|
Title |
[Book Plate of Edwin Forrest, "Richard III"] |
|
Date |
Undated |
|
Production |
Richard III |
|
Character roles |
Edwin Forrest (Richard III) |
|
Artistic roles |
Edwin Forrest (Actor) |
|
Genre |
Shakespeare history |
|
Theme |
Shakespeare |
|
Item description |
Book plate featuring Edwin Forrest in the role of Richard III. |
|
Object narrative |
Edwin Forrest (1806-1872) was the first internationally known and acclaimed American actor. Born to Scottish and German descendants, he made his stage debut in 1820. Touring at first as an actor in the West (Ohio and Kentucky), within six years he was performing in New York and building his reputation as the most powerful physical and vocal actor America had ever seen. He was popular for heroic and physical tragic roles such as Othello, King Lear, Virginius, and Metamora, and often brought audiences to their feet with his passionate, energetic, and frenetic portrayals. He reached his zenith in the late 1830s and 1840s as he toured to England and France, developing a professional rivalry with British actor William Macready, who played the same roles. Both men were known for jealousy and having virile tempers, however, and the feud became personal in the 1840s leading up to Forrest's second tour to England in 1845. Friends in the press and other supporters of both men criticized the other's performances in print, especially after Forrest publicly hissed Macready's performance of Hamlet in Edinburgh in February of that year, leading to public interest and charged opinions on both sides. Tensions eventually led to the Astor Place Riot in New York City on May 10, 1849, in which Americans rioted in the streets during a Macready performance and the militia tragically fired into the crowds. This item is a former book plate featuring a reproduction of an engraving of Forrest in the role of 'Richard III,' of which Macready's newspaper friend John Forster said that Forrest: 'looked like a savage newly caught from out of the American backwoods,' particularly in the fight between Richard and Richmond when the heavy strips of black hair that he had pasted on his head fell down over his face (qtd. in Moody 157). |
|
Type |
Text |
|
Original format |
Book Plate |
|
Original publisher |
[Place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified] |
|
Language |
en |
|
Contributing institution |
Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries |
|
Source collection |
MSS255 Robert C. Hansen Performing Arts Collection |
|
Series/grouping |
10.2.3: Photographs, Cards, Caricatures/Satire and Other Pictoral Materials -- Postcards -- Theatres |
|
Box |
92 |
|
Finding aid link |
http://library.uncg.edu/info/depts/scua/collections/manuscripts/ead/mss255.xml |
|
Preferred citation |
[Identification of item], Robert C. Hansen Performing Arts Collection, 1753-2006 (MSS255), Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives and Manuscripts, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, NC, USA. |
|
Rights statement |
http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/ |
|
Additional rights information |
NO COPYRIGHT - UNITED STATES. This item has been determined to be free of copyright restrictions in the United States. The user is responsible for determing actual copyright status for any reuse of the material. |
|
Object ID |
MSS255.B92.014 |
|
Digital publisher |
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, University Libraries, PO Box 26170, Greensboro NC 27402-6170, 336.334.5304 |
|
OCLC number |
872280803 |
