200 ‘Grim-All-Day’: There are many formulations of this line, a line that first appeared in Oxberry (eds), ‘Memoir of Joseph Grimaldi’, p. 113.
200 ‘I am Grimaldi’: Goodwin, Sketches and Impressions, p. 14.
201 Wertherism: See Inger Sigrun Brodey, ‘Masculinity, Sensibility, and the “Man of Feeling”: The Gendered Ethics of Goethe’s Werther’, Papers on Language & Literature, 35:2 (1999) 115–40, especially pp. 116, 137.
201 ‘diseased muscles’ [sic] shells produce pearls’: Ryan, Table Talk, vol. 2, p. 39.
202 hovering serenely: Goodwin, Sketches and Impressions, p. 18.
202 loss of all its scenery: Kelly, Kemble Era, p. 170.
202 Other lost treasures: Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. 78, 1808, pp. 845–7.
203 ‘lucky old hag’: Dibdin, Reminiscences, vol. 2, p. 422.
204 huge, flapping shoes: Disher, Clowns and Pantomimes, pp. 136–8.
204 band of the Coldstream Guards: See Boaden, Life of J. P. Kemble, pp. 523–4.
205 ‘ponderous inutility’: Boaden, Life of J. P. Kemble, p. 533.
205 the budget still fell short: All figures taken from Marc Baer, Theatre and Disorder in Late Georgian London (Oxford: Clarendon, 1992), pp. 21–2.
205–6 ‘born from misfortune’: Dibdin, Reminiscences, vol. 1, p. 421. Erik Gustaf Geijer, Impressions of England, 1809–1810, trans. Elizabeth Sprigge and Claude Napier (London: Cape, 1932), p. 98–9.
206 ‘the playing of a play which does not endure witnesses’: Baer, Theatre and Disorder, p. 19.
206 ‘roar of disapprobation’: Geijer, Impressions of England, p. 97.
207 ‘Even women tried to speak’: Geijer, Impressions of England, p. 97.
207 ‘whooping-cough’: Ben Wilson, The Making of Victorian Values: Decency and Dissent in Britain, 1789–1837 (New York: Penguin, 2007), p. 200.
208 slept next to a ladder: Kelly, Kemble Era, p. 177–8.
208 just show pantomimes: ‘Whenever there is Danger of a Riot,’ Kemble had written in a memorandum to managers, ‘always act an Opera; for Musick drowns the noise of Opposition.’ Hogan, London Stage, p. ccv; Miles, Grimaldi, p. 161.
209 ‘If that man could speak’: Disher, Clowns and Pantomimes, p. 295.
209 tried at the Old Bailey: See Marcham, ‘Grimaldi and Finchley’.
209 ‘Bravo, Joe!’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 210.
209 ‘We are satisfied’: Boaden, Life of J. P. Kemble, p. 548.
210 ‘Metrical History of England’: Dibdin, Reminiscences, vol. 1, pp. 433, 435.
210 ‘a prettier Cordelia’: Findlater, Joe Grimaldi, p. 136.
211 ‘done to injure you’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 190.
Harlequin in His Element
216 ‘overgrown bantling’: Christopher Hibbert, George IV: Regent and King, 1811–1830 (London: Allen Lane, 1973), p. 6.
216 extravagant costumes: See Tomalin, Mrs. Jordan’s Profession, p. 99.
216–7 elaborate pranks: See John Ashton, Social England Under the Regency (London: Chatto and Windus, 1899), p. 267.
217 Brummell thought he should turn professional: Kelly, Beau Brummell, p. 65.
217 ‘ever so magnificent’: Hibbert, George IV, p. 3.
217: ‘artificial banks’: Steven Parissien, George IV: The Grand Entertainment (London: John Murray, 2001), p. 262.
217 ‘that Sadler’s Wells business’: E. A. Smith, George IV (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1999), p. 134.
218 ‘vast body of conjoined talent’: Reynolds, Life, vol. 2, pp. 401, 402.
218 ‘the best body of performers’: Raymond, Life of Elliston, p. 156.
218 ‘pantomimic wonders’: Thomas Marshall, ‘Ellar, the Harlequin’, in Lives of the Most Celebrated Actors and Actresses, ed. Thomas Marshall (London: 1848), p. 118.
218 ‘original as Grimaldi’s Clown’: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 104.
218 ‘his legs twinkle’: The Times, 27 December 1828.
218 ‘a whirling teetotum’: E. L. Blanchard, The Life and Reminiscences of E. L. Blanchard, with Notes from the Diary of Wm. Blanchard, ed. Clement Scott and Cecil Howard, 2 vols (London: Hutchinson, 1891), vol. 2, p. 581.
219 ‘subject to them’: Disher, Clowns and Pantomimes, p. 124.
219 ‘the king of melo-dramas’: Robson, Old Play-goer, p. 241.
219 ‘enjoy their evening as much as possible’: Oxberry (eds), ‘Memoir of Joseph Grimaldi’, p. 114.
219 ‘a running commentary’: The Times, 27 December 1825.
219 a show could hardly be staged for less: See Mayer, Harlequin in His Element, pp. 102–3.
221 ‘ridiculing the follies of the age’: Malcolm, London Redivium, vol. 3, p. 235; Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 103. Furibond was produced to celebrate the passage of the 1807 Slave Trade Act, legislation criminalising human trafficking within the British Empire, the first major victory in the movement towards abolition. It opened among the slaves of a Jamaican coffee plantation, who are eventually freed after the figure of Britannia descends from the skies and grants them their liberty (see European Magazine, vol. LIII, January 1808, p. 51). Mayer writes that liberal sentiments ‘were not allowed to interfere with the comic possibilities which Drury Lane management felt their due when portraying Negroes on the stage. The pantomime’s Clown had two scenes … in which he pursued a Negro servant girl, attempting to make love to her. When Clown finally married her, he was immediately presented with horns and six children.’ Harlequin in his Element, p. 254.
221 ‘best medium of dramatic satire’: Examiner, 26 January 1817.
221 ‘a whole train of them’: Examiner, 26 January 1817.
222 ‘Hogarth in action’: Miles, Grimaldi, p. 7.
222 ‘Bang up’: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 105.
223 ‘Two black varnished coal-scuttles’: The Times, 15 January 1813, spelling amended.
223 ‘roared with laughter’: The Times, 15 January 1813. 223 ‘general contempt … with chains and cat skins’: The Times, 15 January 1813.
223 ‘ambivalent about their land forces’: As Mayer explains, there was also a fear that in lieu of a foreign enemy, the army might be turned against the domestic population and domestic barracks be used to enforce monarchical tyranny. Harlequin in His Element, p. 55.
223 ‘d—d infernal foolery’: Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. vii (1871), p. 91.
224 ‘one of the best pantomimes’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 187. The Times, 30 December 1808, remarked that, ‘in point of invention, of whim, and of variety, it is very far indeed below Mother Goose … but the rich humour of GRIMALDI is capable of giving currency to a more meagre composition: the success of the performance is principally to be attributed to his exertions’.
224 ‘BEADLE’s hat’: Thomas Dibdin, Harlequin in His Element, in Michael R. Booth (ed.), English Plays of the Nineteenth Century, vol. 5, ‘Pantomimes, Extravaganzas and Burlesques’ (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976), sc. x, p. 83.
225 ‘sleepy style’: The Times, 27 December 1823.
225 ‘no one can be at a loss’: clipping, London Magazine, 1823, Islington Local History Centre.
225 ‘delightful assumption of nonchalance’: Oxberry (eds), ‘Memoir of Joseph Grimaldi’, p. 119; Leigh Hunt’s Dramatic Criticism, p. 110.
225 ‘world of concentration’: Moody, Illegitimate Theatre, p. 216.
225 ‘their old friend Joe’s voice’: William Hazlitt, Examiner, 29 December 1816.
225 close to five thousand: ‘My Father, Brother and self have written more Songs than not only any other three, but three score men put together – some thousands, of which for public, private and various occasions, I have written nearer 5,000 than 4,000.’ Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 46.
225 ‘Unless sung by the Clown of the Pantomime’: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 113.
226 ‘A most remarkable instance’: Goodwin, Sketches and Impressions, p. 14.
227 Harlequin in His Element: The stage directions are as follows: ‘CLOWN makes free with the wine himself, till being quite inebr
iated he determines on a frolic, which he commences by stripping the WATCHMAN and clothing himself in the great coat and hat. Wishing to take another sup of his wine, he after many fruitless attempts at last gets hold of the bottle, but not being able to guide it to his mouth, he with the other hand feels for his mouth and tries again, in vain, to put the neck of the bottle into it. Being vexed he takes up the lantern and, holding it to his cheek, effects … his purpose. He then shuts the sleeper into his box, and with the lantern and rattle parades the stage, crying the hour in a ludicrous tone.’ Thomas Dibdin, Harlequin in His Element, sc. iv, pp. 78–9.
227 ‘The first fierce glance and start’: Robson, Old Play-goer, pp. 240–1.
228 provided instruction to John Philip Kemble: Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. vii (1871), pp. 91. The article also claims that he taught the dandy Charles Stanhope ‘and other noblemen and gentlemen of the Court’.
228 ‘It is greatly to be regretted’: Letter of Thomas Perronet Thompson to Nancy Thompson, 25 June 1812. Brotherton Library, University of Leeds, SC MS 277/1/8.
228 Moll Flaggon: Percival, vol. 4, f. 78.
228 ‘intellectual Clown’: Oxberry (eds), ‘Memoir of Joseph Grimaldi’, p. 120.
229 ‘to be knock’d about’: Thomas Dibdin, Harlequin Hoax (Larpent MS, 1814); Mayer, Harlequin in His Element, p. 176.
229 ‘It is absolutely surprising’: Percival, vol. 4, f. 139.
229 ‘an act which I shall never forget’: Mirza Abul Hassan Khan, A Persian at the Court of King George, 1809–10: The Journal of Mirza Abul Hassan Khan, ed. Margaret Morris Cloake (London: Barrie and Jenkins, 1988), p. 92.
230 ‘Grimaldi, worth his weight in gold’: Daly ex-ill., vol. 2, p. 81 facing.
230 entrusting his entire provincial earnings: This had happened following his engagement in Birmingham at the behest of Louisa Bristow – the loss: £150. See Dickens, Memoirs, p. 191.
230 ‘the great expense’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 212.
230 run-in with the bailiff: See Dickens, Memoirs, pp. 161–3.
231 strolled to a pawn shop: Unidentified clipping, Islington Local History Centre.
231 ‘an Alderman with the quinsey’: MacCarthy, Byron, p. 184.
231 ‘a Persian eunuch’: Paul Ranger, ‘Betty, William Henry West (1791–1874)’, DNB.
231 ‘remains a mystery to him’: Theatrical Inquisitor (1812), pp. 234–5.
231 ‘a local deity’: Grantley Fitzhardinge Berkeley, My Life and Recollections, 4 vols (London: Hurst and Blackett, 1865) vol. 2, p. 164.
231 ‘very medicinal and sufficiently disgusting’: MacCarthy, Byron, p. 183.
232 ‘mingled gratification and suspicion’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 214.
232 ‘Byron is very courteous’: Dickens, Memoirs, pp. 215–16.
233 ‘nice with apple-pie’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 216.
233 too good to take orders from a mere player: See Kristina Straub, Sexual Subjects: Eighteenth-Century Players and Sexual Ideology (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1992), p. 157. Evidence that Grimaldi was beginning to see himself as something other than a performing servant is given in the anecdote concerning the clergyman who invited him and a singer called Higman to dinner with a large, convivial party. As soon as the dinner was over, the host turned to Higman, whom he ‘commanded, rather than asked’, to give a song. Higman obliged, and Grimaldi was next directed to do a turn, although when he demurred, begging some time to digest, the host haughtily informed him that he’d been invited solely to entertain the guests. Joe was incensed, angrily lecturing the clergyman on manners before asking to be excused. Dickens, Memoirs, p. 218.
234 ‘an insult which no Audience can tolerate’: Daly ex-ill., vol. 2, p. 81 facing.
234 strength of his oaths: Byron’s flash and swagger was a version of masculinity with which Grimaldi identified, or so it would seem from a comment in the Memoirs that parrots one of Byron’s own. It concerns the author Matthew Lewis, synonymous with Gothic literature thanks to the success of his deliciously indecent novel, The Monk, whose evident homosexuality unnerved the Clown. ‘He was an effeminate looking man,’ wrote Joe, ‘almost constantly lounging about the green-room… and entering into conversation with the ladies and gentlemen, but in a manner so peculiar, so namby-pamby… that it was far from pleasing to a majority of those thus addressed.’ Byron, who had a long acquaintance with Lewis, letting him stay at the Villa Diodati even though he thought him a ‘jaded voluptuary’, had similarly mixed feelings about his company. ‘I will never dine with a middle-aged man’, he once said, ‘who fills up his table with young ensigns, and has looking-glass panels to his book-cases.’ D. L. Macdonald, Monk Lewis: A Critical Biography (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2000), p. 60.
235 ‘plumed himself’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 222.
235 ‘We looked at the faces we met in the street’: Examiner, 31 December 1815; Hazlitt, Complete Works, vol. 18, p. 208.
235–6 ‘He has complained so much … giving him permission’: Letter from Charles Dibdin to Charles Farley, 9 August 1810, Harvard Theatre Collection.
236 ‘there was nothing but war’: Richard Wheeler’s Memoir from the Clerkenwell workhouse, Percival, vol. 4, f. 193.
236 Dibdin in sole charge: Percival, vol. 4, f. 101.
236 ‘A Theatre should be like an absolute Monarchy’: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 122.
237 personal discounts: Richard Wheeler’s Memoir from the Clerkenwell workhouse, Percival, vol. 4, f. 189.
237 Marengo: Altick, Shows of London, p. 239.
237 ‘All Theatres are bad now’: Arundell, Sadler’s Wells, p. 93.
238 the water had to go: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 117.
238 knee-high water: For examples of unimpressed reviewers tiring of the aquatic drama, see Gillian Russell, The Theatres of War: Performance, Politics, and Society, 1793–1815 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1995), p. 73.
238 negotiations for a new contract: Dibdin and Grimaldi disagree on this point. Grimaldi, who does not mention the time off for touring, claimed that the salary increase was agreed to, but only with the loss of one of his benefits (Dickens, Memoirs, p. 228), whereas Dibdin makes no mention of benefits, and recalls the problem purely revolving around the proposed absence (Dickens, Memoirs, p. 119).
238 ‘lion of the theatre’: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 228.
239 ‘stood his ground ably’: Percival, vol. 4, f. 71.
239 ‘a universal favourite’: Percival, vol. 4, f. 76.
The Orphan of Peru
243 bottom coach: At least they were saved the ordeal of some Wiltshire passengers the year before, who had their coach attacked by an escaped lioness. Ashton, Social England, pp. 354–6.
244 told him to get on with it: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 189.
244 ‘instantaneous burst of laughter’: Reynolds, Life, vol. 2, p. 321.
245 not to sit so close to him during lunch: See ‘Journal of Old Barnes the Pantaloon, On a Trip to Paris in 1830’, Percival, vol. 5, f. 112.
245 that moment to take a break: The Morning Chronicle, 29 December 1779, reported that ‘The scene shifters last night spoilt the effect of [the scenery] and had nearly killed Harlequin (W. Bates) who twice broke the scene to pieces in attempting to jump through the head of an image, placed at the top of a water course, which he could have easily executed had not the scene men, through the most scandalous inattention, suffered the part of the scene which was to give way for the leap, to be fastened up.’
245 broke his hand: Dickens, Memoirs, p. 248.
245 torn it from the man’s scalp: Oxberry (eds), ‘Memoir of Joseph Grimaldi’, p. 115.
245 top of his skull collided: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 115.
246 Joe’s last benefit of the season: See Percival, vol. 4, f. 101. There is a small possibility that JS’s début was actually at Covent Garden on 12 July 1814. The event was a night of music to honour His Excellency Prince Platoff, the Cossack commander who had led his men with distinction eighteen months earlier, harassing Nap
oleon’s vastly superior force on its miserable retreat from Moscow. He had promised to give his daughter to any man who could bring him Napoleon’s head. The bill was predominantly musical, including overtures from Mozart’s Magic Flute and Don Giovanni, an opera, and songs on the death of Nelson, concluded by Sheridan’s Crusoe. See Ashton, Social England, p. 88.
247 ‘when his own heyday of fame’: This wish no doubt lies behind the Memoirs’ mistaken claim that this was the part in which Joe himself had been introduced to the stage by his father (it was in fact The Triumph of Mirth). The desire for continuity-through-symmetry expressed in this false memory was obviously too choice to resist. Dickens, Memoirs, p. 219.
247 Harlequin and Fortunio: Hazlitt described the pantomime as ‘indifferent,’ though ‘better when Mr. Grimaldi comes in, lets off a culverin [a ten-foot cannon] at his enemies, and sings a serenade to his mistress in concert with Grimalkin’, a cat. Examiner, 31 December 1815, Hazlitt, Complete Works, vol. 18, p. 208.
247 ‘highly flattering’: Percival, vol. 6, f. 6.
249 ‘as a Republic’: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 122.
249 tore a hole in the curtain: Findlater, Joe Grimaldi, p. 191.
249 consumed his provincial profits: See Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 53, and Findlater, Joe Grimaldi, p. 192.
250 ‘hailed with shouts of applause’: Dibdin, Memoirs, p. 123.
250 curtain went up at the advertised time: Percival, vol. 4, f. 95.
250 ‘beneath the notice of criticism’: Percival, vol. 4, f. 95.
250 ‘dead failures’: Miles, Grimaldi, p. 171.
251 ‘Hot Codlins’: The humour of this song arose from Dibdin’s device of leaving the final word of each verse blank. The audience was then able to shout the supposedly risqué rhyme back at Grimaldi, who would cry, ‘For shame,’ in mock outrage. That it became such a great favourite was no doubt due to the combination of audience participation and Grimaldi’s peerless drunk act.
The Pantomime Life of Joseph Grimaldi Page 40
