A Jacobean Company and its Playhouse
Cambridge University Press, 10/31/2013
EAN 9781107041882, ISBN10: 1107041880
Hardcover, 280 pages, 23.6 x 15.7 x 2.5 cm
Language: English
Eva Griffith's book fills a major gap concerning the world of Shakespearean drama. It tells the previously untold story of the Servants of Queen Anna of Denmark, a group of players parallel to Shakespeare's King's Men, and their London playhouse, The Red Bull. Built in vibrant Clerkenwell, The Red Bull lay within the northern suburbs of Jacobean London, with prostitution to the west and the Revels Office to the east. Griffith sets the playhouse in the historical context of the Seckford and Bedingfeld families and their connections to the site. Utilising a wealth of primary evidence including maps, plans and archival texts, she analyses the court patronage of figures such as Sir Robert Sidney, Queen Anna's chamberlain, alongside the company's members, function and repertoire. Plays performed included those by Webster, Dekker and Heywood - entertainments characterised by spectacle, battle sequence and courtroom drama, alongside London humour and song.
Introduction
The Red Bull Theatre, St John Street
1. Elizabethan contexts for a Jacobean playhouse
Clerkenwell, East Anglia, the Strand and the Liberty of the Clink (1586–99)
2. The Earl of Worcester, the Essex Circle, the Queen's Servants and their playhouses (1586–1607)
3. Who were the Queen's Servants? What was the Red Bull like?
4. The court and its women
Queen Anna, her circle, and some women-centred plays
5. Entities and splinter groups
the Queen's Servants' companies at the courts, in England and in Europe
6. The company
1605–12
7. The company
1612–19
Conclusion
St John's Day at night.