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26 Jan 2010

The Romantic History of David Garrick

As far as romance novels go, if you are looking for an excellent romantic comedy — and both romantic and comedy are emphasized — you can’t do much better than to check out David Garrick:

The year is 1742, and David Garrick is the biggest celebrity in London, performing Romeo and Hamlet every night at the Drury Lane playhouse. He is admired by all… but the tables are turned one evening when he catches sight of a beautiful girl in the audience. He cannot forget her, and searches the city in vain trying to find her.
Then one day, a wealthy old man contacts Garrick, complaining that his daughter has developed a crush on him so strong that she is refusing to be wed to a handsome, up-and-coming nobleman. Will Garrick assist in making her forget her foolish attraction to a play-actor?

Imagine the horror, of Garrick and the father alike, when it is discovered – the girl is the very girl that Garrick loves!

‘David Garrick‘ is not the best-known romance novel — and that is our loss, for the piece is fantastic. Unlike most romance novels and in comparison to the new romantic comedies, this old fashioned story tells the plot in the mode of all the great romances: two people in love, kept separate by outside conditions. Where ‘Garrick’ differs is in the use of comedy, not tragedy, to portray the scene.

The romance of Garrick began its life as a popular theatrical play. According to multiple sources, Robertson originally fashioned the story as a romance novel, David Garrick: A Love Story, which was first printed in 1864 as a serial in the magazine The Young Englishwoman. However, when the serial was reprinted in 1865 as a regular romantic novel, Robertson says in his preface that it was the other way around, and his novel was adapted from his play. Co-author and original performer of the title role, Edward A. Sothern relates: “In the course of a conversation one day [author T. W. Robertson] mentioned incidentally that many years ago he had translated a German comedy entitled ‘Doctor Davy,’ and recited the plot to me. It was so slight and thread-like, however, that an ordinary page of note paper would have sufficed to describe the whole thing. Notwithstanding this, I was struck by the simplicity of the story, and saw at a glance that it contained the elements of success… and when it was finally produced under the name of ‘David Garrick,’ it met with a reception as flattering as the success was unequivocal. That’s the history of ‘David Garrick.’”

While the plots between both versions are virtually identical, the tone of the romance novel is much more sentimental and somber. Although much of the humor was removed in the novelization, a great deal of exposition was added, and the romance novel actually begins on the day Garrick and Ada first set eyes on each other.

When the love story David Garrick first premiered, it became one of the most popular romantic comedies on the stage. Sothern continued to play the character till he was well too old to be doing so, and no less than three film adaptations were made within ten years of each other. The classic romance story concerns Ada, a young theater fan who falls in love with the great Garrick after seeing him perform. Garrick is in turn enamored, much to the horror of Ada’s father, who (being educated in nothing but business) attempts to pay the actor to give up his affection. Garrick is too much a gentleman to accept such an offer; but also too much a gentleman to risk alienating Ada from her father. In an effort to set things right, Garrick cooks up some of the best comedy in history as he (pretends to) reveal his true colors to Ada as a drunken gambler and bully.

Of course, what makes this comedy romantic is the true devotion Garrick and Ada hold for each other — not like so many low-brow comic romances one finds today where the characters merely insult each other till inexplicably determining it’s love. Even when Garrick’s antics provoke Ada’s ire to the breaking point, she never resorts to insulting the object of her love: true tears of disappointment are all she can manage.

The original play premiered at the Prince of Wales Theater in Birmingham in 1864, where it was successful enough to be moved to the Haymarket Theatre in London. It was a major success for the actor Edward Askew Sothern, who played the title role, but came later to be associated with another famous actor, Charles Wyndham, who often played the romantic Garrick with his real-life wife performing as Ada. A 1923 book, Public Speaking Today, recommends it for performance by high school students alongside The Importance of Being Earnest and The Rivals. In 1922, the play was adapted as a comic opera by Reginald Somerville and played at the Queen’s Theatre. The play was designed as a star vehicle, since the leading man has to portray the famous 18th century actor David Garrick himself as an actor giving a performance.

The play was T. W. Robertson’s first major commercial success and was frequently revived throughout the Victorian era and beyond. Several silent films of the romance genre were made based on David Garrick, including versions in 1913, 1914 and 1916.

You can buy David Garrick: The Play and the Novel from Amazon.com and other retailers.

Talia Felix is an author and editor from Santa Fe New Mexico.

25 Jan 2010

The Better Plays for High School Students

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Year after year, it’s the same routine. High school students are given revivals of plays like The Importance of Being Earnest and A Midsummer Night’s Dream to act in rotation. If the kids aren’t sick of it, the drama teacher sure is. While William Shakespeare and Oscar Wilde have their merits — the public domain being foremost among them — eventually something new, or at least something that’s not played to death, should be seen.

Some of the more obscure classics suited for a school play include works by de Beaumarchais, Gozzi, Shaw, Rostand, and David Garrick. Of these historical characters, the last one is particularly notable for having another great historical play actually written about him.

David Garrick by T. W. Robertson, was written in the 1850s. It was based on (to the extent that at times it was directly translated from) a French play called Sullivan. Sullivan itself was adapted from an earlier play called Le Garrick medicin, written in the 1830s and which spawned several other adaptions. Whatever was done in that play worked, and it captured imaginations for over a century after it was first published in France.

Robertson’s play David Garrick preserves the basic plot of its French predecessors: the famous 18th century actor, David Garrick is astounded to learn that a girl has fallen in love with him from the audience after watching him perform. The term “fangirl” does not yet exist, but it’s clearly what she is. Garrick makes arrangements with her father to ensure she does not get carried away in her affections and, at a fancy dinner party, he proceeds to utilize his acting talents to disgust the girl away from him. Unfortunately, through the course of the night, Garrick finds that he’s really in love with the girl as well.

Due to Victorian censorship rules, the affection displayed between Garrick and his paramour is limited to hand-holding (unless, of course, the director should will otherwise.) A sword-duel in which Garrick becomes involved also works its way off the stage. The real show-stealing scene is in fact the dinner party, where Garrick makes a fool of himself in an effort to convince the other guests of his undesirability; he feigns drunkeness, begins singing and sitting on the other guests, smashes much of the glassware and finishes the night by enacting scenes from Shakespeare before running away wearing the window-curtains. This is only topped a few minutes later when the fangirl’s real fiance, Squire Richard Chivy, comes home actually as drunk as Garrick just had feigned to be.

This once popular play has fallen somewhat from the limelight, but efforts are being made to ensure its revival. A special theater kit for David Garrick is available at a discount from one publisher, and the message boards at Turner Classic Movies are buzzing with requests to show the old film versions. If you’re looking for something fresh, but still with the affordability of the public domain, David Garrick is a smart choice.

David Garrick by T. W. Robertson is available from Amazon.com and Createspace.com

Liata Gluck is an author and journalist from Santa Fe, New Mexico.

24 Jan 2010