ALTHOUGH James Burbage was, as his son asserted, "the first builder of playhouses," a second public playhouse followed hard on the Theatre, probably within twelve months. It was erected a short distance to the south of the Theatre,—that is, nearer the city,—and, like that building, it adjoined Finsbury Field.[106] To the two playhouses the audiences came trooping over the meadows, in "great multidudes," the Lord Mayor tells us; and the author of Tarlton's Newes out of Purgatory (c. 1589) describes their return to London thus: "With that I waked, and saw such concourse of people through the fields that I knew the play was done."[107]

The new playhouse derived its name from the Curtain estate, on which it was erected.[108] This estate was formerly the property of the Priory of Holywell, and was described in 1538 as "scituata et existentia extra portas ejusdem nuper monasterii prope pasturam dicte nuper Priorisse, vocatam the Curteine."[109] Why it was so called is not clear. The name may have been derived from some previous owner of the property; it may, as Collier thought, have come from some early association with the walls (curtains) or defenses of the city; or, it may have come, as Tomlins suggests, from the mediÆval Latin cortina, meaning a court, a close, a farm enclosure.[110] Whatever its origin—the last explanation seems the most plausible—the interesting point is that it had no connection whatever with a stage curtain.

The building was probably opened to the London public in the summer or autumn of 1577. The first reference to it is found in T[homas] W[hite]'s Sermon Preached at Pawles Crosse on Sunday the Thirde of November, 1577: "Behold the sumptuous theatre houses, a continual monument of London's prodigality and folly";[111] and a reference to it by name appears in Northbrooke's A Treatise, licensed December, 1577: "Those places, also, which are made up and builded for such plays and interludes, as the Theatre and Curtain."[112]

Like the Theatre, the Curtain was a peculiarly shaped building, specially designed for acting; "those playhouses that are erected and built only for such purposes ... namely the Curtain and the Theatre,"[113] writes the Privy Council; and the German traveler, Samuel Kiechel, who visited London in 1585, describes them as "sonderbare" structures. They are usually mentioned together, and in such a way as to suggest similarity of shape as well as of purpose. We may, I think, reasonably suppose that the Curtain was in all essential details a copy of Burbage's Theatre.[114] Presumably, then, it was polygonal (or circular) in shape,[115] was constructed of timber, and was finished on the outside with lime and plaster. The interior, as the evidence already cited in the chapter on the Theatre shows, consisted of three galleries surrounding an open yard. There was a platform projecting into the middle of the yard, with dressing-rooms at the rear, "heavens" overhead, and a flagpole rising above the "heavens." That some sign was displayed in front of the door is likely. Malone writes: "The original sign hung out at this playhouse (as Mr. Steevens has observed) was the painting of a curtain striped."[116] Aubrey records that Ben Jonson "acted and wrote, but both ill, at the Green Curtain, a kind of nursery or obscure playhouse somewhere in the suburbs, I think towards Shoreditch or Clerkenwell."[117] By "at the Green Curtain" Aubrey means, of course, "at the sign of the Green Curtain"; but the evidence of Steevens and of Aubrey is too vague and uncertain to warrant any definite conclusions.

Of the early history of the Curtain we know little, mainly because it was not, like certain other playhouses, the subject of extensive litigation. We do not even know who planned and built it. The first evidence of its ownership appears fifteen years after its erection, in some legal documents connected with the Theatre.[118] In July, 1592, Henry Lanman, described as "of London, gentleman, of the age of 54 years," deposed: "That true it is about 7 years now shall be this next winter, they, the said Burbage and Brayne, having the profits of plays made at the Theatre, and this deponent having the profits of the plays done at the house called the Curtain near to the same, the said Burbage and Brayne, taking the Curtain as an esore[119] to their playhouse, did of their own motion move this deponent that he would agree that the profits of the said two playhouses might for seven years space be in divident between them."[120]

THE SITE OF THE CURTAIN PLAYHOUSE

From An Actual Survey of the Parish of St Leonard in Shoreditch taken in the year 1745 by Peter Chasserau, Surveyor. The key to the map gives "93" as Curtain Court, probably the site of the old playhouse, "87" as New Inn Yard, and "94" as Holywell Court, both interesting in connection with Burbage's Theatre. (Redrawn from the original for this volume.)

From this statement it is evident that Henry Lanman was the sole proprietor of the Curtain as far back as 1585, and the presumption is that his proprietorship was of still earlier date. This presumption is strengthened by the fact that in a sale of the Curtain estate early in 1582, he is specifically mentioned as having a tenure of an "edifice or building" erected in the Curtain Close, that is, that section of the estate next to the Field, on which the playhouse was built.[121] Since Lanman is not mentioned as having any other property on the estate, the "edifice or building" referred to was probably the playhouse. The document gives no indication as to how long he had held possession of the "edifice," but the date of sale, March, 1582, carries us back to within four years of the erection of the Curtain, and it seems reasonable to suppose, though of course we cannot be sure, that Lanman had been proprietor of the building from the very beginning.[122]

Certain records of the sale of the Curtain estate shortly before and shortly after the erection of the playhouse are preserved, but these throw very little light upon the playhouse itself. We learn that on February 20, 1567, Lord Mountjoy and his wife sold the estate to Maurice Longe, clothworker, and his son William Longe, for the sum of £60; and that on August 23, 1571, Maurice Longe and his wife sold it to the then Lord Mayor, Sir William Allyn, for the sum of £200. In both documents the property is described in the same words: "All that house, tenement or lodge commonly called the Curtain, and all that parcel of ground and close, walled and enclosed with a brick wall on the west and north parts, called also the Curtain Close." The lodge here referred to, generally known as "Curtain House," was on, or very near, Holywell Lane;[123] the playhouse, as already stated, was erected in the close near the Field.[124]

How long Sir William Allyn held the property, or why it reverted to the Longe family, we do not know. But on March 18, 1582, we find William Longe, the son of "Maurice Longe, citizen and clothworker, of London, deceased," selling the same property, described in the same words, to one "Thomas Harberte, citizen and girdler, of London." In the meantime, of course, the playhouse had been erected, but no clear or direct mention of the building is made in the deed of sale. Possibly it was included in the conventionally worded phrase: "and all and singular other messuages, tenements, edifices, and buildings, with all and singular their appurtenances, erected and builded upon the said close called the Curtain."[125] Among the persons named as holding tenures of the above-mentioned "edifices and buildings" in the close was Henry Lanman. It seems not improbable, therefore, that the Curtain, like the Theatre, was erected on leased ground.

It is impossible to give a connected history of the Curtain. Most of the references to it that we now possess are invectives in early puritanical writings, or bare mention, along with other playhouses, in letters or ordinances of the Privy Council and the Lord Mayor. Such references as these do not much help us in determining what companies successively occupied the building, or what varying fortunes marked its ownership and management. Yet a few scattered facts have sifted down to us, and these I have arranged in chronological order.

On the afternoon of April 6, 1580, an earthquake, especially severe in Holywell, shook the building during the performance of a play, and greatly frightened the audience. Munday says merely: "at the playhouses the people came running forth, surprised with great astonishment";[126] but Stubbes, the Puritan, who saw in the event a "fearful judgment of God," writes with fervor: "The like judgment almost did the Lord show unto them a little before, being assembled at their theatres to see their bawdy interludes and other trumperies practised, for He caused the earth mightily to shake and quaver, as though all would have fallen down; whereat the people, sore amazed, some leapt down from the top of the turrets, pinnacles, and towers where they stood, to the ground, whereof some had their legs broke, some their arms, some their backs, some hurt one where, some another, and many score crushed and bruised."[127]

The disturbance at the Theatre and the Curtain in 1584, when one Challes "did turn upon the toe upon the belly of" an apprentice "sleeping upon the grass" in the Field near by, has been mentioned in the preceding chapter. If the interpretation of the facts there given is correct, Lord Arundel's Players were then occupying the Curtain.

In the winter of 1585 Lanman entered into his seven years' agreement with Burbage and Brayne by which the Theatre and the Curtain were placed under one management, and the profits shared "in divident between them." This agreement was faithfully kept by both parties, but there is no evidence that after the expiration of the seven years, in the winter of 1592, the affiliation was continued. What effect the arrangement had upon the companies of players occupying the two theatres we cannot now determine. To this period, however, I would assign the appearance of the Queen's Men at the Curtain.[128]

On July 28, 1597, as a result of the performance of Thomas Nashe's The Isle of Dogs, by Pembroke's Men at the Swan,[129] the Privy Council ordered the plucking down of "the Curtain and the Theatre."[130] The order, however, was not carried out, and in October plays were allowed again as before.

At this time the Lord Chamberlain's men were at the Curtain, having recently moved thither in consequence of the difficulties Cuthbert Burbage was having with Gyles Alleyn over the Theatre property. During the stay of the Chamberlain's Company, which numbered among its members William Shakespeare, Richard Burbage, William Kempe (who had succeeded Tarleton in popular favor as a clown), John Heminges, Thomas Pope, and Augustine Phillips, the playhouse probably attained its greatest distinction. Both Shakespeare and Jonson wrote plays for the troupe; Romeo and Juliet, we are told, "won Curtain plaudities," as no doubt did many other of Shakespeare's early masterpieces; and Jonson's Every Man in His Humour created such enthusiasm here on its first performance as to make its author famous.[131]

In the summer of 1599 the Chamberlain's Men moved into their splendid new home, the Globe, on the Bankside, and the Curtain thus abandoned fell on hard times. Perhaps it was let occasionally to traveling troupes; in Jeaffreson's Middlesex County Records, under the date of March 11, 1600, is a notice of the arrest of one William Haukins "charged with a purse taken at a play at the Curtain." But shortly after, in April, 1600, when Henslowe and Alleyn began to erect their splendid new Fortune Playhouse, they were able to give the impression to Tilney, the Master of the Revels, and to the Privy Council, that the Curtain was to be torn down. Thus in the Council's warrant for the building of the Fortune, dated April 8, 1600, we read that "another house is [to be] pulled down instead of it";[132] and when the Puritans later made vigorous protests against the erection of the Fortune, the Council defended itself by stating that "their Lordships have been informed by Edmund Tilney, Esquire, Her Majesty's servant, and Master of the Revels, that the house now in hand to be built by the said Edward Alleyn is not intended to increase the number of the playhouses, but to be instead of another, namely the Curtain, which is either to be ruined and plucked down, or to be put to some other good use."[133]

All this talk of the Curtain's being plucked down or devoted to other uses suggests a contemplated change in the ownership or management of the building. We do not know when Lanman died (in 1592 he described himself as fifty-four years of age),[134] but we do know that at some date prior to 1603 the Curtain had passed into the hands of a syndicate. When this syndicate was organized, or who constituted its members, we cannot say. Thomas Pope, in his will, dated July 22, 1603, mentions his share "of, in, and to all that playhouse, with the appurtenances, called the Curtain";[135] and John Underwood, in his will, dated October 4, 1624, mentions his "part or share ... in the said playhouses called the Blackfriars, the Globe on the Bankside, and the Curtain."[136] It may be significant that both Pope and Underwood were sharers also in the Globe. Since, however, further information is wanting, it is useless to speculate. We can only say that at some time after the period of Lanman's sole proprietorship, the Curtain passed into the hands of a group of sharers; and that after a discussion in 1600 of demolishing the building or devoting it to other uses, it entered upon a long and successful career.

On May 10, 1601, "the actors at the Curtain"[137] gave serious offense by representing on the stage persons "of good desert and quality, that are yet alive, under obscure manner, but yet in such sort as all the hearers may take notice both of the matter and the persons that are meant thereby." The Privy Council ordered the Justices of the Peace to examine into the case and to punish the offenders.[138]

Early in 1604 a draft of a royal patent for Queen Anne's Players—who had hitherto been under the patronage of Worcester[139]—gives those players permission to act "within their now usual houses, called the Curtain, and the Boar's Head."[140] On April 9, 1604, the Privy Council authorized the three companies of players that had been taken under royal patronage "to exercise their plays in their several and usual houses for that purpose, and no other, viz., the Globe, scituate in Maiden Lane on the Bankside in the County of Surrey, the Fortune in Golding Lane, and the Curtain in Holywell."[141] The King's Men (the Burbage-Shakespeare troupe) occupied the Globe; Prince Henry's Men (the Henslowe-Alleyn troupe), the Fortune; and Queen Anne's Men, the Curtain.

But the Queen's Men were probably dissatisfied with the Curtain. It was small and antiquated, and it must have suffered by comparison with the more splendid Globe and Fortune. So the Queen's players had built for themselves a new and larger playhouse, called "The Red Bull." This was probably ready for occupancy in 1605, yet it is impossible to say exactly when the Queen's Men left the Curtain; their patent of April 15, 1609, gives them permission to act "within their now usual houses called the Red Bull, in Clerkenwell, and the Curtain in Holywell."[142] It may be that they retained control of the Curtain in order to prevent competition.

What company occupied the Curtain after Queen Anne's Men finally surrendered it is not clear. Mr. Murray is of the opinion that Prince Charles's Men moved into the Curtain "about December, 1609, or early in 1610."[143]

In 1613 "a company of young men" acted The Hector of Germany "at the Red Bull and at the Curtain." Such plays, however, written and acted by amateurs, were not uncommon, and no significance can be attached to the event.

In 1622, as we learn from the Herbert Manuscripts, the Curtain was being occupied by Prince Charles's Servants.[144] In the same year the author of Vox Graculi, or The Jack Daw's Prognostication for 1623, refers to it thus: "If company come current to the Bull and Curtain, there will be more money gathered in one afternoon than will be given to Kingsland Spittle in a whole month; also, if at this time about the hours of four and five it wax cloudy and then rain downright, they shall sit dryer in the galleries than those who are the understanding men in the yard."

Prince Charles's Men did not remain long at the Curtain. At some date between June 10 and August 19, 1623, they moved to the larger and more handsome Red Bull.[145] After this, so far as I can discover, there is no evidence to connect the playhouse with dramatic performances. Malone, who presumably bases his statements on the now lost records of Herbert, says that shortly after the accession of King Charles I it "seems to have been used only by prize-fighters."[146]

The last mention of the Curtain is found in the Middlesex County Records under the date February 21, 1627.[147] It is merely a passing reference to "the common shoare near the Curtain playhouse," yet it is significant as indicating that the building was then still standing. What ultimately became of it we do not know. For a time, however, its memory survived in Curtain Court (see page 79), and to-day its fame is perpetuated in Curtain Road.