Shakespearean Playhouses Part 37

That the plan actually was carried out, at least in part, is shown by a sketch of the Whitehall buildings made by John Fisher at some date before 1670, and engraved by Vertue in 1747, (see page 398).[667]

Here, in the northeast corner of the palace, we find a little theatre, labeled "The c.o.c.kpit." Its ident.i.ty with the building sketched by Inigo Jones is obvious at a glance; even the exterior measurements, which are ascertainable from the scales of feet given on the two plans, are the same.

[Footnote 667: Vertue conservatively dates the survey "about 1680"; but the names of the occupants of the various parts of the palace show that it was drawn before 1670, and nearer 1660 than 1680.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: INIGO JONES'S PLANS FOR THE c.o.c.kPIT-IN-COURT

Now preserved in the Worcester College Library at Oxford; discovered by Mr. Hamilton Bell, and reproduced in _The Architectural Record_, of New York, 1913.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FISHER'S SURVEY OF WHITEHALL SHOWING THE c.o.c.kPIT-IN-COURT

A section from Vertue's engraving, 1747, of a survey of Whitehall made by John Fisher, 1660-1670. Compare "The c.o.c.kpit" with Inigo Jones's plans.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE THEATRO OLYMPICO AT VICENZA

Which probably inspired Inigo Jones's plans for the c.o.c.kpit-in-Court.]

Mr. Bell describes the plan he discovered as follows:[668]

It represents within a square building, windowed on three sides and on one seemingly attached to another building, an auditorium occupying five sides of an octagon, on the floor of which are shown the benches of a pit, or the steps, five in number, on which they could be set. These are curiously arranged at an angle of forty-five degrees on either side of a central aisle, so that the spectators occupying them could never have directly faced the stage. Surrounding this pit on five sides is a balcony ten feet deep, with, it would seem, two rows of benches on four of its sides; the fifth side in the centre, directly opposite the stage, being part.i.tioned off into a room or box, in the middle of which is indicated a platform about five feet by seven, presumably for the Royal State. Three steps descend from this box to the centre aisle of the pit. To the left of and behind this royal box appears another enclosure or box, part.i.tioned off from the rest of the balcony.

The staircases of access to this auditorium are clearly indicated; one small door at the rear of the _salle_ with its own private stairway, communicating with the adjoining building, opens directly into the royal box; as in the Royal Opera House in Berlin to-day.

There is another door, with a triangular lobby, into the rear of the left-hand balcony. Two windows are shown on each side of the house, opening directly into the theatre from the outer air.

The stage runs clear across the width of the pit, about thirty-five feet, projecting in an "ap.r.o.n" or _avant scene_ five feet beyond the proscenium wall, and is surrounded on the three outward sides by a low railing of cla.s.sic design about eighteen inches in height, just as in many Elizabethan playhouses.

If one may trust an elevation of the stage, drawn on the same sheet to twice the scale of the general plan, the stage was four feet six inches above the floor of the pit. This elevation exhibits the surprising feature of a cla.s.sic facade, Palladian in treatment, on the stage of what so far we have regarded as a late modification of a playhouse of Shakespeare's day. Evidently Inigo Jones contemplated the erection of a permanent architectural _proscenium_, as the ancients called it, of the type, though far more modest, both in scale and ornamentation, of Palladio's Theatro Olimpico at Vicenza, which we know he visited in about 1600, some twenty years after its erection. This _proscenium_, given in plan and elevation, shows a semi-circular structure with a radius of fifteen feet, two stories in height, of the Corinthian or Composite order. In the lower story are five doorways, the centre of which is a large archway flanked by pedestals, on which are inscribed in Greek characters, Melpomene--Thalia; over these and over the smaller doors are tablets.

The second story contains between its lighter engaged columns, over the four side doors, niches with corbels below, destined to carry statues as their inscribed bases indicate. So far as these inscriptions are legible,--the clearest reading "phocles," probably Sophocles,--these were to represent Greek dramatists, most likely aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles and Aristophanes.

The curved pediment of the central archway runs up into this story and is broken in the middle by a tablet bearing the inscription "Prodesse et Delectare," which is flanked by two reclining genii holding garlands.

Above these are two busts on brackets, Thespis and Epicurus, or possibly Epicharmus. The s.p.a.ce directly above this pediment is occupied by a window-like opening five by four feet, the traditional Elizabethan music-room, in all probability, which, Mr. W.J. Lawrence has shown us, occupied this position both in Shakespeare's day and for some time after the Restoration; an arrangement which was revived by Mr. Steele Mackaye in the Madison Square Theatre, and originally in the first little Lyceum, New York, both now pulled down. The pyramidal pediment above this opening projects above the upper cornice into a coved ceiling, which would appear from the rendering of the drawing to form an apse above the semi-circular stage. Behind the _proscenium_ is a large s.p.a.ce with staircases of approach, two windows at the rear, and apparently a fireplace for the comfort of the waiting players. Communication with the front of the house is provided by a door in the proscenium wall opening into the stage door lobby, whence the outside of the building may be reached.

There is no indication of galleries, unless some marks on the angles of the front wall of the balcony may be interpreted without too much license into the footings of piers or posts to carry one; the total interior height shown in the elevation from what I have a.s.sumed to be the floor of the pit to the ceiling being only twenty-eight feet, there would hardly have been room for more than one. The only staircases which could have served it are at the rear of the building in the corners behind the stage wall....

The general dimensions would appear to be:

Total width of the auditorium 58 ft.

Total width of the pit 36 ft.

Total width of the front stage or "ap.r.o.n" 35 ft.

Total depth of the stage from the railing to the centre of the _proscenium_ 16 ft.

The entire building is 58 feet square inside, cut to an octagon of 28 feet each side.

Height from floor to ceiling 28 ft.

Height from stage to ceiling about 23 ft. 6 in.

The lower order of the _proscenium_ 10 ft. 6 in.

The upper order of the _proscenium_ 9 ft. 6 in.

The scale on the drawing may not be absolutely correct, as measured by it the side doors of the _proscenium_ are only five feet high and two feet nine inches wide: this, however, may be an error in the drawing, since we have it on very good authority that Inigo Jones designed without the use of a scale, proportioning his various members by his exquisitely critical eye alone, subsequently adding the dimensions in writing.

[Footnote 668: Reprinted here by the kind permission of Mr. Bell and the editors of _The Architectural Record_.]

I record below some of the references to the c.o.c.kpit which I have gathered from the Herbert Ma.n.u.script and the Office-Books of the Lord Chamberlain. The earliest payment for plays there, it will be observed, is dated March 16, 1633. Abundant evidence shows that the actors gave their performance in the c.o.c.kpit at night without interfering with their regular afternoon performance at their playhouses, and for their pains received the sum of 10. If, however, for any reason they "lost their day" at their house they were paid 20.

1633. March 16. Warrant to pay 270 to John Lowen, Joseph Taylor, and Eilliard Swanston, His Majesty's Comedians, for plays by them acted before His Majesty, viz.--20 for the rehearsal of one at the c.o.c.kpit, by which means they lost their afternoon at their house....[669]

1634. _Bussy d'Amboise_ was played by the King's Players on Easter-Monday night, at the c.o.c.kpit-in-Court.[670]

1634. The _Pastorall_ was played by the King's Players on Easter-Tuesday night, at the c.o.c.kpit-in-Court.[671]

1635. 10 May. A warrant for 30 unto Mons. Josias Floridor, for himself and the rest of the French players for three plays acted by them at the c.o.c.kpit.[672]

1635. 10 Decemr.--A warrant for 100 to the Prince's Comedians,--viz. 60 for three plays acted at Hampton Court, at 20 for each play, in September and October, 1634. And 40 for four plays at Whitehall and [_query_ "at"] the c.o.c.kpit in January, February, and May following, at 10 for each play.[673]

1636. The first and second part of _Arviragus and Philicia_ were acted at the c.o.c.kpit before the King and Queen, the Prince, and Prince Elector, the 18 and 19 April, 1636, being Monday and Tuesday in Easter week.[674]

[Footnote 669: Lord Chamberlain's Office-Book, C.C. Stopes, "Shakespeare's Fellows and Followers," Shakespeare _Jahrbuch_, XLVI, 96.]

[Footnote 670: Herbert MS., Malone, _Variorum_, III, 237.]

[Footnote 671: Herbert MS., Malone, _Variorum_, III, 237.]

[Footnote 672: Lord Chamberlain's Office-Book, Chalmers's _Apology_, p. 508.]

[Footnote 673: _Ibid._, p. 509.]

[Footnote 674: The Herbert MS., Malone, _Variorum_, III, 238.]

Other similar allusions to performance in the c.o.c.kpit might be cited from the Court records. One more will suffice--the most interesting of all, since it shows how frequently the little theatre was employed for the entertainment of the royal family. It is a bill presented by the Blackfriars Company, the King's Men, for Court performances during the year 1637. This bill was discovered and reproduced in facsimile by George R. Wright, F.S.A., in _The Journal of the British Archaeological a.s.sociation_ for 1860; but it was wholly misunderstood by its discoverer, who regarded it as drawn up by the company of players that "performed at the c.o.c.kpit in Drury Lane." He was indeed somewhat puzzled by the reference to the Blackfriars Playhouse, but met the difficulty by saying: "There can be little doubt that the last-named theatre was lent for the occasion to the c.o.c.kpit Company,"

although he suggests no reason for this strange borrowing of a theatre by a troupe that possessed a house of its own, and much nearer the Court, too. It did not even occur to him, it seems, to inquire how the c.o.c.kpit Company secured the plays which we know belonged to Shakespeare's old company. Because of these obvious difficulties scholars have looked upon the doc.u.ment with suspicion, and apparently have treated it as a forgery.[675] But that it is genuine is indicated by the history of "The c.o.c.kpit-in-Court" as sketched above, and is proved beyond any question by the fact that the Office-Book of the Lord Chamberlain shows that the bill was paid:

12th March 1638 {9}.--Forasmuch as His Majesty's Servants, the company at the Blackfriars, have by special command, at divers times within the s.p.a.ce of this present year 1638, acted 24 plays before His Majesty, six whereof have been performed at Hampton-court and Richmond, by means whereof they were not only at the loss of their day at home, but at extraordinary charges by traveling and carriage of their goods, in consideration whereof they are to have 20 apiece for those plays, and 10 apiece for the other 18 acted at Whitehall, which in the whole amounted to the sum of 300.--These are therefore to pray and require you out of His Majesty's treasure in your charge to pay....[676]

[Footnote 675: Fleay in his elaborate studies of performances at Court ignores it entirely, as do subsequent scholars.]

[Footnote 676: Chalmers, _Apology_, p. 510.]

A photographic facsimile of this interesting doc.u.ment may be seen in _The Journal of the British Archaeological a.s.sociation_, already referred to; but for the convenience of those who do not read Elizabethan script with ease, I have reproduced it in type facsimile on page 404.

[Ill.u.s.tration: [Transcriber's Note: The dashes below represent handwritten check-marks in the facsimile.]

before the king & queene this yeare of our lord 1638

At the Cocpit the 26th of march The lost ladie

At the Cocpit the 27th of march Damboyes

At the Cocpit the 3d of Aprill Aglaura