Duke's Company
After a year, the actors moved to a new theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields, a building on Portugal Street that had previously been Lisle's Tennis Court (it opened on 18 June 1661).
[1] In December 1660, the King granted the Duke's Company the exclusive rights to ten of Shakespeare's plays: Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing, Measure for Measure, Henry VIII, and Pericles, Prince of Tyre.
[a] In 1661, their first year at Lincoln's Inn Fields, the company revived Hamlet, in a production that employed the innovation of stage scenery.
The company also acted many translations and adaptations of French and other foreign plays; their 1662 production of Sir Samuel Tuke's The Adventures of Five Hours, a version of Calderón's comedy Los Empeños de Seis Horas, ran for thirteen straight performances and was the first great hit of Restoration drama.
Anne Gibbs (later married to Thomas Shadwell), Hester Davenport and Mary Lee also had noteworthy careers.
[5] Their management team expanded its strategies to ensure success: the company engaged in three consecutive (and profitable) summer seasons in Oxford starting in 1669.
Davenant could do this because he was rewarded with a warrant from Charles I during 1639 to build his own theatre, which whilst defunct still added gravitas to his claims.
Furthermore, his masque work with Charles I, also being the writer for the two operas performed during the Puritan regime certainly cemented him as an accomplished and reliable manager to the second company.
After being lumbered with only 23 plays in comparison to the King's 108,[9] Davenant turned his company in the direction of new writing and adaptations of pre-restoration work that he did have.
Not only did he attempt to keep the work performed for the Duke's men modern, he also had plans to keep the theatres as functional and of the highest quality.
William Van Lennep supports this assumption writing "The formal structure, then, of this type of arrangement consisted of a proprietor (the largest shareholder), who was the master of the company in both theatrical and financial affairs; a small number of sharing actors, who received a proportion of the profits after the gross receipts had provided for the major expenses; and a large number of actors on salary.
Downes remarked that the adaptation of Love and Honour, originally from 1643, in 1661 was "Richly Cloth'd" with Betterton robed in fine garments and the set extraordinary.
William Davenant, as a manager and on good terms with the King, was able to use his patency and Betterton's talents to produce performances of his own plays.
Killigrew and Davenant planned to put on tragedies, comedies, plays, operas, and all other similar entertainments, setting reasonable admission charges to meet "the great expences of scenes, musick and new decorations as have not bin formerly used".
The Duke's Company found themselves subject to Chamberlain's legislation because of the comic performer and renowned improvisor, Edward Angel.
During the run of Dryden and Davenant's The Tempest from 1667 to 1668, the Lord Chamberlain issued a warrant for the arrest of the comedian Edward Angel a member of the Dukes Company.
Although the reasons behind the order remain unclear, one possible explanation is that Angel had caused offence with his talent for improvisation and unscripted political satire.
For example, on 6 February 1720 he ordered Gay's new pastoral tragedy Dione be acted "immediately after Hughes"'s The Siege of Damascus.
1635 – 28 April 1710), English actor in Dukes Theatre Company, son of an undercook for Charles I, born in London.
As a young boy, Betterton's education is unclear, however he is described to have had a "great propensity" for reading, which may explain why he was bound to Sir William Davenant's publisher, John Holden, in an apprenticeship.
"[b] The Dukes theatre, with the help of Betterton's acting, were recognized for passing on a "traditional" and "correct" way to perform older plays, such as Shakespeare.
In Milhous's "Census" there are 180 documented appearances of Betterton in the Dukes company however the real figure is most likely higher as 128 plays are left undocumented.
Betterton's most successful role in the Dukes Company was Hamlet, which he first played in the aftermath of Charles II's coronation in 1661.
John Downes writes that Davenant had seen Joseph Taylor act the part before the interregnum and then taught Betterton "in every particle of it".
The Dukes Companies reparatory system was commercially influenced to catch and shape the social mood of the time.
Betterton throughout his career travelled to France regularly to learn about the Spectaculars and foreign Operas in order to increase the Dukes repertoire.
However, Bettertons role in the spectaculars remained as chief consultant as he could neither sing nor dance, but he continued performing in traditional plays.
