Jack Bologna

Having mostly retired from the stage in 1820, he struggled financially and lived in severe poverty throughout the remaining 26 years of his life, before dying penniless aged 71.

[1] Jack made his debut on the Italian stage at age 11, soon afterwards coming to England in 1787, where he met the ten-year-old Joseph Grimaldi, who had begun performing in the pantomimes of his actor father Giuseppe.

From there, Bologna made his first appearance on the English stage with his family's tumbling act, which initially toured the provincial theatres.

[2] The Bolognas became popular in the provinces and took up an engagement at the Sadler's Wells Theatre in London in 1792 where, among other actors, they appeared in Medea's Kettle; or, Harlequin Renovated and La Tableau Chinois.

From 1802, he appeared at Sadler's Wells as Harlequin, and, with his brother Louis, starred in the burletta Edward and Susan which Jack also composed.

Between November 1805 and February 1806, he was engaged by Charles Dibdin to appear at the Amphitheatre in Dublin, and the following year he choreographed a number of successful pantomimes and plays at the Royal Circus, including The Cloud King, The False Friend, The Mysterious Freebooter, The Sorceress of Strozzi, Black Beard, Moms and Mercury, Buenos Ayres, Werter and Charlotte and Edwin of the Green.

[3] Having seen Bologna in a performance of Oscar and Malvina in 1807,[7] the actor John Philip Kemble said of him: "If that man could speak as well as he acts [in] pantomimes, I would never again appear on the stage".

There, he met Lord Byron, who admitted to being such a fan of pantomime that he based his poem Don Juan on an afterpiece given by Delpini, a character from the harlequinade.

He emerged to teach choreography and was recruited in 1841 by a magician named Anderson to play his black-faced sidekick, Ebony, at public houses throughout the provinces.

The Anderson and Ebony act was controversial and caused public outrage when they exhibited two disabled children whom they billed as the "Aztec Lilliputians".