Shakespeare… by gaslight!

Romeo and Juliet's 'balcony scene' is already one of the most famous scenes in Shakespeare's works, and we can only wonder what difference the new innovation of gas light in the theatre would have brought to the performance.

This playbill, from Oswestry in Shropshire, is dated December 1819, and invites people to enjoy the newly installed gas lighting in the theatre.

The first use of gaslight in a British theatre was in 1804, three years before the first public street lighting with gas was demonstrated. The venue was the Royal Lyceum in London, after an entrepreneur called F A Winsor took out a patent on a lighting apparatus based on gas. It was used to light up the facade and entrances to the theatre.

The first theatre to introduce gaslight onto its stage was the Olympic Theatre in Oct 1815 and it impressed the public and the press who described it like the striking of daylight.

In Oswestry, the balcony scene is performed, and is one of five acts from different plays – three from Shakespeare.

These days we would call it a variety show.

This playbill presents a 'dramatic olio', a selection of extracts from well-known plays written by popular dramatists: Shakespeare, Sheridan and Morton.

An olio is an assortment of acts, for example acrobats, magicians and instrumental and vocal soloists.

With its selection of high tragedy and low comedy, the olio offers performers an opportunity to show off their versatility and it is presented by a group of actors – the Tyrers, the Cuffleys and Mrs Wilson.

Sheridan was a playwright and the owner of the Drury Lane Theatre (30 October 1751 – 7 July 1816). The School for Scandal was his best known work, a comedy of class and manners, with characters who are stereotypes.

statue of William Shakespeare at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London (c) BBC

Speed the Plough is also a comedy, by Thomas Morton, first performed in 1798 at the Theatre Royal, Convent Garden and featuring the unseen but censorious and conventional Mrs Grundy.

So on this night, Shakespeare provides the terror, the passion and the tragedy.

In the second act of Macbeth, the killing of King Duncan is carried out by the malevolent Macbeth inspired by his Machiavellian wife.

In the second act of Romeo and Juliet, the dramatist illuminates the theme of bright youthful love in the famous balcony scene.

In the final act of Hamlet, the Royal family is extinguished. Hamlet avenges his father's death by slaying his uncle, the Queen drinks the poison intended for Hamlet, while he in turn, is killed by a poisoned sword.