1827.] 



Monthly Theatrical Report. 



changes of society. Fifty years ago the 

 higher orders led the public tastes the 

 presence of stars and garters was essential 

 even to dramatic fortune, and the play 

 which ventured forth without a handsome 

 display of diamonds and feathers in the 

 side boxes, was pronounced good for no- 

 thing at once. But those times are past, 

 the higher orders lead no public taste 

 they are directors of nothing but stupid 

 routesand exclusive balls, fashionable mar- 

 ket places for the disposal of heirs and 

 heiresses. The world knows but little 

 about them, or they about the world the 

 little that is known is not good, and 

 another class of society, a much more in- 

 telligent, accomplished, active, and useful 

 race, have altogether thrown the " privi- 

 leged" into the back ground. With the 

 young nobility, dandies, and profligates ; 

 theirseniors, gamblersand victims to pride, 

 poverty and the gout; intrigue and insi- 

 pidity among their women ; and general 

 indolence and fastidious foolery the cha- 

 racteristic of the whole ; we may leave 

 them to the unenvied possession of titles 

 which, to their great majority, are but a 

 reproach ; and opulence, when real, often 

 made worthless by its abuse, yet full as 

 often empty and nominal as their virtues. 



The middle classes of society have so 

 totally superseded those feeble holders of 

 distinction, that the only individuals of the 

 nobility who retain any true rank, retain 

 it on the claim of adopting the habits, 

 knowledge, and intellectual vigour of 

 those classes. We may thus disregard the 

 supercilious distance which such unleading 

 leaders may be pleased to interpose be- 

 tween themselves and the better mind of 

 England, and follow the course of our 

 public tastes, without knowing or caring 

 at what hour it may please a duchess to 

 dine, or a noble marquess to leave his faro 

 table. 



The result of all this change should be 

 a conviction on the mind of every man 

 who provides for the public intellectual 

 gratification, that the opinions of the " very 

 first world" the starred and gartered, the 

 elite of the creation, are utterly insignifi- 

 cant that he has no occasion to trouble 

 his soul with the columns of the Morning 

 Post, announcing the return or departure 

 of their lordships from London and duns 

 that the dinner hour in Portman-square 

 may be forgotten among his calculations 

 of popularity, and that whether my lord is 

 a subscriber to the Paudemonium in St. 

 James's-street, or to the more select and not 

 less plundering associations of St. James's- 

 square, is a matter with which he has no 

 more concern than with the discovery of 

 the Pole. 



Yet with this knowledge feelingly im- 

 pressed upon every fibre of managers, re- 

 peated night after night iu the visages of 



treasurers, and echoed by every form of 

 public communication, managers will per- 

 sist in " reserving their force," as they call 

 it, for the fortunate months of spring, 

 when ladies may walk in Kensington Gar- 

 dens, and therefore must go to the play. 

 We wish these men would take the trouble 

 of ascertaining, for their own edification, 

 how many noble families see one play a 

 piece in the course of the season. We 

 wish they would make the still more va- 

 luable experiment of how many families of 

 the middle classes might be attracted by a 

 vigorous exertion of the whole means of 

 the theatre at the commencement of the 

 season. If Mr. Kenny is to produce his 

 translation at all, let it be ready before a 

 single fiddler breaks the summer silence 

 of the house. If Mr. Poole teems with 

 farce, let him teem in time. If the other 

 habitual authors of the theatre are to give 

 their efforts, let them be called on at once ; 

 the idea of reserving the manager's 

 strength for the fulness of the town, is ab- 

 surd. Let it be exerted at the time when, 

 its exertion is most required by the thin- 

 ness of the town, if London can be consi- 

 dered thin, and a single experiment will, 

 we have no doubt, settle the question in. 

 favour of the old maxim, that the first 

 blow is half the battle. 



We give Drury-lane, however, credit 

 for having made an attempt to strike the 

 first blow, and that, too, a home one. The 

 introduction of young Kean was an excel- 

 lent ruse, if it was no more. Of course the 

 manager never dreamed that the son would 

 supersede the father, nor that the public 

 would care sixpence whether lie did or not. 

 But no expedient could have been more 

 ingeniously conceived to divide the public 

 attention, and none could have more ef- 

 fectually succeeded. No man alive <:an 

 play more impressively than Kean, the 

 father, when he chooses. Yet the Shylocks 

 and Richards have been paralysed by the 

 Norval. Comparison between the actors 

 would be idle. But the effect has been, 

 wrought, and the elder Kean talks in a pet 

 about abandoning the ungrateful stage, 

 and leaving the ungrateful public to find 

 out his equal when he is gone. Whether 

 this resolution be more than the fever of 

 the moment, must depend on caprice ; but, 

 for the sake of those who desire to see 

 Shakspeare represented on our stage, we 

 hope that Kean's caprice will be brought to 

 reason by that golden persuasion which 

 shakes the resolutions even of the most 

 angry among actors and men. 



Young Kean has figured for a few nights 

 in Norval, a part long exhausted, never 

 good for much beyond the display of school 

 boys, at a Christmas breaking-up, and 

 now tiresome beyond endurance. His 

 Ackmet was probably a more fortunate 

 character ; but the public will not be per- 



