2 Dutton Cook No preview available - 2019 |
On the Stage: Studies of Theatrical History and the Actor's Art; Volume I Dutton Cook No preview available - 2023 |
Common terms and phrases
Aaron Hill action actor actress adapters admired appear applause audience ballet Baron de Grimm Beaumont and Fletcher better burletta character Charles Charles Kean Cibber comedian comedy comic Covent Garden critic dancing Davenant door doubt drama dramatist Drury Lane Dryden dumb-show English stage entertainments exhibitions express eyes face famous Fletcher Français French Garrick gentleman gesture Ghost Hamlet hand harlequin histrionic imitate Junius Brutus Booth Kean King lady Le Malade Imaginaire Lear licence London Lord Lord Chamberlain Macbeth Macready manager manner Marylebone Gardens ment Molière nature never night opera Othello pantomime passion patent patent theatres performance person piece players playgoers playwright poet Preceptor present produced profession properties Queen Quincey Reader of Plays represent representation ridiculous scene seemed Shake Shakespeare sort speak spectators speech stage-doors theatre Théâtre Français theatrical Thespian tion tragedian tragedy voice wont word writes wrote
Popular passages
Page 207 - A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your actors by the scroll Masters, spread yourselves.
Page 91 - Their plays are now the most pleasant and frequent entertainments of the stage; two of theirs being acted through the year for one of Shakespeare's or Jonson's...
Page 131 - Then the scenes I had to go through !— the authors, and the authoresses, and the milliners, and the wild Irishmen, — the people from Brighton, from Blackwall, from Chatham, from Cheltenham, from Dublin, from Dundee, — who came in upon me ! to all of whom it was proper to give a civil answer, and a hearing, and a reading. Mrs. Glover's father, an Irish dancing-master of sixty years, called upon me to request to play Archer...
Page 67 - He fought like one drunk with wounds : and the attitude in which he stands with his hands stretched out, after his sword is taken from him, had a preternatural and terrific grandeur, as if his will could not be disarmed, and the very phantoms of his despair had a .withering power.
Page 268 - All I can say for those passages, which are, I hope, not many, is, that I knew they were bad enough to please, even when I writ them...
Page 218 - Mar-all practised upon his mistress ; for though they flew in sight, the music proceeded from a concert of flageolets and bird-calls, which were planted behind the scenes. At the same time I made this discovery, I found by the discourse of the actors, that there were great designs on foot for the improvement of the Opera ; that it had been proposed to break down a part of the wall, and to surprise the audience...
Page 217 - Charles's time have laughed to have seen Nicolini exposed to a tempest in robes of ermine, and sailing in an open boat upon a sea of pasteboard? What a field of raillery would they have been let into, had they been entertained with painted dragons spitting wild-fire, enchanted chariots drawn by Flanders mares, and real cascades in artificial landskips...
Page 211 - ... in the other; for if you should bestow your person upon the vulgar when the belly of the house is but half full, your...
Page 169 - Concealing herself till the scene in which Ophelia makes her appearance in her insane state, she pushed on to the stage before her who played the character that night, and exhibited a far more perfect representation of madness than the utmost exertions of mimic art could do. She was in truth Ophelia's self, to the amazement of the performers as well as of the audience. Nature having made this last effort, her vital powers failed her.
Page 92 - Let any man, who understands English, read diligently the works of Shakespeare and Fletcher, and I dare undertake, that he will find in every page either some solecism of speech, or some notorious flaw in sense.