Production
greatest Exactitude in its first represent
NEW Play requires th
“
in
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writes Aaron Hill, “as the Impression given an Audience is
1.1
conveyed to the whole Town, and the Success of the Play depeiijs
great measure, upon it” (The Prompter, 6 May 1735). Here the
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critic utters a universal truth concerning the production of a neW
unfa;'0٢
0
results
shake off til
in the Augustan Age. Few plays coul
first night's staging' ;;
or negligent flaws
response to acciden
٠
only the new plays but also the revivals of older drama and tlie stock p
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care and intelligent planning for presentation, since
requi
the .main features of production during the years 1729-47. Pro
f
!
tend to become static in a tradition-minded society like that of tlic th
and clianges seem to come about almost by accident. Tlie acquis
fi),
a resident liouse dramatist had not yet developed, as it was to Jo
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mid-century. All companies had a resident librettist or arti
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٧
pantomimes. Thurmond performed tliis ser.vice for Drury
Lan
| ؛
left during tlie squabbles of 1733 and moved over to join Giffard at
'
The eminent Shakespearean editor Lewis
man's Field
improviser for some of the most profitable pantomimes Rich ever offc’ ij,
٠6
غ
and
StiLiftx as Tbe Rape oj Proserpine, Urpbetts and Euryiice, and Perse
'•
Theobald tloctored tlie last named of these on several occasions
Thurmond’s departure, Theopliilus Cibber got up the pantomime
Drury I.ane more successftilly than anything else he ever attempted :
theatre. Thurmond’s most popular achievements were Harlequin v ;
Faustus and Harlequin Sheppard (the latter named after t lie juvenile deliml
١٠١
Jack Sheppard whom Defoe made famous
Though the processes of staging remained similar, tlie imp
إ,
companies began to add composers of music, song writers
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members of their company, a
resi
a
and chor
١
to the older practice of simply paying such specialists for particular
clxxvi