below it in the center was occupied by single gentlewomen who had lodgings to let, and who were equally famous for their delicacy and taciturn disposition. The remainder of the boxes, I was given to understand, were visited by none but the dandies, and people of the first respectability and fashion; while the pit presented a mixed multitude of the lower orders of all sorts, sizes, ages and deportments.23
Given his ironic description of prostitutes as “single gentlewomen,” one may wonder whether this farmer was joking when he suggested abolitionists sat in the gallery with blacks. Nevertheless, his observations indicate the fluidity of the theatergoing audience. Outside the South, blacks and whites often shared the gallery, and well-to-do free blacks were allowed to sit in boxes in northern cities (and in New Orleans, which had developed an elaborate multiracial social structure long before it became part of the United States).
An evening at the theater was a rowdier affair then than it is today. The house lights were never dimmed (this was too complicated before electricity), and people went as much to see and be seen as to watch the show. Nonetheless, as paying customers they felt entitled to comment on the entertainment by cheering or hissing at the performers, and the crowd’s wishes often determined which pieces the orchestra would play. If their disapproval was particularly strong, some members of the audience would throw objects at those actors and musicians who had provoked their scorn.24
Eventually, this social porousness led the new bourgeoisie to leave these theaters and form a genteel culture centered around museums, concert halls, opera houses, and academies beyond the reach of ordinary citizens. But this process would not become complete for another century, and in the meantime the theater remained a remarkably democratic institution.25
This egalitarianism extended to the performers. With some exceptions, acting was still the largely marginal occupation it had been in Susanna Rowson’s day. It required exhausting amounts of travel and a good deal of versatility, because plays turned over rapidly (one week was considered a long run). Except for a few superstars, pay was poor. In fact, one of the most important sources of income for a theater company was the “benefit night,” when the profits from the performance were designated for actors, playwrights, managers, or others.26
The stage life was especially hard on women. Not only did the social stigma surrounding the stage remain powerful, but women who pursued any profession were regarded as somewhat suspect. A few women thrived: Women’s rights activist Fanny Wright lent her radical voice to drama by writing Altorf (1819), a celebration of Swiss independence. Actress Charlotte Cushman sustained a successful acting career in the 1830s and 1840s, and novelist/play-wright/actress Anna Cora Mowatt enjoyed considerable success with her hit play The Fashion (1844), a patriotic comedy that was successfully revived in the 1920s and again in the 1950s. Yet even these women struggled financially in order to achieve their status. More typical was the remark of an avowed friend of the theater who described one neophyte as “a young actress yet undebauched by her profession.”27
As with fiction, the overwhelming influences on drama in the United States came from Great Britain well into the nineteenth century. England supplied not only the plays, but a large number of players who came to the United States and traveled widely. As one historian put it, “The English began to dump their surplus stars—or, more accurately, the surplus time of their stars—on the Americans.”28 Growing resentment of British performers and a belligerent sense of nationalism led to a number of conflicts, including the Astor Place riot in 1849.
A CLOSER LOOK:
The Astor Place Riot
From angry New Jersey tenant farmers in 1766 to frustrated Los Angeles residents in the aftermath of the Rodney King verdict in 1992, rioting is an American tradition. Such outbursts are usually the result of accumulating social tensions that have gone unaddressed by those in authority, and New York’s Astor Place riot of 1849 was no exception. What made it unusual, however, was its immediate cause: a dispute about the correct way to perform the lead role in William Shakespeare’s Macbeth.
Unlike in the twentieth century, when Shakespearian drama became a largely academic passion for the well-read few, the early nineteenth century was a time when the Bard enjoyed mass appeal. Working people were intimately familiar with many of his plays and had firm ideas about proper interpretations of them. As a result, Shakespearian actors developed large and devoted followings in both England and the United States.
THE ASTOR PLACE OPERA HOUSE ON THE NIGHT OF THE RIOT
In the 1820s, 1830s, and 1840s, the premier American actor was Edwin Forrest. Born in 1806 into a working-class Philadelphia family, Forrest exhibited theatrical promise as a child and apprenticed himself to the great English tragedian Edmund Kean when he toured the United States. Taking a cue from his mentor, Forrest developed an expressive style of performing Shakespeare that was very popular with U.S. audiences. Something of what we might call a method actor, Forrest built up his body, analyzed scripts, and tried to immerse himself emotionally and intellectually in his roles. To play King Lear, for example, he visited mental institutions so as to better portray insanity. He was also an ardent nationalist, ever ready to proclaim the superiority of his country. In this regard, he may have reflected a cultural insecurity of Americans vis-a-vis Europe that persists at least to some degree to the present day.
Forrest was also well regarded in England, particularly for his performance as an Indian chief in Metamora, a play he commissioned to create a showcase for himself. As a Shakespearian actor, however, he had a rival in William Macready, a prominent London tragedian whose style tended to be more restrained. Like Forrest, Macready had built up a following on both sides of the Atlantic, but his more refined demeanor and elitist sympathies led to a different set of dramatic priorities. The two men were at least civil to each other until Forrest’s second English tour, in 1845, where he was met with small, unenthusiastic audiences and hostile reviews, including one written by a friend of Macready. In retaliation, Forrest hissed during one of Macready’s performances in Scotland. An outraged Macready denounced Forrest, who insisted he was simply exercising his right to show his feelings about the performance. Forrest then returned to the United States to a hero’s welcome, denouncing the British in particular and aristocracy in general. In the events that followed, the right of an audience to express its opinion, friendly or otherwise, became a banner around which Forrest’s followers would rally.
In 1848, Macready left for a U.S. tour with some trepidation (his friend Charles Dickens, who had written a critical portrayal of Americans in Martin Chuzzlewit, considered it too risky even to see him off). Matters went well until Macready reached Philadelphia, where Forrest opened a version of Macbeth opposite his own. Both attracted large audiences, but by this point the controversy had been widely reported and Macready was attacked by a barrage of rotten eggs and vegetables. He cut short his Philadelphia run and went South and West, but found a great deal of hostility there too.
Five months later Macready ended his tour playing Macbeth at the Astor Place Opera House in New York. This grand hall was a symbol of the economic disparities that would grow ever greater over the course of the nineteenth century. Forrest once again played the same role, this time at the Bowery Theatre, which was in a tough neighborhood, the turf of “Bowery B’hoys” and “Bowery G’hals” who wore flashy clothes and participated in a rich street life that included parades, horse races, and fights between gangs. The Bowery Theater was at the heart of the neighborhood’s nightlife, a place where journeymen, laborers, and factory workers went to socialize and enjoy entertainment. These people formed the core of Forrest’s constituency.
The two actors took the stage to play their respective Macbeths
