Samuel Johnson (comedian)

Samuel Johnson (1830–15 February 1900) was an actor-manager and Shakespearean actor of the 19th century and a member of Henry Irving's Company at the Lyceum Theatre, for which he played the comedic roles.

[2] From 1853 to 1855 he was in partnership with John Coleman, and the two rented theatres in Stockport, Oldham (where over 2,000 applicants responded to their advert for actors), Cambridge and Sheffield.

[2] Johnson made his London stage début at a Savage Club performance at the Lyceum Theatre as Cassim Baba in The Forty Thieves.

From 1860 to late 1862 Johnson was in Edinburgh where he played low comedy roles and Scottish characters, and from April to December 1862 he was actor-manager of the new Theatre Royal at St Helens.

Byron's Goldenhair the Good and Leontes in William Brough's burlesque Perdita, the title role being played by Marie Wilton.

While many of his roles with the company were small, John Martin-Harvey described him as the acknowledged Shakespearean clown of his day, and his Lancelot Gobbo in The Merchant of Venice,[5] Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing (1882 and 1893)[6][7][8] and Gravedigger in Hamlet reflect this.

He was Feste in Twelfth Night,[10] Colonna in The Corsican Brothers (1880 and 1891),[11][12] Countryman in Becket (1893 and 1894),[13][14] Marcel in Louis XI (1890),[15] Porter in Macbeth (1895)[16] and Hans in The Bells (1891 to 1898).

Not feeling in the best of health, Johnson decided not to join the sixth Lyceum tour to America, appearing instead in his last role as Meester van Speenen in The Black Tulip with Cyril Maude and Winifred Emery at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in a production that ran for 77 performances and which closed on 6 January 1900.