Page:Cymbeline (1924) Yale.djvu/165

The Tragedy of Cymbeline author.' Fortunately 'unprecedented difficulties and discouragements in the theatre' prevented a long run at Covent Garden Theatre. Two years later, in 1761, Garrick made the first of his many appearances as Posthumus in Shakespeare's play. The play ran for sixteen nights, and the Dramatic Censor stated that Garrick's astonishing talents were never more happily exerted. In 1767 and 1770 Mrs. Barry played Imogen to Garrick's Posthumus. John Philip Kemble first played Posthumus in 1785; Mrs. Siddons first appeared as Imogen in 1787; and Charles Kemble, who had appeared as Polydore in 1812 played Posthumus in 1825. Macready played Posthumus in 1818. From the time of Garrick on, Cymbeline seems to have been a favorite play for one-night, benefit performances. Helen Faucit was one of the great Imogens of the middle of the nineteenth century, and Ellen Terry's 'last great part on the Lyceum stage' was the rôle of Imogen in Henry Irving's gorgeous production in 1896. Irving chose to play the part of Iachimo, and seems to have made an indifferent success in the rôle. Popular enthusiasm was devoted to Miss Terry's Imogen and to the setting by Alma Tadema.

While Garrick and the Kembles were using Cymbeline almost yearly in England, the new and struggling theatres in the American colonies and states followed their illustrious example. From 1767 to 1793 eight revivals of Cymbeline occurred along our Atlantic seaboard, three in New York, two in Philadelphia, one in Boston, one in Annapolis, and one in Charleston, South Carolina. One hundred years later Cymbeline again became popular on the American stage. Mary Shaw Hamblin, who died in 1873, was a famous Imogen in the sixties. Adelaide Neilson in the seventies, Modjeska in the eighties, and Margaret Mather in the nineties kept the play familiar to American audiences. In 1906 Viola Allen again revived it, and