THE LONDON theatre world is sometimes about art, but always about filling seats. And so it was during the days of William Shakespeare, according to priceless 16th-century papers that were once the preserve only of scholars, but which are now available to the world online.
The unique archive of theatre-owner and impresario Philip Henslowe and his actor son-in-law Edward Alleyn numbers thousands of pages and has been held in the Dulwich College library in London for centuries.
However, it has now been copied into digital format, with the help of charitable donations.
Shakespeare was a member of acting troupes from which Henslowe commissioned plays, and the newly released papers include box office receipts for Titus Andronicusand Henry VI– the only ones to survive of any Shakespeare play. Titus was a hit with Tudor audiences, earning Henslowe 40 shillings in one day, though it fell far behind Christopher Marlowe's The Jew of Malta, which took in 50 shillings in the course of an afternoon.
Henslowe built one of London's first theatres, the Rose, on the site of a bear-baiting ring and brothel, and Shakespeare trod the boards there, scholars agree. Indeed, Titus Andronicuswas first staged there.
Named by King James I as “Joint Masters of the Royal Game of Bears, Bulls and Mastiff Dogs”, Henslowe and Alleyn helped to invent both professional theatre and sports in England, said Reading University’s Prof Grace Ioppolo.
Foreshadowing London theatres’ worries about swine-flu today, Alleyn and Henslowe exchanged anxious correspondence in 1593 about the threat posed by plague, which led the authorities to order all theatres closed to halt the spread of the disease.
In May of that year, Alleyn wrote to his wife, Joan, his “good sweett harte and loving mouse”, urging her to scatter rue and other bitter herbs to keep their home safe from the plague, which killed thousands in the city.
The papers reflect a theatrical cattiness that has survived through the centuries. In one exchange of letters, Henslowe describes playwright Ben Jonson, who was known for being temperamental and quick to rile, as “a bricklayer”, after he killed actor Gabriel Spenser in a duel.
The archive, available at www.henslowe-alleyn.org.uk/index.html, is the largest and single most important dealing with theatre in early modern England, Dulwich College said yesterday.
It includes bills, box-office receipts, scripts and
prompt-notes for forgetful actors, along with the cost of a ferry ticket across the Thames and the amount spent by Henslowe’s parsimonious wife when she darned his socks.