British Library To Display 1660 Prologue Warning Audience That A Woman Will Be Playing OTHELLO's Desdemona

It might be hard to imagine a young man being the first to play Lady Macbeth or Cleopatra, but, as it's well-known, women were forbidden from the stage in Elizabethan times and female roles were played by boys and young men.

Which makes it so fascinating that The British Library, as reported by The Guardian, will soon be displaying a copy of a 1660 prologue, written by actor and poet Thomas Jordan, warning the audience that a woman would appear on stage that night as Desdemona in OTHELLO.

His words were originally spoken to an audience at the Vere Street Theatre in Lincoln's Inn. The rare document is included in a new exhibition, Shakespeare in Ten Acts, one of the numerous world-wide events commemorating the 400th anniversary of The Bard's death.

The prologue reads, in part:

"I come unknown to any of the rest,

to tell you news, I saw the Lady dress't,

the woman playes to day, mistake me not,

No man in Gown, or Page in Petty-Coat,

A woman to my knowledge, yet I cann't

(If I should dye) make affidavit on't."

It wasn't until two years later that a royal proclamation licensed women to appear again on the professional stage. All theatre had been banned by a Puritan ordinance of 1647, but in 1660 two performing companies, one run by William Davenant and another by Thomas Killigrew, were granted licenses. England's King Charles II, a great fan of the theatre, soon allowed more theatres to open, with women allowed to play female characters.

The exhibition's lead curator, Zoë Wilcox believes she knows what woman appeared in Killigrew's production of OTHELLO, necessitating the new prologue.

"There is very little written evidence," says Wilcox, "but we think it was actually a woman called Ann Marshall. That best fits the dates."

Marshall, also known as Mrs. Quin, was a Restoration celebrity, as was her younger sister, Rebecca.

Female Shakespearean actors provoked strong reactions, often seen as fair game for voyeuristic fans who relished a peep show element at the theatre.

The new exhibition features the pages of a journal called 'The Female Tatler," which complained of men sitting backstage at the theatre to watch the female performers get dressed, rather than watching the play.

Cross-dressing also caused a degree of sexual frisson among theatre-goers and prompted wider moralizing in society. Petty criminal Moll Cutpurse, the famous London "Roaring Girl" who regularly dressed as a man, was the subject of a popular play and after appearing in person in a stage sketch to promote the show, was arrested for indecency.

Edward Kynaston, a male "boy player" who had continued to play lead female roles, developed a huge following among men and women. "His rich female fans used to take him out for public carriage rides in the park dressed in full Shakespearean costume," said Wilcox.

Click here for the full article.

Visit bl.uk.