O, call back yesterday – bid time return!

 

A Hamlet's-eye view of Autumn just starting in Stratford

I have been back from Stratford for a week and I'm only now getting a chance to sort out my notes, my second hand book purchases and my photographs from five nights staying in the cottage I like to pretend is my second home.  I'm struggling to get my head round the fact that my greatly anticipated September visit is past and gone already! It was the availability of the cottage that made me decide in July that I needed to make another visit.  The fact that the dates available included the last weekend of the summer holidays enabled me to shoe-horn four performances into four nights, gave me a chance to see As You Like It in the outdoor Garden Theatre and also take in a talk by Simon Russell-Beale in conversation with Greg Doran on the Sunday evening.

Sunday's performance was the final one for the Garden Theatre - it was fascinating watching it being dismantled on Monday! - and there was some doubt as to whether the weather would mean it was cancelled: as an entirely metal structure, thunder storms present a particular hazard! We were late starting but the atmosphere was fabulous and the 'edited' 90 minute text managed to squeeze in all the significant lines.  There was something particularly wonderful about being in that space, just feet away from the doorway where Henry Ainley was photographed as Orlando c.1910 - the photograph that started the Bensonian obsession for me!

 I'd requested some material for the Monday and Tuesday openings at the Birthplace Reading Room to make up for missing out in February, delving into the minutes of the Company after 1911, with a particular focus on the build up to the American tour.  It was fascinating - if rather sad - to observe Benson gradually losing control of his company after the Memorial Theatre stepped in to try and deal with the vast amount of debt he'd built up.  

As always, I kept my eyes open for Bensoniana around Stratford and found this addition to The Greenwood Tree in the Great Garden of New Place, which I had not seen the last time I had been there - evidence that there are other Merry Shrews out there! An entirely appropriate epithet, I think!

The theatre's exhibition space had changed some of its exhibits since the last time I visited it and this time, the Benson cabinet displayed Constance Benson's outfit as Mistress Ford.  At close view, it appears to be made from very heavy wool - almost blanket-weight - fabric, which moths had clearly had some fun nibbling on over the years, as it was patched in several places.  The lack of embellishment on this fitted with the studio portrait from Dublin and the photograph from The Tatler in 1902 which showed the Laundry Basket scene:

It was suggested by the label that this was one of the costumes borrowed, possibly from Irving, after the Newcastle Theatre Royal fire.  Merry Wives of Windsor was one of this summer's plays as was The School for Scandal, both, of course, regularly played on tour by all of the Benson companies.  Both were fabulous - performed by largely the same cast - as was Pericles - a play which I saw at the Globe some years ago and really didn't enjoy much.  This production had, admittedly, had some quite creative editing - doubling Gower and Marina was inspired - and was very simply but effectively staged in The Swan, with an exceptional central performance from Alfred Enoch.  It is still a flawed play but it did polish up well!  I was very impressed by what I saw of the RSC's season and the whole place seems to have a renewed sense of energy and purpose.

Stratford was as lovely as ever, although last year's heatwave was replaced by some very humid and then showery weather which felt much more autumn-like than I'd been expecting.  I am so grateful for these short 'escapes' to Stratford and the chance to indulge my obsession! Having the cottage so close to hand is incredible and having somewhere to come back to at the end of the day where I can type up my notes in comfort, prepare my own food and basically please myself is an absolute godsend.  Fingers crossed that 2025 provides at least one opportunity to do it all again.

Sunflowers I bought to celebrate being back in Stratford in September!

It is a purposed thing, and grows by plot...

Well, that's what I keep telling myself about the behemoth of ten years intermittent research into the Benson repertory! I'm more or less stuck at the moment on 83% complete which is about as much as I've been able to squeeze from the wonderful British Library Newspaper Archive.  So... what do I do with it? It has to be accessible or it remains a vanity project

My current thinking is that the data could be cloud-hosted as a Google sheets document both here and on another blog site just for the data - without all my bletherings attached! In order to do this, however, I have to do some serious work at standardising the data and making sure there are as few human errors as possible. I started this only intending to document the North East visits of the companies to inform my Masters' dissertation and so the early entries are inconsistent and I've used some annotations that even I don't really understand.  Then there's a lack of consistency in the inputting of play titles and even in the recording of midweek matinees, not to mention the erratic nature of some of my late-night spelling: Juliet Caesar isn't a play anyone really wants to see...!  

I still want to write about Benson but, to do that, I need more information. So, in September I head Stratford-wards again for another couple of days of Reading Room exploration.  The scholarship money is much depleted now, but a nice cheque from the Tax Office has given me the excuse to book 'my' lovely cottage again, just for four nights this time, and to buy tickets to see As You Like It in the outdoor theatre, School for Scandal, Pericles and Merry Wives.  When I come home, I will start the writing...  I will, honestly!

The quote is Coriolanus and this is Benson AS Coriolanus:

The map of days outworn...

Ten years have passed since I graduated (in absentia!)from the Shakespeare Institute and - inevitably - that fact has led to more soul searching.  Ten years on, and the performance database remains incomplete and I'm having to accept that some of the 560 or so remaining entries will never be filled.  The jubilation of tracking down an elusive visit of the South or Midland Company to some Corn Exchange or Drill Hall is often over-balanced by the sense of  frustration when there is no mention of it in the local press. 

Feeling frustrated with my inability to complete the task, I wondered if there was actually anything useful I could do with the material I did have.  Although I might not have the rep for every visit, I am reasonably sure that I've managed to place the companies for around 99% of the time they were on the road.  After the Tyne Theatre conference in September, I'd wondered about the feasibility of creating a map to track the progress of each company and yesterday, I finally bit the bullet and started on it.  

Using Google maps, I've added a marker for every place a Benson company visited, creating an individual 'layer' for each company so that it is easy to see the spread of each company and the overlap.  I've also started to add notes about the dates played at each location and intend eventually to include some information about the venue as well. Google maps store any changes I make to the cloud and I can also share the information easily through this link Benson Companies Touring Map and can, should I wish to do so, ultimately make it visible to google searching. 

Immediately, the visual impact of this task was incredibly useful: places which had been little more than names suddenly had an actual geographic location. The concentration of the South/C/London company in the Southern part of Wales - at this time, the mining centre of the country - and the heavy concentration of the Principal company around the outskirts of London are both really noticeable.

The markers helped to not only show where the companies had been, but also to highlight where they hadn't.  For example, looking at the North Yorkshire area I was surprised to realise that reasonably big market towns such as Richmond, Thirsk and Pickering were not on the smaller Company's tours at all.  This cannot have been because of difficulty of transport ( as was clearly the case in the Northwest of Scotland or the centre of Wales) as a rail infrastructure was there.  

Equally, towns like Doncaster and Swindon, which might reasonably have expected visits from the North or Principal companies, do not appear to have any visits at all (and both were notable 'railway towns' in the late 19th and early 20th centuries).  Either I am missing key touring dates to some of these places, or the data needs some interrogation.

I had never before thought about what might be missing from the touring schedule of the companies, assuming the four corners of the country had been equally covered when in fact there is a real imbalance, a favouring of the east coast of Scotland over the west, the midlands and the south over the north and west of England and very little attempt at venturing beyond the major towns in Ireland.

Some places have multiple tags and appear for two, three or even four companies - often beginning with the Principal company and then receiving visits from the North (B) company and latterly the South (C), London or Midland Companies before being revisited by FRB as part of his post 1920 touring under the 'Bensonian' or H.V. Neilson banners.

Clearly there are questions which need to be answered about the touring circuits Benson companies followed and it would be interesting to know if any of the equivalent companies 'on the road' at around the same time (Martin-Harvey, Calvert etc) visited similar places.

As always, the more I think I know, the more there is to find out...!

Benson as Shylock c.1900

Shakespeare Day 2024

It's Shakespeare's Birthday - always a happy day for any Merry Shrew.  Since I last posted here, I've sneaked in a further visit to Stratford for the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust's 'Winter School', taking in a wonderful performance of 'The Merchant of Venice:1936' and a gloriously silly Midsummer Night's Dream, which was so good, I went back to see it again the next night from the 'cheap seats'. 

Unfortunately, I was recovering (slowly) from a really unpleasant chest infection and so I made the decision to skip the Reading Room this time: I wouldn't have liked to be in the same space as someone coughing as much as I was.  

The weather was largely rainy and cold - it was February after all - and Stratford seemed a little lack-lustre. The Shakespeare Hotel was closed 'for extensive renovation' although no work at all appeared to be going on as far as I could see, and New Place was closed for the winter as well, (although the lack of foliage did mean I could peep through the gates to check on the tree!) 

I'd had such good intentions in September, but the best laid schemes had been plotted without the family emergency that took over most of November and December and is still causing issues now with time and space.  It means that a lot of what I'd planned to do just hasn't happened, and I'm sometimes a bit frustrated.  During my September visit, I'd had thoughts that seemed to point the way I ought to go but then life got in the way.

However, the data base is always there and I've really put a lot of effort since I came back from Stratford into trying to break through the last barriers around the North, South and Midland Companies.  Despite all the wonderful stuff on the British Library website, finding this last 23% of entries is proving a challenge.  I'm getting results, but there are still huge holes to fill.  Yesterday and today I managed to fill in enough to make the total complete 80%.  It feels like something of an achievement but it has been hard fought for!

To celebrate, tomorrow I'm heading into Newcastle to the Tyneside Cinema to see the John Singer Sargent exhibition 'on screen': its actually on at the Tate in London and it is exactly the sort of exhibition which - only a few months ago - I'd have been dashing down to see.  As it is, this is the best compromise.  I won't, of course, be able to linger in front of the Ellen Terry Lady Macbeth dress the way I'd have done 'in real life' but it is better than nothing!

My second hand book hunting took me to Sedbergh a couple of weeks ago where I picked up an old  book about Stratford and a book of theatrical memoirs by Sidney Blow 'The Ghost walks on Fridays'. Blow was a young actor at the turn of the century who married Hilda Trevallyan , the actress who originated the role of Wendy in Peter Pan.  It's very gossipy and flits about from story to story, but the highlight so far has been a wonderfully catty account by Irene Vanbrugh of rehearsing at His Majesty's with Ellen Terry. written as a playscript.  There's lots of period detail of theatres in London and New York at the time the Bensons were touring and it's a very easy read.  

Tonight, no proper Shakespeare for me but there will be cake.  Happy Birthday, Mr Shakespeare!

We happy few...

Well, after a dismal summer where 'the rain it raineth every day', my 'Great Escape' to Stratford upon Avon was blessed by September sunshine and temperatures not usually seen at this time of year.  In fact, the week was glorious in every respect: exactly what was needed to mark the first week of a new school year... the first without me actually being at school!

The official motive for going was to spend some time in the Shakespeare Birthplace Reading Room, somewhere I haven't been since before the Covid lockdowns.  I wanted to add to my prompt book research by looking at 'Twelfth Night' and also try to build up a better picture of the company by looking at some of the material connected to some of the company members.

The very generous Louis Marder Bursary paid once again for my accommodation in the lovely 1837 cottage where I've stayed before.  Although I was there on my own this time, it felt very much like a home from home.  It cost about the same as a guest house or hotel and it gave me the freedom to come and go as I wanted, to pop home for lunch or drop off bags after researching, as well as a couple of comfy sofas and a good kitchen table to write on!  Marks and Spencer were my caterers, saving me from having to eat out at further expense.

I spent a day and a half in the archives and the rest was divided between being a tourist and pretending I was a resident.  I set myself the task, in tourist role, of seeing how many references or traces I could find of the Benson Company and was very pleased with the final result.  Far from being forgotten entirely, there are still quite a few references to them to find around the town if you are paying attention! ( I was!)

I must have seen this before on my visits to Holy Trinity church, but maybe I'd just not read it? In the St Peter's Chapel, reserved for quiet prayer, is this on the wall, a partner to the Benson memorial window in the Swan foyer.  The lines are by Rudyard Kipling.

The plaque appears on the Imperial War Museum's War Memorial's Register and is surrounded by other memorial plaques, most of which predate the First World War.  

Holy Trinity also holds the silver processional cross donated in memory of Bensonian Frank Rodney, who died in 1903. Again, I'd walked past this many times and never  given it a glance.

High up in the panelling of what had been the library of the old Memorial Theatre - now the bar of the Swan Theatre - there's this:

Beneath it, an explanation of the fact that Benson 'would play the character of Caliban with a real fish in his mouth, rather than a prop.  If the fish was not changed regularly, it would soon smell bad.  His wife. Constance, recalled in her memoir " Sometimes, the property man would forget to renew this piece of realism(,,,)which was most distressing to Benson, and indeed to everyone on stage." '

The Benson memorial windows are still very much the centre piece of the picture gallery upstairs, which now hosts the annually changing 'The Play's the Thing' exhibition. The lighting conditions and weather outside made the windows slightly better than normal to photograph, although I still cannot manage to get the centre panel really clearly.  The second and third windows are rather obscured by the displays, which is a shame. I've read in several places that when the memorial to Benson was added in 1952, there was a window also dedicated to Constance Benson.  However, there is no trace of this at all, and I've been unable to find any photographs.  The hunt continues...  

Finally, the thing I most wanted to see - Constance Benson's costume as Lady Macbeth.  The panel dates this to 1902/3, but also claims it was salvaged from the Theatre Royal fire.  As always, it is the colour that impresses me - I'm so used to seeing black and white photographs that costumes 'in real life' always surprise me with their vibrancy.  I was particularly interested in seeing how this garment compared to the famous 'Beetle Wing' dress worn by Ellen Terry at the Lyceum in 1889. 

The dress is silk and very Pre-Raphaelite in its gathering and draping. Unlike Ellen Terry's very fitted bodice, this is loose and unstructured, designed to drape like a column rather than reveal her figure.  It has similar vast sleeves to those on the Terry dress and the metal beads which have been sewn along the sleeve edges and the neck line would probably have caught the stage lights in a similar way to the beetle wing casings.

The embroidery on the bottom half of the dress is worked in satin stitch - it has faded to grey and cream, but I suspect a gold and lavender were the original colours.  This echoes the decoration on the top half of the dress which I thought at first was stencilled but is actually narrow gold ribbon, surface appliqued.

It would be interesting to see this in the context of the production, of course: to see to what extent the costume stood out on stage from the rest of the setting.

In 2016, the RSC displayed another dress from the collection as Constance's Lady Macbeth costume, stating that this had been ' thrown together from a few last minute donations, following a fire that devastated the company's entire wardrobe'  (RSC (1) Facebook)

Sadly, I didn't get to see this one 'in person'.  

I shall do such things...

It is the end of the second week of the school holidays and the second full of week of my conscious uncoupling from teaching.  I've had the leavers' speeches, the flowers, the bottles of prosecco, the cards, the tears and laughter, and I've cleared out thirty one years of accumulated stuff from the cupboards at work - and binned most of it!  I still can't quite believe I won't be going back in September.

I'm not ready to 'retire' as such - this is more of a tactical withdrawal! - and I know there's going to be a considerable gap between my salary and the amount from the pension, but I reached a stage earlier this year when I realised that time is far more valuable than money to me. I'm hoping that my pension - which I can claim in October - will cover my bills and that this will allow me some time to decide what I really want to do. 

Of course, that quote from King Lear continues with What they are, yet I know not which seems entirely fitting, under the circumstances!  At the moment, I am waiting to see what the universe suggests to me.  

Immediate plans: the first week in September will see me head to Stratford upon Avon, using the last of the money from the fabulous Louis Marder bursary.  I'm planning to do a bit of research and at the same time 'decompress' from the manic year I've had.  I'm hoping Stratford will work its magic.  I haven't been there in three years and am desperate to go back.

The following week sees an International Theatre History conference - on Victorian and Edwardian Theatre - at the Tyne Theatre, one of the two Grade 1 listed theatres in Newcastle upon Tyne.  It is more or less on my doorstep and if I had been at work, I could not have attended.  Several really significant people from the world of theatre history are going to be there presenting papers and there are all sorts of events being planned across the three days.  

After that, who knows? I want to take some time to write, to keep researching and to focus on things which make me happier.  I really want to write about Benson.  If I don't do it, who will. And if I don't do it now, will I ever?

However, before that, I still have the summer. Last Sunday I went to see 'The Taming of the Shrew' in a marquee in Durham - shades of the Benson pastoral seasons were invoked as the theatre company fought against strong winds and the bells of Durham Cathedral!  Although I’m not sure Benson would have entirely endorsed the feminist re-reading of the final scene, I think he’d have appreciated the spirit of the occasion…

Find out Moonshine...?

                          

Apologies for the long absence. To be honest, the day job has become so demanding that I've had to fight for any Benson research time and blogging my finds has slipped down the to-do list. However, I have not been idle. The data base continues to grow and I have some plans for it. After much heart and soul searching I am leaving the day job in August to explore 'other avenues' and one of my summer jobs is to create a version of the data base which others can use. (Always assuming they want to...!)

Update aside, I've been tempted back to this blog today by a photograph shared on Facebook and Twitter by the 'Everything to Everybody' project - a collaboration between the University of Birmingham and Birmingham City Council - which is raising the profile of the incredible Shakespeare Library in Birmingham. This untapped resource is calling like a siren for me to visit it - and maybe that will be possible at some point next year. They have posted several interesting photos connected to Stratford and Benson, but yesterday's was a real find.



I have copies of several of the photos which were taken beside this 'sweet and lovely wall' but I've never seen these before!

Their digitisation officer, Richard, picked it as his favourite image from the collection and added this comment " I keep coming back to this photograph. He/she (we don’t have a name) is obviously a much loved cast member where time has been taken to set up a professional photograph outside of the theatre. I wish I had seen this production. Just looking at this dog obediently posing somehow draws you back over a century to the moment it was taken."

(Richard is clearly a Merry Shrew, even if he doesn't know it yet!)

So with an unexpectedly free evening at my disposal, I've been digging to try and find out more, and I THINK I might have an identity for this delightful doggie!

Although I can't find any reference to the dog appearing in this production, I'm wondering if this might be the actor Murray Carrington's dog, 'Dick', who had appeared in Two Gentlemen of Verona in Stratford in 1910 and created something of a sensation.

J.C. Trewin mentions him in 'Benson and the Bensonians', seemingly taking his information from Constance Benson's Memoirs. Apparently, during Lance's sad speech in Act 2 to Crab the dog, Dick 'looked steadily into the audience as if counting the house' but when Launce (played by Bensonian stalwart H.O. Nicholson) 'broke into sobs, he turned and sympathetically licked his face. This little bit of realistic acting so enchanted the audience they greeted it with a tremendous round of applause. The next morning Dick found himself famous. He received the "star" notices.'

Murray Carrington played Oberon in both the 1911 and 1912 performances of Midsummer Night's Dream. He was one of the Benson Company for eight years and returned to Stratford after the First World War. He was apparently the first actor to play Hamlet on the radio! H. O Nicholson played Starveling (who becomes Moonshine), in 1911, but he had left the Bensons' Company by 1912. Nicholson, a Cambridge Classics graduate and former school master, joined Benson in 1896 and was a long-standing member of the Company as well as being one of the Bensonians who ended up with Granville Barker's Company at the Savoy in 1912-13... where he played Starveling again, only this time without a real dog!

I've no idea if this is actually Dick - the name on the collar is too indistinct to read - or whether I'm just 'barking up the wrong tree', (sorry) but it is a nice thought! And I've loved doing the searching!