Christopher Rich (theater manager)

Christopher Rich (* 1657 ; † November 4, 1714 ) was a theater operator in London in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.

Act

Previously working as a lawyer, Rich acquired a share of the Theater Royal on Drury Lane on March 24, 1688 from Alexander D'Avenant , who owned the theater together with Charles Killigrew , son of the builder and patent holder Thomas Killigrew. The tasks of the management included from 1693 also the administration and operation of the smaller but older Dorset Garden Theater .

From 1693 Christopher Rich also took over the management of the United Company theater company (and thus the management of the Dorset Garden Theater). However, his autocratic methods were so controversial that actors such as Thomas Betterton , Elizabeth Barry and Anne Bracegirdle rebelled.

Theater Royal Drury Lane

By 1692 the theater had amassed £ 800 in debt . Audience numbers fell and the actors became more dissatisfied. At this point, Alexander Davenant and Charles Killigrew decided to cut the actors' salaries , streamline the organization and make the company profitable again. However, funds must have been embezzled at the same time, as Alexander Davenant was soon suspected of this and fled to the Canary Islands in 1693. So, Rich, now a senior manager, tried to continue the efforts that had been made to restore the theater to health. However, he showed little skill in leading people. He not only saved on the fees, but also played the actors off against each other. He has been described as "as sly a Tyrant as ever was at the Head of a Theater" ("as cunning as a tyrant as he was ever at the head of a theater"). By 1695 the actors, including manager and acting legend Thomas Betterton, were so estranged and humiliated that they - nine actors and six actresses - left the house and founded their own theater company.

A pamphlet of unknown origin described it at the time: “The disparity was so great after the departure that it was almost impossible on Drury Lane to raise enough numbers to fill all the roles in a play; and so few of them were bearable that a piece which was not particularly favored by the public had to be panned out of necessity. No fewer than sixteen (most of the old tried and tested) left; and with them the best and strongest on the stage; Those who remained were learners, boys and girls, a very poor compensation for those who revolted. "

Competition and "theater war"

The theater monopoly of the Theater Royal in Drury Lane, which had existed in London since the United Company operating there, was broken when Betterton received and received a patent for the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theater (now a ballroom , a kind of tennis hall), which had been abandoned as a theater 20 years ago after it was dismantled into a theater, it opened on April 30, 1695 with William Congreves Love for Love and was also very successful.

Betterton then announced a new production of Hamlet for the following Tuesday (May 3rd) - a play in the lead role of which he had previously enjoyed great success. Rich responded by scheduling Hamlet for the previous Monday at the Theater Royal Drury Lane. In order not to fall behind, Betterton announced that his "Hamlet" will now also premiere on Monday. In order not to risk two Hamlets and corresponding shortfalls in sales on the same evening, which Drury Lane simply could not afford at the time, Rich gave in and announced a remake of Congreve's hit "The Double Dealer". Not wanting to hear of an agreement between the now rival theater companies, Rich worked instead on redesigning Drury Lane. From 1700 he was advised by the actor Colley Cibber , who received a five-year contract for acting and management. Rich also predicted the imminent end of the competing theater company. This did not happen, of course, and in 1705 Betterton and his troupe moved to the Queen's Theater on Haymarket, which was newly built by actor John Vanbrugh . Vanbrugh suffered an opera ( Gli amori d'Ergasto ) loss and then supported the house with other operas and plays. In October 1706, however, Vanbrugh was forced to sell shares in the theater to Rich's agent Owen Swiney , who brought a group of actors from Drury Lane with him, for a period of 14 years . This is remarkable in that Swiney was himself in debt and was considered an employee of Rich.

“The real truth was, that he [Rich] had a mind both companies should be clandestinely under one and the same interest; and yet in so loose a manner, that he might declare his verbal agreement with Swiney good, or null and void, as he might best find his account in either. "

“The truth was, he [Rich] planned that both companies should be secretly under the same interest. And yet so loosely that he could validate his verbal agreement with Swiney or declare it null and void, so he could get his greatest advantage out of both. "

- Colley Cibber

The three London theaters (Drury Lane, Dorset Garden and Haymarket) were thus for a time under the de facto direction of Christopher Rich.

Professional decline

One of the main owners, Sir Thomas Skipwith, who invested early on in the Dorset Garden Theater, sold half of his stake in the Theater Royal Drury Lane to the theater-loving Colonel and politician Henry Brett in 1707. He used his personal influence with Lord Chamberlain , Henry Gray, 1st Duke of Kent , to advance a favorite project of Cibbers, which should enable the theater troupes of Drury Lane to merge with the Cibbers at the Haymarket Theater. On December 31 of that year, Gray issued an edict restricting Haymarket to opera performances under Swiney's direction and ordering Rich's actors back to the Drury Lane spoken theater stage. At about the same time, Swiney also became completely estranged from Rich. On January 15, 1708, the two theater companies Haymarket and Drury Lane performed together in Hamlet on Drury Lane. However, this coming together did not satisfy anyone. On March 31, 1708, Brett transferred his share of the patent to Robert Wilks, Richard Estcourt and Colley Cibber, and they immediately planned a new spin-off.

Rich also got involved in those special performances that were only allowed a few times a year, the proceeds of which could be paid out directly to the participating actors, the so-called Benefit Performances . These contractual agreements were only agreed orally and were disregarded by the patent owners of Drury Lane under Rich. They denied any actor this benefit performance until he or she signed a paper guaranteeing payment of a third of this performance to the theater owners. The actors appealed to the Lord Chamberlain and the patent owners were then instructed to satisfy plaintiffs' claims. The patent holders refused and the theater was then forbidden on June 6, 1709 to bring further performances on the stage. This closure was to last until 1712. Rich ran an ad claiming actors Wilks, Betterton, Estcourt, Cibber, John Mills and Anne Oldfield received just under £ 2,000. Rich, along with the patent owners, petitioned Queen Anne , citing their complaints against Lord Chamberlain, who refused to make amends for the closure. Some actors also did so in their own petition. Wilks, Thomas Dogget, Cibber, and Mrs. Oldfield did not join the petition; they had decided to move to Swiney on Haymarket, where they opened on September 15, 1709 with Othello .

Rich continued to sign Barton Booth and other actors. William Collier , one of the patent owners, applied for and received a license and was able to secure a lease for Drury Lane. Since there were no performances, Rich did not pay the rent, but retained access to the theater. In doing so, he is said to have stripped the theater of anything movable that he could get hold of. In the satirical magazine Tatler of July 15, 1709 (issue 42) Richard Steele published a mocking listing of "movables" by Christopher Rich, Esquire of the palace in Drury Lane. There are such things as a rainbow, a little faded; a sentence with clouds in the French fashion, streaked with lightning; Roxana's nightgown, Othello's handkerchief, the imperial garments of Xerxes, worn only once, a sword with a basket handle, very practical for carrying milk and the like; a snake to bite Cleopatra […] ”Collier took possession of the house on November 22nd, 1709. A humorous account of these events can be found in The Tatler, No. 99 of November 26th, 1709, in which Rich, introduced under the name Divito , is said to have “wounded all adversaries with so much skill that men even rightly feared against him be".

On November 22, 1709, Collier appeared with some NCOs and armed soldiers in front of the Theater Royal and forcibly broke the doors open. They threw Rich's staff out of the house, and Collier said he was under Her Majesty's orders. He was referring to a letter dated November 19, written by James Stanley, 10th Earl of Derby (1664-1736), in which this necklace announced that the Queen would allow him to play the theater under his leadership. Shortly thereafter, Rich lost his support and position at Drury Lane and was eliminated.

Last work and death

However, Rich had already received a patent granted by Charles II for the abandoned Lincoln's Inn Fields Theater. On this basis, he tore down the old house and built a new theater in roughly the same place on Portugal Row. Before it was completed, however, Rich died on November 4, 1714. It was then opened on December 18, 1714 by his sons John Rich and Christopher Mosyer Rich with the play The Recruiting Officer by George Farquhar , written in 1706 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Christopher Rich in Dictionary of National Biography by Leslie Stephen , Volume 48
2. ↑ An Apology for the Life of Mr. Colley Cibber (autobiography) in the Google book search
3. ^ A Source Book in Theatrical History by Alois Maria Nagler 1959 in the Google book search
4. ↑ Also "War of Actors" or "Civil War". See Over The Footlights , PDF 116 kB
5. ↑ Information on a study website
6. Jump up ↑ Charles Killigrew, Charles D'Avenant , William Collier , Francis North, 2nd Baron Guilford , Lord Hervey and Anne Shadwell
7. ↑ Ruth B. Emde: Actresses in Europe in the 18th century: their life, their writings and their audience, Rodopi Verlag 1997 in the Google book search
8. ↑ This letter is digitized in the British Museum Add. MS. 20726, no.5.
9. ^ Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald, A new history of the English stage, from the restoration to the liberty of the theaters, in connection with the patent houses , 1882
10. ↑ Elisabeth J. Heard Experimentation on the English Stage, 1695-1708, Routledge, London 2015 in the Google book search