Thomas Killigrew
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Thomas Killigrew (February 7, 1612 – March 19, 1683), was an English dramatist and theatre manager. He was a witty, dissolute figure at the court of King Charles II of England.
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[edit] Life and Work
Killigrew was one of twelve children of Sir Robert Killigrew, of Hanworth, a courtier to James I; he became a page to King Charles I at about the age of thirteen. According to Samuel Pepys, the boy Killigrew used to volunteer as an extra, or "devil," at the Red Bull Theatre, so that he could see the plays for free. The young Killigrew had limited formal education; the Court and the playhouse were his schoolroom.
Before the English Civil War, Killigrew wrote several plays—tragicomedies like Claracilla and The Prisoners, as well as his most popular play, The Parson's Wedding (1637). The latter play has been criticized for its coarse humor; but it also contains prose readings of John Donne's poetry to pique a literate audience.[1]
A Royalist and Roman Catholic, Killigrew followed Prince Charles (the future Charles II) into exile in 1647. In the years 1649-51 he was in Paris, Geneva, and Rome, and in the later year was appointed Charles' representative in Venice. (It has been said that Killigrew wrote each of his plays in a different city; Thomaso, or the Wanderer was written in Madrid.)
At the Restoration in 1660, Killigrew returned to England along with many other Royalist exiles. Charles rewarded his loyalty by making him Groom of the Bedchamber and Chamberlain to Queen Catherine. He had a reputation as a wit; in his famous Diary, Samuel Pepys calls Killigrew the King's fool and jester, with the power to mock and revile even the most prominent without penalty (Feb. 12, 1668).
Along with Sir William Davenant, he was given a royal warrant to form a theatre company in 1660—which gave Killigrew a key role in the revival of English drama. Killigrew beat Davenant to a debut, at Gibbon's Tennis Court in Clare Market, with the new King's Company. Its original members were Michael Mohun, William Wintershall, Robert Shatterall, William Cartwright, Walter Clun, Charles Hart and Nicholas Burt. They played for a time at the old Red Bull Theatre, but in 1663 the company moved to the new Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. (Unfortunately, Killigrew gained a reputation as an incompetent manager; he was constantly in disputes with his actors and had to bribe his stars to keep working for him.) Killigrew staged plays by Aphra Behn, John Dryden, William Wycherley...and Thomas Killigrew, as well as revivals of Beaumont and Fletcher. Having inherited the rights and repertory of the old King's Men, the King's Company performed many of Shakespeare's works, in the rewritten forms that were so popular at the time and so disparaged later (like King Lear with a happy ending). Two Killigrew productions of his own Parson's Wedding, in 1664 and 1672-3, were cast entirely with women.
He married twice. His first wife was Cecilia Crofts (died 1638), a maid of honor to Queen Henrietta Maria; they had a son. His second wife was Charlotte de Hesse; they had two sons and a daughter. A sister of Killigrew (Elizabeth, wife of Francis Boyle, 1st Viscount Shannon) was one of Charles II's mistresses.
In 1673, Killigrew was appointed Master of the Revels. He lost control of his theatre in a conflict with his son Charles in 1677. (Charles, in turn, went bust a year later.) Thomas Killigrew died at Whitehall on March 19, 1683.
Thomas Killigrew's dramas are:
- The Prisoners (written ca, 1632-5; printed 1641)
- Claracilla (ca. 1636, Italy; printed 1641)
- The Princess, or Love at First Sight (ca. 1636, Italy; printed 1663)
- The Parson's Wedding (ca. 1637)
- The Pilgrim
- Bellamira Her Dream, or Love of Shadows
- Cicilia and Clorinda, or Love in Arms
- Thomaso, or the Wanderer (printed 1663).
His eight plays were published in a collected edition in 1664, by stationer Henry Herringman.
The Parson's Wedding and Claracilla were successful stage plays. Of his last three works, Thomaso is a broad comedy based on Killigrew's experiences in European exile, while Bellamira and Cicillia are heroic romances—but all three are closet dramas, ten-act double plays never intended for the stage. Yet oddly enough, Aphra Behn adapted Thomaso for her successful The Rover (1677).[2] The tragedy The Pilgrim, apparently never performed, borrows its plot from James Shirley's The Politician and reveals many allusions to Shakespeare.
Some critics have considered The Parson's Wedding as a Restoration play written before the Restoration, an anticipation of what was to come—and Killigrew himself as a central figure in the transition from English Renaissance theatre to Restoration drama.
[edit] The Other Killigrews
Among his 8 siblings, Thomas had two brothers who also wrote plays:
- An elder brother, Sir William Killigrew (1606-1695), was a Court official (vice chamberlain to the Queen) who wrote four plays: Selindra; Pandora; and Ormasdes, or Love and Friendship—all printed in 1664; and The Siege of Urbin (1666), generally considered his best work.
- A younger brother, Henry Killigrew (1613-1700), a clergyman, wrote only one play...but he wrote it twice. His The Conspiracy was published in 1638, apparently pirated; he revised it into Pallantus and Eudora (1653). Henry was the father of the poet Anne Killigrew.
One of Thomas Killigrew's sons by Charlotte de Hesse, known as Thomas Killigrew the Younger (1657-1719), had one successful play, called Chit-Chat (1719).
[edit] Notes
- ^ William R. Keast, "Killigrew's Use of Donne in The Parson's Wedding," Modern Language Review, 45 (1950), pp. 512-15.
- ^ Margaret Lindon Whedon, Rogues, Rakes, and Lovers, dissertation, 1993.
[edit] References
- Alfred Harbage, Thomas Killigrew, Cavalier Dramatist, 1612-1683, Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1930.
- Alfred Harbage, Cavalier Drama, New York, Modern Language Association of America, 1936.
[edit] External Link
This article incorporates public domain text from: Cousin, John William (1910). A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. London, J.M. Dent & sons; New York, E.P. Dutton.
