A Shoemaker A Gentleman - Date and Performance

Date and Performance

The date of the play is not known with certainty, and its early performance history is largely a blank. The title page of the 1638 quarto states that the work was "sundry times acted at the Red Bull and other theaters, with general and good applause." Okes' dedication of the play to the guild of shoemakers also mentions the play's popularity, and states that "some twenty years agone, it was in the fashion." This suggests a date c. 1618 for the play's origin, though the "twenty years" figure could be only an approximation. Commentators have suggested dates of authorship as early as c. 1608.

The comic subplot of the play was extracted and performed as a "droll," and was often staged at Bartholomew Fair and Southwark Fair during the middle and later decades of the seventeenth century. The play was revived at least once during the Restoration era.