The Genesis of David Garrick's Romeo and Juliet

Abstract

DAVID GARRICK's 1750 PRODUCTION OF Romeo and Juliet at Drury Lane attracted much attention of the Town at the time and has attracted many scholars since.' Garrick had provided London with a better Romeo and Juliet two years before, but that has been almost completely overlooked. The circumstances of the 1750 production were spectacular. Spranger Barry and Susanna Cibber had defected to Covent Garden, and Garrick boldly met the challenge head on: when it became apparent that John Rich would stage Romeo and Juliet at Covent Garden, capitalizing on the suitability and previous success of Barry and Cibber in the lead roles, Garrick resolved to do the part of Romeo himself, with young George Anne Bellamy as his Juliet. The consequent battle confined London to an exclusive diet of Romeo and Juliet from the 28th of September until Covent Garden faltered and played The Beggar's Opera on the 12th of October.2 Although Shakespeare's original play had been revived in 1662, it was displaced by Thomas Otway's History and Fall of Caius Marius (1679), which interpolated great chunks of Romeo and Juliet into a new plot drawn from North's Plutarch. The love story of Marius Junior and Lavinia is subordinated in the beginning to the political and military struggle between Marius Senior and Metellus (Lavinia's father), but assumes a dominant part as the play progresses. Although Otway was criticized for his rather expedient borrowing (readily acknowledged in his Prologue), he blended the material with some skill, and his play has effective passages beyond Shakespeare's borrowed glory. It continued to be acted in the first three decades of the eighteenth century, one or two performances in most seasons through 1727, the final performance coming in 1735 with Theophilus Cibber's eccentric sister, Mrs. Charlotte Charke, playing Marius Junior as a trousers role.3 In those years Romeo and Juliet was not performed.