John Ward (24 June 1704 – 30 October 1773) was an English actor and theatre manager. The founder of the

Warwickshire Company of Comedians The Warwickshire Company of Comedians, also known as Mr Ward's Company of Comedians and after 1767 as Mr Kemble's Company of Comedians, was a theatre company established by John Ward in Birmingham, England in the 1740s, touring throughout the Wes ...

– a Birmingham-based theatre company who toured throughout the West Midlands and into Wales during the mid to late eighteenth century – he was the first of the Kemble family theatrical dynasty, whose most notable member was his granddaughter

Sarah Siddons Sarah Siddons (''née'' Kemble; 5 July 1755 – 8 June 1831) was a Welsh actress, the best-known Tragedy, tragedienne of the 18th century. Contemporaneous critic William Hazlitt dubbed Siddons as "tragedy personified". She was the elder siste ...

. Ward was the first recorded performer of a Shakespearian play in

Stratford-upon-Avon Stratford-upon-Avon ( ), commonly known as Stratford, is a market town and civil parish in the Stratford-on-Avon (district), Stratford-on-Avon district, in the county of Warwickshire, in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands region of Engl ...

, and is also notable as the author of the two earliest surviving

prompt book Prompt may refer to: Computing * Command prompt, characters indicating the computer is ready to accept input * Command Prompt, also known as cmd.exe or cmd, the command-line interpreter in some operating systems * Prompt (natural language), instr ...

s of

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 23 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

's ''

Hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

'', which reveal how the play was performed in eighteenth century England and also throw light on earlier practice.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ward, John 1704 births 1773 deaths 18th-century English male actors English theatre managers and producers Actor-managers English male stage actors