on a theory of clumsy foreshortening, and to imply the adoption, either generally or occasionally, of some such principle of convertible houses, as was already in full swing upon the public stage.[1]
I do not think that the history of the Blackfriars was materially different from that of Paul's. There are in all twenty-four plays to be considered; an Elizabethan group of seven produced by the Children of the Chapel, and a Jacobean group of seventeen produced by the successive incarnations of the Revels company.[2] Structural alterations during 1603 are here less probable, for the house only dated from Burbadge's enterprise of 1596. Burbadge is said to have intended a 'public' theatre, and it may be argued on a priori grounds that he would have planned for the type of staging familiar to him at the Theatre and subsequently elaborated at the Globe. The actual character of the plays does not, however, bear out this view. Like Paul's, the Blackfriars relied at first in part upon revivals. One was Love's Metamorphosis, already produced by Lyly under Court conditions with the earlier Paul's boys, and tout en pastoralle.[3] Another, or if not, quite an archaistic play, was Liberality and Prodigality, the abstract plot of which only needs an equally abstract scene, with a 'bower' for Fortune, holding a throne and scaleable by a ladder (30, 290, 903, 932, 953), another 'bower' for Virtue (132), an inn (47, 192, 370), and a high seat for a judge with his clerks beneath him (1245).[4] The two new playwrights may reasonably be supposed to have conformed to the traditional methods. Jonson's Cynthia's Revels has a preliminary act of open country, by the Fountain of Self Love, in Gargaphia. The rest is all at the Gargaphian palace, either in the presence, or in an ante-chamber thereto, perhaps before a curtain, or for one or two scenes in the
- ↑ The four plays which seem most repugnant to continuous staging, Westward Ho!, Northward Ho!, A Mad World, my Masters, and A Trick to Catch the Old One, are all datable in 1604-6.
- ↑ Elizabethan Plays: Love's Metamorphosis, Liberality and Prodigality, Cynthia's Revels, Poetaster, Sir Giles Goosecap, Gentleman Usher, and probably All Fools; Jacobean Plays: M. d'Olive, May Day, Widow's Tears, Conspiracy of Byron, Tragedy of Byron, Case is Altered, Malcontent, Dutch Courtesan, Sophonisba, Eastward Ho!, Your Five Gallants, Philotas, Isle of Gulls, Law Tricks, Fleir, Faithful Shepherdess, Knight of the Burning Pestle. In addition Fawn and Trick to Catch an Old One, already dealt with under Paul's, were in the first case produced at, and in the second transferred to, Blackfriars.
- ↑ Cf. p. 34.
- ↑ Lib. and Prod. 903, 'Here Prod. scaleth. Fortune claps a halter about his neck, he breaketh the halter and falles'; 1245, 'The Judge placed, and the Clerkes under him'.
