Hope Theater

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The Hope
The Hope Theater, or the second Bear Garden, from Wenceslaus Hollars View of London (1647) [1]
location
Address: Bear Garden
City: London 9AR (Southwark)
Coordinates: 51 ° 30 '30 "  N , 0 ° 5' 44"  W Coordinates: 51 ° 30 '30 "  N , 0 ° 5' 44"  W.
Architecture and history
Construction time: Summer 1613 – October 1614
Opened: October 31, 1614
Spectator: 3000 seats
Architect: Gilbert Katherens (carpenter)
(probably) demolished on March 25, 1656
The Hope Theater, reproduced from Wenceslaus Hollar's map of London after the great fire; the lower part is from Faithorne's Map of London (1658)
The Hope Theater is at the bottom of this map of London, near the banks of the Thames

The The Hope Theater was one of the permanent theater houses that were built in and around London, where the Elizabethan theater reached its peak. It is comparable in its kind to the neighboring and much better known Globe Theater , the Curtain Theater , the Swan Theater and other famous theaters of the day.

Planning and construction

The Hope Theater was built between 1613 and 1614 by Philip Henslowe and a partner named Jacob Meade in Southwark , near the south bank of the Thames . There was already an event building on the property of the Bankside , which was used for hunting animals (called the Beargarden , since bears were the preferred victims of those dubious amusements). Since the site was outside of the City of London, there were much freer regulations regarding entertainment, prostitution or theater. Henslowe was already successful here with his Rose Theater , which he built in 1587, just a few meters from Hope, in an old rose garden. When the lease for the property expired in 1605 and was no longer renewed, he gave up the Rose (which was probably demolished the following year). After taking over the lease of the Beargarden, Henslowe commissioned the carpenter Gilbert Katherens on August 29, 1613 to close down the old venue and build a new theater in its place at a price of £ 360. After completion, the Hope Theater was still popularly called “Beargarden” , probably out of habit, but also because animal fights continued to take place there, and it was also included in historical documents.

Construction was slow and took more than a year. One reason could have been the lack of availability of craftsmen at that time, as the Globe Theater burned down on June 29, 1613 and the capacity for two new theaters at the same time in Southwark was barely sufficient. The almost immediate proximity of the two houses to one another exacerbated this deficiency. However, there was another reason for the construction delays: The planning showed a dual use, both as a theater and as an animal fighting arena.

(Extract from the order description)

Plaiehouse fitt & convenient in all things, bothe for players to play in, and for the game
of Beares and Bulls to be bayted in the same, and also a fitt and convenient Tire house and
a stage to be carryed and taken awaie, and to stande vppon tressels ....
[...] Theater ready for occupancy & convenient in all areas, equally usable for actors to appear and for the play of bears and bulls, and also the completion of the relaxation rooms [backstage] and a stage that can be carried and taken away and that stands on trestles [...]

Thus, in contrast to the Globe, the Hope needed additional extensions to accommodate the competition animals.

Since the original contract between Henslowe and Katherens still exists in full, we know today about the exact design and construction of the Hope; far more than that of other theaters of that time. The contract states that the theater to be built had to be of the same type as the Swan Theater; with two staircases on the outside and the "Heavens" (playable structures) above the stage, without supporting pillars that impair the view of the audience. A circumstance that was not only unusual for the theaters of that time, but also fulfilled the requirement of a “flying” stage, as desired, i.e. a stage that could be dismantled quickly.

business

The Hope was completed in October 1614. On 31 October, the theater company led Lady Elizabeth's Men , the piece Bartholomew Fair by Ben Jonson on. However, Jonson later criticized the location of that premiere in the print publication of his work with the words "as dirty as Smithfield and stinking every whit" ("dirty as Smithfield [London district with cattle market and slaughterhouses] and stinks just like that")

When Henslowe died in 1616, his son-in-law Edward Alleyn inherited his share of Hope, which Alleyn immediately leased to Meade. The Hope remained an active entertainment venue for decades. In the first few years the house was used more for theater performances than for hunting animals. The troop of the Lady Elizabeth's Men were supplemented in 1615 with the Prince Charles's Men . When the Lady Elizabeth's Men set out on their tour of the country in 1616, the Prince's Charles's Men stayed at the house for three more years. However, the offer, which alternated between animal hunting and theater, was never really easy for those involved and the actors became increasingly dissatisfied over time. They then moved to the Cockpit Theater in 1619 and the Hope was afterwards only used for bear and bullbaiting, prize boxes, fencing competitions and similar entertainment.

The End

When the London theaters were to be closed in 1642 , Hope was not immediately affected due to the lack of theater operations, but a few years later, due to a general ban on animal fighting imposed by the Puritans in 1656, it had to stop its animal hunting. The last remaining bears were shot by soldiers; the other animals, dogs and roosters, were also killed. The officer Thomas Pride was responsible for this . In 1680, 24 years after this action and two years after Pride's death, an anonymous satirist wrote a fictional Prides confession: Last Speech ... being touched in Conscience for his inhuman Murder of the Bears in the Beargarden

One, albeit dubious, statement can be found as a handwritten supplement to the 1631 edition of the Stow and Howes's Chronicle which reads: "pulled down to make tenements, by Thomas Walker, a petticoat maker in Canon Street on Tuesday, March 25, 1656" ("Demolished by Thomas Walker, a crinoline maker on Canon Street Tuesday, March 25, 1656 to make residential buildings"). However, the text contains errors: it was claimed that Hope was built in 1610, and that Thomas Walker was actually a warden in the nearby The Clink prison.

In the Stuart Restoration from 1660 onwards, animal fights were allowed again. The Hope had gone, but a replacement was quickly created in its place. The records of Samuel Pepy attest to a visit by the chronicler and his wife to the Beargarden on August 14, 1666. The last mention of animal fights at this site is on April 12, 1682. In 1714, a settlement called Bear Garden Square was established on the site wore. Even today, a small street at this point indicates the location of the former amusement park on the banks of the Thames ( Bear Garden ).

Individual evidence

  1. Tarnya Cooper (Ed.): Searching for Shakespeare , National Portrait Gallery, London 2006, ISBN 978-0-300-11611-3 , pp. 92-93, Chapter: A view from St Mary Overy, Southwark, looking towards Westminster , c.1638
  2. ^ Halliday, pp. 231-232.
  3. The complete work instructions for the carpenter on gutenberg.org
  4. ^ Durston, p. 157.
  5. McMains, p. 223 n.7.
  6. cited in Halliday, p. 232 and Wheatley, Volume 2, pp. 229-230.
  7. ^ Halliday, p. 56.

Literature evidence

  • Christopher Durston: Cromwell's Major Generals: Godly Government During the English Revolution. Manchester University press, Manchester 2001.
  • Andrew John Gurr: The Shakespearean Stage 1574-1642. Third edition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1992.
  • FE Halliday: A Shakespeare Companion 1564-1964. Penguin, Baltimore 1964.
  • HF McMains: The Death of Oliver Cromwell. University Press of Kentucky, Lexington 1999.
  • Henry Benjamin Wheatley: London, Past and Present: Its History, Associations, and Traditions. 3 volumes, Scribner & Welford, London 1891.