Theatre Royal, Drury Lane

Current areas of research:

London and New York stages in the 19C with a particular focus on the performance and acting styles of George Frederick Cooke, Edmund Kean, William Charles Macready, Edwin Forrest and Charlotte Cushman and also Junius Brutus Booth and Mary Ann Duff.

Recent papers and talks

At present I am preparing a talk – Edmund Kean (1787-1833) Shakespearean actor and Richmond Theatre Manager – for the Richmond [Surrey] Local History Group which will be given in March 2018.    

In February 2017 the Royal Society for Arts – The William Shipley History Group held a one day Symposium in London: The Undisputed Monarch of the English Stage, David Garrick (1717-1779). I was invited to give a paper:

Garrick’s acting and his techniques and how these may have been absorbed by the following generation of actors, that is Garrick’s successors.*

The paper was repeated for members of the Garrick Club in May 2017

The Society for Theatre Research: in August 2016 on behalf of the Society, I convened a conference held at Downing College, Cambridge: Theatre in the Regency Era: Plays, Performance, Practice: 1795-1843. I gave a paper which dealt with George Frederick Cooke’s death in America and who then might have taken his head: title – The Skull in a Glass Case; Or, the Case of the Actor who Lost His Head.

Previous papers include:

Macready & Forrest: A Fatal Controversy; Or, It started with a Hiss: Society for Theatre Research members. The paper explored the fatal dispute between William Charles Macready and the American actor Edwin Forrest.

An Unrequited Profession – this paper discussed Sir Henry Irving and his successors and was given to the Irving Society.

Publications

These include the following articles, forewords, prefaces, etc.:

*The Undisputed Monarch of the Stage, David Garrick (1717-1779)

Occasional paper no.32 RSDA/ William Shipley History Group (2017)

Teaching Actors, Knowledge Transfer in Actor Training by Ross W. Prior (Intellect,

Bristol) 2012 – Foreword

Movement Training for Actors by Jackie Snow (Methuen Drama) 2012

Preface

Chapter 17 – An Overview of period Movement

Chapter 18 – an Overview of Period Dance

Masters of the Stage, British Acting Teachers Talk about Their Craft

Interview: The Guildford School of Acting

By Eva Mekler (Crowe Weidenfeld) 1989

A Guide to the History, Architecture and Current Proposals for the Church of St. Mary-at-Lambeth, London (The Vauxhall Society) 1980

Chapter 1: The History of St. Mary-at-Lambeth

Chapter 2: A Guided Tour of the Church with notes on features of architectural and historic     interest

Editorial support:

Renee Houston, Spirit of the Irresistible by Miranda Brooke (Tempest Time 2016)

The History of the Prince of Wales Theatre London (1771-1903) by Richard Lorenzen

(The Society for Theatre Research & Hertfordshire Press 2014)

Edwin Booth, a Biography and Performance History by Arthur W. Bloom

(McFarland & Company 2013)

Current:

Biography of Edwin Forrest by Arthur W. Bloom               

To view my research photo gallery please click here.