User:Bishonen/David Garrick

Garrick in 1770 by Thomas Gainsborough.

David Garrick (February 19, 1717 – January 20, 1779) was an English actor, dramatist and theatre manager, and a pupil and friend of Dr. Johnson.

David Garrick was born in Hereford, England and educated, like Johnson, at Lichfield. Johnson later taught him the classics, and in 1737 he travelled to London to seek his fortune. Having failed to succeed in a legal career, he decided on the stage, and by 1741 he was the talk of the theatrical scene for his performance in William Shakespeare's Richard III. He went on to manage Drury Lane Theatre, and enjoyed a thirty-year career at the top of the tree, one of the most influential and popular figures in the whole of British theatre history.

Garrick tried to portray his characters as real people, rather than as melodramatic caricatures. He did this by telling his actors to not be too pompous and to act as they would in everyday life.

David Garrick died in London, England and was interred in the "Poet's Corner" at Westminster Abbey. A monument to him in Lichfield Cathedral bears Johnson's famous comment, "I am disappointed by that stroke of death that has eclipsed the gaiety of nations, and impoverished the public stock of harmless pleasure."

Garrick as actor

Garrick and his wife Eva Maria in 1772—73 by Sir Joshua Reynolds.

Garrick as Richard III in Cibber's adaptation of Shakespeare.

The sensation of his Richard III

"Natural" acting: how many times has that concept been re-created and foregrounded against the artificiality of the last generation—any last generation?

Actor-Manager

Colley Cibber was the first actor-manager, with the emphasis on manager. Garrick was the first great artistic individualist a-m, the first to structure his public persona round his charisma and fame as an actor, and the first intellectual and analytic am, the first to both create famous Shakespeare interpretations in his own body, to direct and produce famous Shakespeare performances, to write Shakespeare criticism, and to also write analytic books and essays about his philosophy of Shakespeare acting and production. This combination of roles blazed a trail for the 19th century ams. There is of course no comparing their acting and production results, but none of his successors were anything like as reflective, explicit, and intellectual in their approach as he was.

Garrick's influence in France and Germany

Surprisingly for a practiser of an evanescent art, Garrick became through his writings about Shakespeare production as famous and influential in France and Germany as in his native land. He was idolized in Germany as part of the whole romantic German Shakespeare cult.

What about the US?