A History of Pantomime Part 10

by ridiculing the popular amus.e.m.e.nt in having the character of Harlequin hung in full view of the audience in a play ent.i.tled "The Wishes." When the catastrophe was at hand Murphy whispered to c.u.mberland: "If they don't d.a.m.n this, they deserve to be d.a.m.ned themselves!" No sooner were the words uttered than a turbulent mob in the pit broke out, and quickly put an end to the dire fatality with which Pantomime and its hero, Harlequin, were threatened.

Christopher Rich gave the first engagement to the afterwards celebrated actress, Mrs. Oldfield, and, previously, a similar kindness to Robert Wilks, about the year 1690, at the salary of fifteen s.h.i.+llings a week, with two s.h.i.+llings and sixpence deducted for teaching him to dance.

Another famous performer, Macklin, was also introduced to the stage by this family.

At the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, in 1721, there was a memorable riot, caused by some drunken aristocratic beaux, owing to an alleged insult, which one of their number was supposed to have received. The beau referred to, a n.o.ble Earl, had crossed the stage whilst Macbeth and his lady were upon it, in order to speak to a companion who was lolling in the wings. Rich told the n.o.ble Earl that for his indecorum he would not be allowed behind the scenes again, which so incensed the latter that he gave Manager Rich a smart slap on the face, which Rich returned.

Swords then were drawn, and between the actors and the beaux a free fight ensued, which ended in the former driving the latter out of the theatre. The rioters, however, again obtained access, and rus.h.i.+ng into the boxes, cut down the hangings, besides doing other damage, when, led by Quin and a number of constables, several of the beaux were captured, and taken before the magistrates. The end of it all was that the matter was compromised; but, in order to prevent a recurrence of such disorderly scenes, a guard should attend the performances. The custom of having the military in attendance at our theatres--which the above affray was the primary cause--was in vogue for over a hundred years after this event.

Rich lived to see Pantomimes firmly established at Drury Lane and Covent Garden. Drury Lane did, for a few years, discard it in favour of spectacle, but ultimately found it advisable to return to Pantomime.

At the beginning of the 'sixties of the eighteenth century--1761--died the father of Harlequins in England, and also--as he has been called--of English Pantomimes, and there is, I believe, a costly tomb erected to his memory in Hillingdon Church-yard, Middles.e.x.

Rich left Covent Garden Theatre to his son-in-law, Beard, the vocalist, with the not unpleasant restriction, however, that the property should be sold when 60,000 was bid for it, and for which sum it ultimately pa.s.sed into the hands of Harris, Colman, and their partners.

CHAPTER XVI.

Joseph Grimaldi.

The year 1778 marks an epoch in the History of Pantomime, as just over three-quarters of a century before marked another epoch, the introduction of Pantomimes to the English stage. On December 18th, 1778, was born Joseph Grimaldi--afterwards the Prince of Clowns, and the son of Giuseppe Grimaldi ("Iron Legs"). Joe's first appearance was at Sadler's Wells on April 16, Easter Monday, 1781, he not being quite three years old. d.i.c.kens, in the "Memoirs of Grimaldi," has given us from the Clown's own diary, which Grimaldi kept close up to the time of his death, on May, 31st, 1837, a full and true account of the life of this remarkably clever Pantomimist. To add to what d.i.c.kens has written of "Only a Clown" (which doubtless the reader is already acquainted with) would only be like painting the lily; and, perhaps, I cannot do better in honouring his memory than by quoting the words of Mr. Harley at the annual dinner of the Drury Lane Fund, spoken in the June following Grimaldi's death:--"Yet, shall delicacy suffer no violence in adducing one example, for death has hushed his c.o.c.k-crowing cachination, and uproarious merriment. The mortal Jupiter of practical Joke, the Michael Angelo of buffoonery, who, if he was _Grim-all-day_, was sure to make you chuckle at night."

A contemporary writer of Grimaldi's days thus eulogises the Prince of Clowns:--

As a Clown, Mr. Grimaldi is perfectly unrivalled. Other performers of the part may be droll in their generation; but, which of them can for a moment compete with the Covent Garden hero in acute observation upon the foibles and absurdities of society, and his happy talent of holding them up to ridicule. He is the finest practical satyrist that ever existed.

He does not, like many Clowns, content himself with raising a horse-laugh by contortions and grimaces, but tickles the fancy, and excites the risibility of an audience by devices as varied as they are ingenious. "He uses his folly as a stalking-horse, under cover of which he shoots his wit;" and fully deserves the encomium bestowed upon him by Kemble, who, it is said, p.r.o.nounced him to be "the best low comedian upon the stage."

There are few things, we think, more delightful than a Pantomime--that is, a _good_ Pantomime, such as is usually produced at Covent Garden. We know there are a set of solemn pompous mortals about town, who express much dignified horror at the absurdities of these things, and declaim very fluently, in good set terms, upon the necessity of their abolition.

Such fellows as these are ever your dullest of blockheads. Conscious of their lack of ideas, they think to earn the reputation of men of sterling sense, by inveighing continually against what _they_ deem to be frivolity; while they only expose more clearly to all observers the sad vacuum which exists in their _pericraniums_. Far, far from us be such dullards, and such opinions; and let us continue to laugh heartily at our Pantomimes, undisturbed by their tedious harangues; "Do they think, because they are _wise_, there shall be no more cakes and ale?" The man who refuses to smile at the humours of Grimaldi is made of bad materials--_hic niger est_--let no such man be trusted!

Can there possibly be a more captivating sight than that which the theatre presents nightly, of hundreds of beautiful children all happy and laughing, "as if a master-spring constrained them all;" and filled with delight, unalloyed and unbounded, at the performance of one man?

And shall that man go without his due meed of praise? Never be it said!

No, Joey! When we forget thee, may our right hand forget its cunning! We owe thee much for the delight thou hast already afforded us; and rely upon thee, with confident expectation, for many a future hour of gay forgetfulness. Well do we remember, in our boyish dreams of bliss, how prominent a feature thou didst stand amongst the antic.i.p.ated enjoyments of Christmas; how the thoughts of home, of kindred, and release from school, were rendered ten-fold more delightful by the idea of thy motley garb and mirth-inspiring voice, which ever formed the greatest enjoyment our holidays afforded. Heaven be praised, we still are children in some respects, for we still feel gladdened by thy gambols, as heartily as we did years ago, when we made our periodical escape from the terrors of our old pedagogue's frown, and went with Aunt Bridget ("Happier than ourselves the while") to banquet upon the Pantomimic treat provided for us. "All wisdom is folly," says the philosopher; but we often incline to think the converse of the proposition correct, when we see thee put thy antic disposition on, and set the audience in a roar by the magic of thy powers.

It is thought by many persons that Grimaldi is seen to greater advantage on the small stage of Sadler's Wells, than on the more capacious one of Covent Garden; but, this is an opinion with which we cannot coincide. He always appears to us more at his ease at the latter house; to come forth exulting in his power, and exclaiming, "Ay, marry, here my soul hath elbow-room." His engagement there has certainly been a lucrative speculation for the proprietors. "Mother Goose," we believe, drew more money than any other piece which has been produced during the present century; and no Pantomime since brought forward at Covent Garden has been unsuccessful; which is mainly to be attributed to his inimitable performance of Clown. It is scarcely possible for language to do justice to his unequalled powers of gesture and expression. Do our readers recollect a Pantomime some years ago, in which he was introduced begging a tart from a pieman? The simple expression, "May I?" with the look and action which accompanied it, are impressed upon our recollection, as forming one of the finest pieces of acting we ever witnessed. Indeed, let the subject be what it may, it never fails to become highly amusing in the hands of Grimaldi; whether it is to rob a pieman, or open an oyster, imitate a chimney-sweep, or a dandy, grasp a red-hot poker, or devour a pudding, take snuff, sneeze, make love, mimic a tragedian, cheat his master, pick a pocket, beat a watchman, or nurse a child, it is all performed in so admirably humorous and extravagantly natural a manner, that spectators of the most saturnine disposition are irresistibly moved to laughter.

Mr. Grimaldi also possesses great merit in Pantomimic performances of a different character, which all are aware of, who have ever seen him in the melodrama, called "Perouse," and other pieces of the same description.

We cannot better terminate this article, than with a poetical tribute to his powers, addressed to him by one of the authors of "Horace in London," who appears to have had a true relish of his subject:--

Facetious Mime! thou enemy of gloom, Grandson of Momus, blithe and debonair, Who, aping Pan, with an inverted broom, Can'st brush the cobwebs from the brows of care.

Our gallery G.o.ds immortalize thy song; Thy Newgate thefts impart ecstatic pleasure; Thou bid'st a Jew's harp charm a Christian throng, A Gothic salt-box teem with attic treasure.

When Harlequin, entangled in thy clue, By magic seeks to dissipate the strife, Thy furtive fingers s.n.a.t.c.h his faulchion too; The luckless wizard loses wand and wife.

The fabled egg from thee obtains its gold; Thou sett'st the mind from critic bondage loose, Where male and female cacklers, young and old, Birds of a feather, hail the sacred Goose.

Even pious souls, from Bunyan's durance free, At Sadler's Wells applaud thy agile wit, Forget old Care while they remember thee, "Laugh the heart's laugh," and haunt the jovial pit.

Long may'st thou guard the prize thy humour won, Long hold thy court in Pantomimic state, And, to the equipoise of English fun, Exalt the lowly, and bring down the great.

Again we are told "That his Pantomime was such that you could fancy he would have been the Pulcinello of the Italians, the Harlequin of the French, that he could have returned a smart repartee from Carlin. His motions, eccentric as they were, were evidently not a mere lesson from the gymnasium; there was a will and mind overflowing with, nay living upon fun, real fun. He was so extravagantly natural, that the most saturnine looker-on acknowledged his sway; and neither the wise, the proud, or the fair, the young nor the old, were ashamed to laugh till tears coursed down their cheeks at Joe and his comicalities."

Grimaldi used sometimes to play in two different Pantomimes at two different theatres, when he would have to go through some twenty scenes.

Unlike the painting of the face with a few patches adopted by the modern Clown, Grimaldi used to give one the idea of a greedy boy, who had covered himself with jam in robbing from a cupboard. Grimaldi dressed the part like a Clown should be dressed. His trousers were large and baggy, and were fastened to his jacket, and round his neck he wore a schoolboy's frill--part of the dress, in all probability, borrowed from the Spanish Captain and the French Pierrot.

At Drury Lane on Friday, June 27, 1828, he took his farewell benefit.

The following being the bill:--

Mr. Grimaldi's Farewell Benefit, On Friday, June 27th, 1828, will be performed JONATHAN IN ENGLAND, after which A MUSICAL MELANGE, To be succeeded by THE ADOPTED CHILD, and concluded by HARLEQUIN HOAX, In which Mr. Grimaldi will act Clown in one scene, sing a song, and speak his FAREWELL ADDRESS.

With the reader's permisson, I will give, from his "Memoirs," the address he spoke:--

"Ladies and Gentlemen:--In putting off the Clown's garment, allow me to drop also the Clown's taciturnity, and address you in a few parting sentences. I entered early on this course of life, and leave it prematurely. Eight-and-forty years only have pa.s.sed over my head--but I am going as fast down the hill of life as that older Joe--John Anderson.

Like vaulting ambition, I have overleaped myself, and pay the penalty in an advanced old age. If I have now any apt.i.tude for tumbling it is through bodily infirmity, for I am worse on my feet than I used to be on my head. It is four years since I jumped my last jump--filched my last oyster--boiled my last sausage--and set in for retirement. Not quite so well provided for, I must acknowledge, as in the days of my Clowns.h.i.+p, for then, I dare say, some of you remember, I used to have a fowl in one pocket and sauce for it in the other.

"To-night has seen me a.s.sume the motley for a short time--it clung to my skin as I took it off, and the old cap and bells rang mournfully as I quitted them for ever.

"With the same respectful feelings as ever do I find myself in your presence--in the presence of my last audience--this kindly a.s.semblage so happily contradicting the adage that a favourite has no friends. For the benvolence that brought you hither--accept, ladies and gentlemen, my warmest and most grateful thanks, and believe, that of one and all, Joseph Grimaldi takes a double leave, with a farewell on his lips, and a tear in his eyes.

"Farewell! That you and yours may ever enjoy that greatest earthly good--health, is the sincere wish of your faithful and obliged servant.

G.o.d bless you all!"

Poor Joe was buried in the burying-ground of St. James' Chapel, on Pentonville Hill, and in a grave next to his friend, Charles Dibdin. May the earth lie lightly over him!

CHAPTER XVII.

Plots of the old form of Pantomimes--A description of "Harlequin and the Ogress; or the Sleeping Beauty of the Wood," produced at Covent Garden--Grimaldi, _Pere et Fils_--Tom Ellar, the Harlequin, and Barnes, the Pantaloon--An account of the first production of the "House that Jack built," at Covent Garden--Spectacular display--Antiquity and Origin of some Pantomimic devices--Devoto, Angelo, and French, the Scenic Artists--Transparencies--Beverley--Transformation Scenes.

Of the plots of the old form of Pantomime and what these entertainments were generally like, graphically, does Planche describe them.

How different (he says) were the Christmas Pantomimes of my younger days. A pretty story--a nursery tale--dramatically told, in which "the course of true love never did run smooth," formed the opening; the characters being a cross-grained old father, with a pretty daughter, who had two suitors--one a poor young fellow, whom she preferred, the other a wealthy fop, whose pretensions were, of course, favoured by the father. There was also a body servant of some sort in the old man's establishment. At the moment when the young lady was about to be forcibly married to the fop she despised, or, on the point of eloping with the youth of her choice, the good fairy made her appearance, and, changing the refractory pair into Harlequin and Columbine, the old curmudgeon into Pantaloon, and the body servant into Clown: the two latter in company with the rejected "lover," as he was called, commenced the pursuit of the happy pair, and the "comic business" consisted of a dozen or more cleverly constructed scenes, in which all the tricks and changes had a meaning, and were introduced as contrivances to favour the escape of Harlequin and Columbine, when too closely followed by their enemies. There was as regular a plot as might be found in a melodrama.

An interest in the chase which increased the admiration of the ingenuity and the enjoyment of the fun of the tricks, by which the runaways escaped capture, till the inevitable "dark scene" came, a cavern or a forest, in which they were overtaken, seized, and the magic wand, which had so uniformly aided them, s.n.a.t.c.hed from the grasp of the despairing Harlequin, and flourished in triumph by the Clown. Again at the critical moment the protecting fairy appeared, and, exacting the consent of the father to the marriage of the devoted couple, transported the whole party to what was really a grand last scene, which everybody did wait for. There was some congruity, some dramatic construction, in such Pantomimes; and then the acting. For it was acting, and first-rate acting.

To give the reader a further insight into the old form of Christmas Pantomimes, I cull the following from "The Drama," a contemporary magazine of the period (1822):--

In compliance with the long-established custom of gratifying the holiday visitors of the theatres with Pantomimic representations at this season of year, a new piece of that description was produced at this theatre (Covent Garden) last night, December 26th, 1822, under the t.i.tle of "Harlequin and the Ogress; or the Sleeping Beauty of the Wood." The introductory story is taken from the well-known tale of "The Sleeping Beauty," in "Mother Bunch's Fairy Tales," which had before been "melodramatised," but had not hitherto been taken for the groundwork of a Harlequinade.

The piece opens in one of the fabled grand caverns under the Pyramids of Egypt, in which the three fatal sisters of Mother Bunch's Mythology are seen spinning and winding a ball of golden thread, the fastening of which to the wrist of the Sleeping Beauty is intended to add another century to the duration of her life, and of the power which the Ogress, or Fairy, has exercised over her, and her possessions, for the preceding hundred years. The ball having been completed, with the due quantum of magic incantation in such cases prescribed, is consigned to the care of Grim Gribber, the porter of the castle, with directions to attach it to the wrist of the lady in the chamber of sleep, whither he accordingly proceeds for that purpose; but overcome by the soporific influences of the atmosphere of that enchanted place, he falls into a deep sleep ere his task is accomplished. The Prince Azoff, with his Squire Abnab, straying from a hunting party into the enchanted cedar grove, encounters the Fairy Blue-bell, protector of the Sleeping Beauty, who imparts to the Prince the story of her enchantment, furnishes him with a magic flower to protect him from the influence of the Ogress, and instructs him in the means of releasing the Beauty at the expiration of the term of her first enchanted sleep, which is then drawing to a close. In the amazement which seizes the Prince on finding himself in the chamber of sleep, at the splendour of everything around him, and the sight of the Sleeping Beauty with her surrounding train of attendants, whose faculties are all enchained in the same preternatural slumber, he lets fall the magic flower, and becomes thereby subject to the power of the Ogress, from which he is, however, rescued on the instant by the protecting interference of the Fairy Blue-bell. But in punishment of his neglect, he is condemned to wander for a time in search of happiness with the now-awakened Beauty, pursued by the relentless Ogress and her servant, Grim Gribber. The whole of the persons engaged in the scene now undergo the prescriptive Pantomimic changes, and the ordinary succession of Harlequinade adventures, tricks, and transformations ensue.

Our old favourites, the Grimaldis, father and son, Mr. Ellar as Harlequin, and Mr. Barnes as Pantaloon, were hailed, on their appearance, with the warmth of greeting to which their excellence in their several parts fully ent.i.tles them, and displayed their wonted drollery, gracefulness, and agility: and Miss Brissak, who, for the first time, appeared as Columbine, acquitted herself with tolerable credit, and was very well received.