Blackfriars Theatre - First Theatre

First Theatre

Blackfriars Theatre was built on the grounds of the former Dominican monastery; the black robes worn by members of this order lent the neighbourhood, and theatres, their name. In the pre-Reformation Tudor years, the site was used not only for religious but also for political functions—perhaps most notably, the divorce trial of Catherine and Henry VIII which would, more than a century later, be reenacted in the same room by Shakespeare's company. After Henry's expropriation of monastic property, the monastery became the property of the crown; control of the property was granted to Thomas Cawarden, Master of the Revels. Cawarden used part of the monastery as Revels offices; other parts he sold or leased to the neighbourhood's wealthy residents, including Lord Cobham and John Cheke. After Cawarden's death, the property passed to Sir William More. In 1576, Richard Farrant, then Master of Windsor Chapel leased part of the former buttery from More in order to stage plays. As often in the theatrical practice of the time, this commercial enterprise was justified by the convenient fiction of royal necessity; Farrant claimed to need the space for his child choristers to practice plays for the Queen, but he also staged plays for paying audiences. The theatre was small, perhaps 46 feet (14 m) long and 25 feet (7.6 m) wide, and admission, compared to public theatres, expensive (apparently four pence); both these factors limited attendance at the theatre to a fairly select group of well-to-do gentry and nobles.

For his playing company, Farrant combined his Windsor children with the Children of the Chapel Royal, then directed by William Hunnis. On Farrant's death in 1580, Hunnis took on John Newman as a partner and they subleased the property from Farrant's widow, putting up a ₤100 bond on the promise to promptly pay the rent and to make needed repairs. But the venture did not go well financially, which put Farrant's widow in jeopardy of defaulting on the rent to More. In November 1583, Farrant brought suit against Hunnis and Newman for default on the bond. To escape a suit by her or More, Hunnis and Newman transferred their sublease to Henry Evans, a Welsh scrivener and theatrical affectionado. This unauthorised assignment of the sublease gave More an excuse to bring suit to retake possession of the property, but More used legal delays and finally escaped legal action by selling the sublease to Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, sometime after Michaelmas Term (November) of 1583, who then gave it to his secretary, the writer John Lyly.

As proprietor of the playhouse, Lyly installed Evans as the manager of the new company of Oxford's Boys, composed of the Children of the Chapel and the Children of Paul's. Lyly turned his talents to play writing, and his Campaspe was performed at Court on New Year's Day 1584, and Sapho and Phao on 3 March, with Lyly listed as the payee for both appearances. In November 1583, Hunnis, still Master of the Chapel Children, successfully petitioned the Queen to increase the stipend to house, feed, and clothe the company. More finally obtained a legal judgement voiding the original lease at the end of Easter Term (June) of 1584, thereby ending the First Blackfriars Playhouse after eight years and postponing the performance of Lyly's third play, Gallathea.