Shakespeare in a Divided America

by James Shapiro

  Another tension was in play, between the homegrown future and the British-inflected past of Shakespeare in America, and by extension, where the nation had come from and was headed. Two days before Macready took to the stage, the Albion urged its readers not to miss him, for the British star was the “last surviving link of that galaxy of the highest order of histrionic talent that succeeded Garrick, and which numbered in its ranks the Kembles, the Siddons, O’Neill, Young, and Kean, with all of whom Mr. Macready was a contemporary.” Like many farewell tours, Macready’s was haunted by nostalgia for a reassuring past. You might not be able to put these complicated feelings into words, but seeing Macready perform captured them perfectly. More was at stake, then, than watching an aging star for the last time. Macready’s accent, gentle manliness, and propriety represented a world that was being overtaken by everything that Forrest, guiding spirit of the new and for many coarser age of Manifest Destiny, represented. From the box seats, it must have looked like a ruthless Macbeth was killing off the gracious Duncan. But viewed from the pit, the refusal to concede that the old ways—embodied in Macready—had always favored the elite must have been infuriating.

  The immediate goal of those opposing Macready was simple: drive him from the stage. But this would not be easy at the Opera House, which was difficult to infiltrate. The solution for Forrest’s supporters was to go around to various hotels, buying fifty tickets here, thirty there, and then quietly distribute these to young toughs who understood what was required. Rynders bought some, as did others. We don’t know who bankrolled their efforts or whether Forrest knew of these plans, but in the end, roughly five hundred tickets to Macready’s Macbeth were distributed in this way. While they weren’t anticipating any significant disruption, the managers of the Opera House were reassured when New York City’s chief of police, George Matsell, accompanied by a few of his men, agreed to be there.

  A playgoer who was there that evening recalled how those sitting in “the boxes began to feel anxious” when a “hard-looking crowd” of working-class men, some “in their shirt-sleeves, others . . . ragged and dirty,” entered the theater shortly after 7 p.m. A new sound was heard in the Opera House, the “stage reveille” familiar to playgoers at the Chatham or Bowery theaters: a rhythmic rapping and stomping—“Tap! Rap-rap-tap—Tap! Tap! Rap-rap-tap!”—from first-time visitors impatient for the play to begin. Macready mistook what he thought was “the greatest applause, as it seemed, from the whole house.” He bowed repeatedly, and, as the noise failed to diminish, began to think, “This is becoming too much.” It slowly dawned on him that in addition to cheering and handkerchief-waving supporters, “there was opposition, and that the prolongation of the applause was the struggle against it.” He tried waiting it out, to no avail. He even tried addressing the audience, but the protesters would not allow him to be heard. A banner was unfurled, reading “No apologies—it is too late!” on one side, and on the other, “You have ever proved yourself a liar!” When it became clear that the clamor was not going to subside, Macready told his fellow actors that they would present the play wordlessly—and so they did.

  This enraged those keen on disrupting the performance. They hurled eggs and pennies. Potatoes followed, along with lemons, apples, an old shoe, and a bottle of asafetida, a foul-smelling spice, that splashed Macready’s costume. It took courage to withstand the onslaught, but Macready and the rest of the cast persisted, through the first Act, then the second. The uproar never ceased. Those trying to disrupt the performance loudly chanted snatches of the witches’ choruses. Cries rang out hinting at the larger sources of conflict: “Three groans for the codfish aristocracy!” “Down with the English hog!” and then, mockingly, “Three cheers for Macready, Nigger Douglass, and Pete Williams!” (Frederick Douglass had arrived in New York to speak at the American Anti-Slavery Society Convention, and had been seen walking downtown in the company of two white women; Williams was an African American who owned a saloon in Five Points where whites and blacks danced together). Amalgamation, abolition, and a performance of Macbeth by a British actor were all part of the same elitist worldview that had to be forcefully rejected.

  The fury of the protesters intensified at the sight of Macready entering in Act 3 wearing a crown. First one chair, then another, then two more came flying onstage from the second tier of seats. The police chose not to intervene and made no arrests. Despite the apparent danger, a reporter for the New York Herald seated close to the stage reported that none of what was thrown “appeared to be aimed directly at the person of Mr. Macready.” Macready didn’t have the luxury of knowing that the chairs crashing onstage a few feet from where he stood weren’t meant to hit him. Before things got further out of hand, he bowed to the audience, told a fellow actor that he had fulfilled his obligations, and walked off. The curtain dropped. Undaunted by the experience, and escorted from the theater by friends, Macready left Astor Place, he recorded, “in the best spirits.” The victorious protesters spilled out of the theater. Rather than heading home or to nearby saloons for a celebratory round or two, they moved on to the Broadway Tabernacle, intent on breaking up a meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society.

  The following morning Macready decided he had had enough and booked passage home to England. But Macready’s supporters saw how much was at risk if thuggish protesters could establish a precedent in this violent way. They had to act quickly. In a remarkably short time, a group of forty-eight leading financial and cultural leaders signed and published a letter urging Macready to continue performing at Astor Place. With this action they assumed center stage; the anonymous author of Account of the Terrific and Fatal Riot at the New-York Astor Place Opera House writes that Macready “was to be put down less on his own account, than to spite his aristocratic supporters. The question became not only a national, but a social one. It was the rich against the poor.”

  Their letter ran in local papers, along with Macready’s response. He agreed to perform on Thursday, May 10, and finish what he had started: he would play Macbeth again. Most of those who had signed the letter were politically engaged men of means—real estate developers, bankers, lawyers, editors, and judges—known for their support of the arts. They were joined by some high-profile men of letters, including Washington Irving, Evert Duyckinck, and Herman Melville. Melville’s name may have struck some as a surprise, since unlike almost all the other signers, he wasn’t a Whig, but rather a Young America Democrat, and committed to establishing a national drama. The controversy was forcing him and many other New Yorkers to take sides, which meant weighing in the balance competing loyalties and interests—financial, personal, aesthetic, political, and ideological—and betraying some of them. It also meant deciding whether, as a writer, you saw yourself, and your work, as highbrow or popular. It could not have been an easy decision for the 30-year-old novelist.

  What seems to have tipped the balance for Melville was his changing view of Shakespeare, whose work would so profoundly influence his next novel, Moby-Dick. He had only recently started reading the plays closely, having bought his first set of Shakespeare’s works a little more than a year earlier, and since then had fallen hard for his works, especially the tragedies. Melville had gone to hear Fanny Kemble read from Macbeth and Othello and had recently written to his friend (and fellow signer) Evert Duyckinck that “I would to God Shakespeare had lived later, and promenaded on Broadway.” An American Shakespeare was clearly needed, though one on the page, not the stage, if Forrest’s bluster was the best the theater could offer. When within a year Melville would write “that men not very much inferior to Shakespeare are this day being born on the banks of the Ohio,” he might have been pointing at himself.

  Much of the evidence about what happened behind the scenes over the next three days is lost or suppressed. We know that this time Macready’s followers tried to pack the house. On the other side, Rynders came up with a new strategy. Working out of the Empire Club, where his Native American Party headq
uarters were located, he had hundreds of posters printed, then displayed throughout the town, that read:

  WORKING MEN,

  SHALL

  AMERICANS

  OR

  ENGLISH RULE

  IN THIS CITY

  The crew of the British steamer have

  Threatened all Americans who shall dare to express their

  Opinions on this night, at the

  ENGLISH ARISTOCRATIC OPERA HOUSE!

  We advocate no violence, but a free expression of opinion

  To all public men.

  WORKINGMEN! FREEMEN!

  STAND BY YOUR

  LAWFUL RIGHTS!

  American Committee.

  Having pushed all the right patriotic, nativist, and anti-elitist buttons (without even naming Macready), and invented that bit of fake news about the crew of that British steamer, Rynders then went one step further, posting alongside these inflammatory posters others calling on all Englishmen to come out in force to “sustain your countrymen.” With any luck there would be brawling in the streets.

  Mayor Caleb Smith Woodhull, sworn in earlier that week, anticipated trouble and arranged for a meeting at City Hall with the theater managers and leading members of his administration. He wanted to call off the performance, but by then it was too late. Everyone in the room felt the political pressure of the signatories. Woodhull was told by his chief of police that he lacked the manpower to control the crowd if things really got out of hand, so it was decided to call up the militia. No warning was made, however, urging New Yorkers to stay off the street. Meanwhile, workmen boarded up the lower windows of the theater. Late that afternoon, 200 policemen took positions inside the theater and another 125 around it. Farther downtown, two hundred infantrymen of the Seventh Regiment collected ammunition and were joined by two companies of hussars, two troops of horse and one of light artillery.

  When the doors to the Opera House opened, employees screened out undesirables whose tickets lacked a special mark on the back. This time around the protesters—fewer than a hundred managed to get in—were badly outnumbered. When a deafening mix of cheers and hissing greeted the British star’s first appearance onstage, and agitators cried “Out with him” and shook their fists “in savage fury,” Macready laughed at them and used Macbeth’s truncheon to point out offenders to the police, who initially refused to intervene, respecting the time-honored right of playgoers to make their feelings known. The management then brought out a sign that read: “The friends of order will remain quiet.” It was a neat trick, as only Macready’s supporters fell silent. The police at last dragged out some of the most disruptive protesters; the hope was that making an example of a few young men would calm the rest. It worked. The show went on, even though by now it was clear that protesters who couldn’t enter were attacking the building. The actors onstage had to compete with the noise and distraction of the tumult, as cobblestones smashed the theater’s unprotected upper windows and one hurled through an opening struck and damaged the magnificent chandelier. Word spread that the mob intended to torch the theater.

  When his fellow actors implored Macready to shorten the performance, he refused, determined to show a steely resolve, later recalling how he threw himself into the part “whilst those dreadful deeds of real crime and outrage were roaring . . . all around us.” He spoke the words “I will not be afraid of death and bane / ’Til Birnam Forest come to Dunsinane” (5.3.61–62) so defiantly that Forrest’s supporters made a final attempt “to get up a tumult . . . but failed.” And when Macready came to the line “Our castle’s strength / Will laugh a siege to scorn” (5.5.2–3), his supporters in the audience—in the midst of a furious siege themselves—loudly applauded. Macbeth was acted until the final curtain, at which point the remaining playgoers exited through a path protected by soldiers with fixed bayonets.

  Outside there was chaos—and had been for the better part of two hours. While Rynders, hoping to keep a low profile, had stayed away from Astor Place that evening, his ally Ned Buntline mobilized supporters in the surrounding streets. When a large pile of cobblestones from a construction site nearby was spotted, Buntline urged his followers to hurl them, in volleys, at the Opera House. The police, badly outnumbered, and having only nightsticks for protection, were also showered with volleys of stones, and those who were injured retreated into the playhouse. Others waded into the crowd and arrested stone throwers and ringleaders, including Buntline himself. There were cries of “Burn the damned den of the aristocracy” and “America rules England tonight, by Jesus.” Smaller groups of rioters tried to break down the theater doors. A little before 9 p.m. word was sent downtown: bring up the militia.

  The cavalry arrived first but was quickly overwhelmed. Some of the riders were pulled off their mounts, the rest, bloodied, were driven off, but the infantry managed to force their way through the furious crowd. The new mayor, who was on the scene, consulted with his security forces and was told that he needed to give the order to fire; the troops would otherwise be overwhelmed. The mayor equivocated, then slipped away to a nearby hotel, leaving others to give that controversial command. With the situation becoming desperate, the soldiers, dozens of them now bloodied, were ordered to “charge bayonets.” But the rioters were by now so close that they yanked muskets out of soldiers’ hands. The order was at last given to the troops to fire—though only as a warning shot, over the heads of the rioters. A cry was heard, “They have only blank cartridges, give it to them again,” and the protesters resumed the attack, one of them daring the soldiers to fire in earnest: “Take the life out of a free-born American for a bloody English actor?” Another command to fire was given, this time aiming low. The rioters initially retreated toward Lafayette Place before surging forward again. One last time the militia was ordered to fire, this time directly at the mob, which gave way. By now more than twenty people were dead and, on both sides, dozens wounded.

  At half past eleven the light artillery arrived on the scene and set up two cannons, one facing Broadway, the other, the Bowery. They had arrived just in time, for it was rumored that “the crowd intended to arm and renew the attack.” By one in the morning the remaining protesters had finally dispersed. Astor Place looked like a war zone. Nearby houses were spattered with bullet holes. Littered on the ground were sections of heavy iron railings that had been torn from fastenings and used by the rioters against the military. The Opera House windows were shattered and two of its doors smashed. The surrounding area was strewn with bricks and cobblestones, and there were pools of blood on the sidewalks.

  The following morning, newspapers reported that “the excitement today is intense, and fearfully increasing. Nothing else but the Tragedy of Macbeth is talked of, or thought of. Knots of men, on every corner, are discussing the affair and we find the liveliest apprehensions are entertained that the terrible scenes of last night will be attempted to be renewed, this evening at night fall.” Rumors were rampant. According to one, “firearms had been purchased and obtained in large quantities by persons riotously disposed.” Another warned “that there is to be an attack on the Arsenal and an armed demonstration at sundown.” There was also talk of making “a sudden rush upon the soldiers about midnight, and to disarm them.” The Telegraph reported threats that “the Mayor’s house . . . will be sacked tonight, also, that the Opera House will be blown up!” Some of the wealthy thought it a good time to leave town. Others hired private security, packed up valuables, and cleaned their pistols. “The town was in a fearful condition,” the actor Lester Wallack recalled, “and for several days after was like a city in a state of siege. Some were saying that it was a rascally thing that the people should be shot down and murdered in the streets, and others were arguing that the military had only done their duty.” New Yorkers “from the nursery to the work shop, and from the parlor to the counting room” debated who was in the right.

  The authorities,
fearing more violence, acted aggressively. Dozens were arrested. It was agreed that the damaged Opera House would be closed. The mayor issued a proclamation “deploring the loss of life, urging all citizens to stay home and avoid assembling in public,” and warned that rioters did not have a monopoly on violence. Gun shops were searched and their weapons secured at the Arsenal after the mayor’s office learned of efforts to rent two thousand muskets. A thousand special deputies, two thousand infantry, as well as a squadron of cavalry and four troops of horse artillery were marshaled.

  The opposition plotted their next moves as well. They lacked the firepower of the authorities and were aware that despite the anger at the mayor and the military, talk in the street had begun to turn against them, or at least against violent protest. As the Morning Express put it, the “sight of blood had restored peace, and re-enthroned reflection.” If they had any hopes of shifting public opinion and of securing the crucial support of the middle class, they would have to rely on oratory. To that end, placards were posted throughout the city, attracting crowds, declaring that “the great Crisis has come”: “Will English aristocrats and foreigners be allowed to triumph?” And will citizens “allow themselves to be deprived of the liberty of opinion—so dear to every true American heart?” A second round of posters was plastered around the town, this time urging citizens to join a large rally, followed by a protest march back to Astor Place that evening.

  The size of the crowd that gathered downtown on May 11 was estimated at 25,000 or more. Newspapers reported that the opposition had succeeded in attracting “an immense number of citizens of the greatest respectability in demeanor, deportment and appearance”—the crucial middle class they needed on their side. The rally was like a modern-day version of the funeral oration scene in Julius Caesar, where the citizens gather after blood has been shed to hear and act on the exhortations of powerful speakers. A series of resolutions were proposed at the outset of the rally calling for the censure and indictment of the authorities and condemning the murder of innocent protesters. Measure for Measure, a play that turns on the abuse of civic authority, was quoted (2.2.123) in deriding “the pride, tyranny and inhumanity of those who, ‘dressed in a little brief authority,’ have shown a higher regard for the applause of those who courted a fatal issue than for the lives of their fellow citizens.” It was also resolved that the time-honored rights of playgoers would not easily be surrendered: while “opposed to all violence, in theatres, or elsewhere, we still insist that citizens have a perfect and indisputable right to express their approbation or disapprobation in all places of public amusement.”