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The Beau Defeated
''The Beau Defeated. Or, The Lucky Younger Brother'' is a comedy from the Restoration era by Mary Pix. Genesis Pix wrote in her foreword, that her play was adapted from ''Le Chevalier a la Mode'' by Florent Carton Dancourt (1687). Pix's changes to several aspects of the story include substantially different characters and new dimensions in the plot. Comparing the two led McLaren to see more clearly Pix's "comic gifts and her dramatic and moral concerns.” Elisabeth Heard, on the other hand, states that recent research has concluded that the play's author is unknown. Plot The plot combines and contrasts stories about two wealthy widows. Mrs. Rich is not an aristocrat, but she was married to a banker. Lady Landsworth is an aristocrat and was married to a dissolute man who severely limited her freedom to leave the house. The widows are very interested in finding new husbands. Mrs. Rich want a titled spouse; Lady Landsworth wants a gentleman who is educated and interested in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
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Stuart Restoration
The Stuart Restoration was the reinstatement in May 1660 of the Stuart monarchy in Kingdom of England, England, Kingdom of Scotland, Scotland, and Kingdom of Ireland, Ireland. It replaced the Commonwealth of England, established in January 1649 after the execution of Charles I, with his son Charles II of England, Charles II. The Commonwealth of England had been governed by Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell and then his son Richard Cromwell. The term is also used to describe the reign of Charles II (1660–1685), and sometimes that of his younger brother King James II, James II (1685–1688). The Protectorate After Richard Cromwell, Lord Protector from 1658 to 1659, ceded power to the Rump Parliament, Charles Fleetwood and John Lambert (general), John Lambert then dominated government for a year. On 20 October 1659, George Monck, the governor of Scotland under the Cromwells, marched south with his army from Scotland to oppose Fleetwood and Lambert. Lambert's a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
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Mary Pix
Mary Pix (1666 – 17 May 1709) was an English novelist and playwright. As an admirer of Aphra Behn and colleague of Susanna Centlivre, Pix has been called "a link between women writers of the Stuart Restoration, Restoration and Augustan literature, Augustan periods". Early years Mary Griffith Pix was born in 1666, the daughter of a rector, musician and Headmaster of the Royal Latin School, Buckingham, Buckinghamshire; her father, Roger Griffith, died when she was very young, but Mary and her mother continued to live in the schoolhouse after his death. She was courted by her father's successor Thomas Dalby, but he left with the outbreak of smallpox in town, one year after a fire that burned the schoolhouse. In 1684, at the age of 18, Mary Griffith married George Pix (a merchant tailor from Hawkhurst, Kent). The couple moved to his country estate in Kent. Her first son, George (b. 1689), died very young in 1690. The next year the couple moved to London and she gave birth to an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
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Florent Carton (Dancourt)
Florent Carton aka Dancourt (1 November 16617 December 1725), French dramatist and actor, was born at Fontainebleau. He belonged to a family of rank, and his parents entrusted his education to Pere de la Rue, a Jesuit, who made earnest efforts to induce him to join the order. But he had no religious vocation and proceeded to study law. He practised at the bar for some time, but his marriage to the daughter of the comedian Francois Lenoir de la Thorilliere led him to become an actor, and in 1685, in spite of the strong opposition of his family, he appeared at the Theatre Francais. His gifts as a comedian gave him immediate and marked success, both with the public and with his fellow actors. He was the spokesman of his company on occasions of state, and in this capacity he frequently appeared before Louis XIV., who treated him with great favour. One of his most famous impersonations was Alceste in Molière's ''The Misanthrope''. His first play, ''Le Notaire obligeant'', produced ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
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Thomas Betterton
Thomas Betterton (August 1635 – 28 April 1710) was the leading male actor and theatre manager during Restoration England. He was the son of an under-cook to King Charles I and was born in London. Apprentice and actor Betterton was born in August 1635 in Tothill Street, Westminster. He was apprenticed to John Holden, Sir William Davenant's publisher, and possibly later to a bookseller named John Rhodes, who had been wardrobe-keeper at the Blackfriars Theatre. In 1659, Rhodes obtained a license to set up a company of players at the Cockpit Theatre in Drury Lane; and on the reopening of this theatre in 1660, Betterton made his first appearance on the stage. Betterton's talents at once brought him into prominence, and he was given leading parts. On the opening of the new theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields in 1661, Davenant, the patentee of the Duke's Company, engaged Betterton and all Rhodes's company to play in his '' The Siege of Rhodes''. Also in 1661 he played Prince Alva ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
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Royal Shakespeare Company
The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs over 1,000 staff and opens around 20 productions a year. The RSC plays regularly in London, Stratford-upon-Avon, and on tour across the UK and internationally. The company's home is in Stratford-upon-Avon, where it has redeveloped its Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Royal Shakespeare and Swan Theatre (Stratford), Swan theatres as part of a £112.8-million "Transformation" project. The theatres re-opened in November 2010, having closed in 2007. As well as the plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries, the RSC produces new work from living artists. Company history The early years There have been theatrical performances in Stratford-upon-Avon since at least Shakespeare's day, though the first recorded performance of a play written by Shakespeare himself was in 1746 when Parson Joseph Greene, master of Stratford Grammar School, organise ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |