Roger Kemble (1 March 1721 – 6 December 1802) was an English

theatre manager Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perfor ...

, strolling player and

actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), l ...

. In 1753, he married Irish actress Sarah "Sally" Ward (1735–1806) at Cirencester, Gloucestershire, and they had thirteen children, who formed the

Kemble family Kemble is the name of a family of English actors, who reigned over the English stage for many decades. The most famous were Sarah Siddons (1755–1831) and her brother John Philip Kemble (1757–1823), the two eldest of the twelve children of ...

of 19th-century actors and actresses.

Biography

Roger Kemble was born in

Hereford Hereford () is a cathedral city, civil parish and the county town of Herefordshire, England. It lies on the River Wye, approximately east of the border with Wales, south-west of Worcester and north-west of Gloucester. With a populatio ...

, a grand-nephew of Fr John Kemble, a

recusant Recusancy (from la, recusare, translation=to refuse) was the state of those who remained loyal to the Catholic Church and refused to attend Church of England services after the English Reformation. The 1558 Recusancy Acts passed in the reign ...

priest, who was hanged in that city in 1679. Kemble first entered the theatre by joining Smith's company at

Canterbury Canterbury (, ) is a cathedral city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, situated in the heart of the City of Canterbury local government district of Kent, England. It lies on the River Stour. The Archbishop of Canterbury is the primate of ...

in 1752. Whilst he was there it was agreed that he would marry

Fanny Furnival Elizabeth "Fanny" Furnival or "Mrs Kemble" (fl. 1731–1752) was a British actress and singer who appeared in theatres in London and Dublin. She notably took the role of Hamlet in 1741. She lost a vendetta with George Anne Bellamy. She appeared ...

and although she appeared as "Mrs Kemble" it is thought that they never married. Furnival and Kemble then moved to

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...

under the management of John Ward, whose daughter Kemble would eventually marry. Upon Ward's retirement, Roger took on his first management position by taking over the management of the theatre at

Leominster Leominster ( ) is a market town in Herefordshire, England, at the confluence of the River Lugg and its tributary the River Kenwater. The town is north of Hereford and south of Ludlow in Shropshire. With a population of 11,700, Leominster is t ...

in 1766. He formed a traveling theatrical company soon after his marriage to Sarah Ward, and subsequently she and their children toured with the company for the next fifteen years. Five of Kemble's children and many of his grandchildren became famous actors. The oldest of their twelve children,

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

, became the most famous. She first appeared as

Ariel Ariel may refer to: Film and television *Ariel Award, a Mexican Academy of Film award * ''Ariel'' (film), a 1988 Finnish film by Aki Kaurismäki * ''ARIEL Visual'' and ''ARIEL Deluxe'', 1989 and 1991 anime video series based on the novel series ...

in '' The Tempest'' with her father's company in Coventry in 1766. In 1767 the actor William Siddons joined the company whom Sarah married in 1773, returning to the stage as Mrs. Siddons. As primarily a theatre manager, Roger Kemble never became as famous as his children, although he scored a success at London's

Haymarket Theatre The Theatre Royal Haymarket (also known as Haymarket Theatre or the Little Theatre) is a West End theatre on Haymarket in the City of Westminster which dates back to 1720, making it the third-oldest London playhouse still in use. Samuel Foot ...

where in 1788 he appeared as

Falstaff Sir John Falstaff is a fictional character who appears in three plays by William Shakespeare and is eulogised in a fourth. His significance as a fully developed character is primarily formed in the plays '' Henry IV, Part 1'' and ''Part 2'', wh ...

in Shakespeare’s

Henry IV, Part 1 ''Henry IV, Part 1'' (often written as ''1 Henry IV'') is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written no later than 1597. The play dramatises part of the reign of King Henry IV of England, beginning with the battle at ...

and in the ''Miller of Mansfield''.

Legacy

There is a plaque commemorating Kemble's Hereford birthplace at 28-29 Church Street and Kemble Road in London's

Forest Hill Forest Hill or Forrest Hill may refer to: Places Australia * Forest Hill, New South Wales, a suburb of Wagga Wagga * Forrest Hill, New South Wales, a suburb of Albury * Forest Hill, Queensland * Forest Hill, Victoria ** Forest Hill Chase Sh ...

is named after him.

Notes

References

* Philip H. Highfill, Kalman A. Burnim, Edward A. Langhans, ''A Biographical Dictionary of Actors'', v. 8, Hough to Keyse: Actresses ..., 1982, p. 387. ;Attribution * English male stage actors 1721 births 1802 deaths 18th-century English male actors 19th-century English male actors Actor-managers Kemble family {{England-actor-stub