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The most celebrated English playwright is undoubtedly William Shakespeare, and he wrote so many glorious women roles: Juliet, Ophelia, Desdemona, Olivia, Lady Macbeth, Beatrice, Titania, Miranda, the three witches, I could go on.
But Shakespeare wrote every word of these roles with the firm expectation that they would be acted by men or boys. No female was allowed to act in a public theater. That would be shockingly indecent.
Women in Classical Theater
I am sorry to say that this was not purely an English opinion. The ancient Greeks also had men and boys play the female roles. In China it depended on the dynasty. Sometimes women were allowed, sometimes not. In Japan, women started a couple of the traditional theatrical forms but they were later banned from it.
Ancient Rome did allow women to act on the public stage, at least it some forms of theater. An actress named Verecunda is known to have been working in Roman Britain because her name is inscribed on a piece of pottery found in modern-day Leicester (Leicester City Council; Goodman, 19). Unfortunately, that is all I know about her.
Verecunda and other women like her did not hold a high prestige place in Roman society. Acting was very low status. A role for slaves. Or prostitutes. Or both.
Anyway, Rome collapsed, Britain became England, and the theaters were closed. The earliest plays associated with England weren’t written in English. They were written in Latin, or maybe Anglo-Norman, which is a dialect of French, and they were intended for a clerical and courtly audience. They had mostly religious themes. The oldest one I know of told the story of Adam and Eve and was written between 1146 and 1174 (Goodman, 56). I don’t know who played Eve. I also don’t know what he or she wore by way of a costume.
A Theater Revival (Twice)
By Shakespeare’s time in the late 16th, early 17th centuries, the secular drama world had risen from the ashes. Multiple theatrical troupes were competing for business in London, but their very names tell you just how welcome women weren’t. They’re called The King’s Men, the Admiral’s Men, Queen Henrietta’s Men, Beeston’s Boys (Goodman, 200-201). No women need apply.
By 1642, Shakespeare was long since dead, the English Civil War had begun, and a puritanical Parliament closed all the theaters in these “times of humiliation.” The times were thought to be incompatible with public stage-plays, which were full of “lascivious mirth and levity” (Thomson, 6).
Actors and producers cannot have been pleased to be out of a job, but they’d seen this before. Theaters had been shut down in the past for epidemics. They came back eventually. No one would have guessed that this closure would last eighteen long years (Goodman, 208).
When the Civil War and the Interregnum was finally over, a king came back in England. Charles II had spent many of his years of exile in France, where the theater was alive and well, and he liked it. He officially entered London on May 29, 1660, and by June the theaters were back in business (Goodman, 3).
Their existence was formally ratified in August, when Charles issued royal warrants authorizing one Thomas Killigrew and another Sir William Davenant to organize two companies of players to “for the representation of tragedies, comedies, plays, operas, and all other entertainments of that nature” (Thomson, 10).
Despite being a royalist and not a Puritan, Charles was alive to the unsavory reputation which had contributed to the banning of the theater in the first place. His warrant continued:
“Nevertheless, we do hereby by our authority royal strictly enjoin the said Thomas Killigrew and Sir William Davenant that they do not at any time hereafter cause to be acted or represented any play, interlude, or opera, containing any matter of profanation, scurrility, or obscenity; and we do further hereby authorise and command the said Thomas Killigrew and Sir William Davenant to peruse all plays that have been formerly written, and to expunge all profanities and scurrility from the same before they be represented or acted” (Thomson, 10).
Yeah. You can imagine how long that lasted.
Women on the Stage? Shocking!
Anyway, theater was back, and for those old enough to remember theater at all, it had a few new exciting twists, and the one that concerns us today is the presence of women on the stage.
It’s not at all clear exactly why, when, or how this started, but it’s not hard to guess that Charles II, a notorious admirer of women, had no objection to ogling them on the stage. He had seen women on the stage in France, and he liked it. He may have egged Killigrew and Davenant into hiring women. Or they may have done it on their own initiative, hoping to attract audiences and feeling sure the king would have no objection.
What we do know is that on December 8, 1660, Thomas Killigrew, manager of the King’s Company of players, staged Othello, written by the great Bard himself. And the role of Desdemona was played by a woman, probably for the very first time (Highfill, vol 12, 242-243).
We know this from a variety of inferences, not the least of which is the later publication of a prologue, specially composed for this production. It was needed to explain to the audience what they were about to see. Here’s the prologue:
I come, unknown to any of the rest
To tell you news, I saw the lady drest;
The woman playes today, mistake me not,
No man in gown, or page in petticoat;
A woman to my knowledge; yet I cann’t,
(If I should dye) make affidavit on’t.
Do you not twitter, gentlemen? I know
You will be censuring, do’it fairly though;
‘Tis possible a virtuous woman may
Abhor all sorts of looseness, and yet play;
Play on the stage, where all eyes are upon her,
Shall we count that a crime France counts an honour?
The prologue goes on to speak of the “women” who have been on the stage before. That is to say, the men who were playing women. This prologue now declares that such men were totally unbelievable in their roles. It says:
Our women are defective, and so siz’d,
You’d think they were some of the guard disguis’d;
For to speak truth, men act that are between
Forty and Fifty, wenches of fifteen;
With bone so large and nerve so incompliant,
When you call Desdemona, enter Giant.
The prologue also takes thought for what any ladies in the audience might think of seeing one of their own. It says:
But Ladies what think you, for if you tax
Her freedom with dishonour to your Sex,
She means to act no more, and this shall be
No other Play but her own tragedy;
She will submit to none but your Commands,
And take Commission onely from your hands.
(Wilson, 5-6)
And in this the prologue spoke true enough. For if audiences rejected women on the stage, any such woman could kiss her career goodbye. She’d be back in domestic service, which was probably where she came from. It wasn’t upper-class women mounting the stage, you can be sure.
With this prologue delivered, the King’s Company launched into Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice, in which the title character is led to believe his adoring young wife Desdemona is betraying him, so much that he kills her in jealousy. She was faithful all along, and no doubt many eyes were upon her throughout this production for more than one reason.
The trouble is that even with all this recorded prologue and exact timing, nobody bothered to write down who played Desdemona. I am not even kidding. We actually don’t know who the first woman on the English stage was. Historians have debated and argued and weighed the reliability of recollections made years after the event, but there is no consensus. In general, they’ve settled on two as the most likely candidates, but they’re not even the only candidates. I’m going with those two for this episode.
I’m not entirely sure what the reaction to that initial Desdemona was, but it must have been positive enough for both of the authorized companies to keep hiring women. The very next month, in January 1661, the diarist Samuel Pepys watched a comedy called The Beggars Bush. He looked twice to be sure the lady was not played by the famous Edward Kynaston, a boy who had often taken the women’s roles.
But it was not Kynaston. It was a veritable woman. Pepys wrote in his diary that this was “the first time that ever I saw women come upon the stage” (Wilson, 3). It wouldn’t be the last time.
By 1662, Charles II had issued another declaration, insisting that hiring women was not just possible, it was royally approved.
“For as much as many plays formerly acted to contain several profane, obscene and scurrilous passages, and the women’s parts therein have been acted by men in the habit of women, at which some have taken offence, for the preventing of these abuses for the future, we do hereby strictly command and enjoin that from henceforth no new play shall be acted by either of the said companies containing any passages offensive to piety and good manners… And we do likewise permit and give leave that all the women’s parts to be acted in either of the said two companies for the time to come may be performed by women so long as their recreations, which by reason of the abuses aforesaid were scandalous and offensive, may by such reformation be esteemed not only harmless delight, but useful and instructive representations of human life, to such of our good subjects as shall resort to the same.” 25 April 1662 (Thomson, 53-54).
What this meant was that women could feel secure in their careers as actresses. Inasmuch as it is possible to feel secure in such a career, anyway.
Both of the candidates for that initial Desdemona managed to make a career of it. At least for a while.
Anne Marshall Quin
The first candidate is Anne Marshall, who was certainly among the first female hires of The King’s Company, if not the very first. She and her sister Rebecca were said to be the daughters of a clergyman, and both appeared on stage. Anne played a number of leading ladies in a number of plays (none of whose titles I recognize) between 1661 and 1665, when the theaters were temporarily shut down because of plague. She got married then, and when the theaters reopened, she was known as Mrs. Quin, which has caused endless confusion because Nell Gwyn was another very famous actress who had a longtime extramarital affair with the king himself. You can here see the extent to which the King did not object to women on the stage.
As for Anne Marshall Quin, she returned to her career, quarreled with management over her roles, won herself a private dressing room, and continued taking leading roles (Highfill, vol. 12, 243). Of particular interest, she played Angelica Bianca in The Rover and Lady Knowell in Sir Patient Fancy (Wilson, 168-170; Highfill, vol. 12, 244). I’ll be surprised if you know those plays by their titles. I certainly would not have, but I do know the playwright. Her name was Aphra Behn, the first woman to support herself as an author in English. (See episode 8.2.)
Margaret Peg Hughes
The second possible candidate for the claim of first woman on the English stage is Margaret Hughes, and we know a little more about her. John Downes, who worked as a prompter in the theater, later recollected that Margaret, called Peg, was among the first actresses hired by Killigrew, though there has been some question about whether he was misremembering. Hence the arguments about who was actually first. At any rate, Peg certainly played Desdemona later. Samuel Pepys saw her in Othello in 1669 (Wilson, 150).
But that isn’t really why she was famous. Her story is indubitably bound up in the reasons why women on stage were controversial. I have no idea what Peg or any other actress thought about herself or her role, but there is simply no denying that others considered them to be prostitutes available for hire. These were mostly women who would otherwise be domestic servants. They were always in danger of downgrading back into that role, and even as actresses they were financially vulnerable. An experienced actress could earn 30 shillings a week, but an experienced male actor earned 50. Most actresses had no privacy whatsoever. Members of the public had free access backstage. Samuel Pepys quite enjoyed going back to watch the actresses changing costumes. And if you were prepared to pay a little, you might get to do considerably more than just watch the undressing. Many of the upper-class men attending the theater weren’t there because they loved art. They were there to find themselves a mistress (Spencer, 315-316).
It worked for King Charles, who picked up Nell Gwyn. It also worked for his cousin, the dashing Prince Rupert. Rupert was a war hero, an accomplished scientist, and an artist. A real Renaissance man in a way. He was also known for a fiery, ungovernable temper, and not everyone liked him, so it was with some amusement that his neighbors watched him fall head over heels for the actress Peg Hughes. One count recorded that
“Prince Rupert found charms in the person of another player, called Hughes, who brought down, and greatly subdued his natural fierceness. From this time, adieu alembics, crucibles, furnaces, and all the black furniture of the forges: a complete farewell to all mathematical instruments and chemical speculations: sweet powder and essences were now the only ingredients that occupied any share of his attention. The impertinent gypsy chose to be attacked in form; and proudly refusing money, that, in the end, she might sell her favors at a dearer rate, she caused the poor Prince to act apart so unnatural, that he no longer appeared like the same person. The king was greatly pleased with this event, for which great rejoicings were made at Tunbridge; But nobody was bold enough to make it the subject of satire, though the same constraint was not observed with other ridiculous personages” (Spencer, 314).
How accurate this is, I don’t know. Given her uncertain position in society, it’s more than possible that Peg did play hard to get in hopes of a better deal from Rupert. Or perhaps that’s unfair. Maybe she played hard to get because she would actually have preferred to maintain her own independence, such as it was. She certainly had no reason to believe his infatuation would last. She was not the first actress to catch his eye. The only surprising part about this was that at least he wasn’t married. It wouldn’t have changed anything if he was. Being married certainly didn’t stop King Charles.
But if Peg expected Rupert’s love to be brief, she was wrong. She became his mistress, and I am happy to say he stood by her. He didn’t marry her. That would have been a step too far for any aristocrat of the time. But he did build her a grand house, he bedecked her with jewels, he had her portrait painted, and he was delighted when she gave birth to a daughter, named Ruperta. He was still a very proud father years later when he wrote to his sister that Ruperta “already rules the whole house and sometimes argues with her mother, which makes us all laugh” (Spencer, 318-319). They do genuinely seem to have made a family of it, even if it was a family unsanctioned by the church or by law.
As for Peg, she maintained her acting career, at least in some seasons. But she was also touched by tragedy. Her brother was killed in a duel, which would be bad enough, but the subject of the duel made it worse. It was an argument over whether she, Peg, was prettier than Nell Gwyn or vice versa (Spencer, 320-321). Such a stupid thing to die over. It cannot have been fun for Peg.
She was touched by tragedy again in November 1682, when Rupert died of fever and pleurisy. In his will, Rupert left most of his possessions to Peg and to their daughter Ruperta. He instructed the nine-year-old Ruperta to obey her mother. Unfortunately, Rupert’s possessions in death did not amount to the same lifestyle he had provided them in life. Peg was reduced to selling the jewelry he had given her, as well as the house he had built for her. She was much younger than he was and lived another thirty-seven years in a state that was called widowhood, even though she had never actually been married to him (Spencer, 366; Highfill, vol. 8, 26).
The Legacy
As for the English stage, women were there to stay. They have never since been banished from it, and while it is no longer required for women to play women’s roles, that has certainly been the norm for the past few hundred years. Sadly, the expectation that female actors were also prostitutes took a very long time to die. Acting as a profession did not significantly rise in social status until the end of the 19th century. Rich men continued to take actresses as mistresses, but not as wives.
It wasn’t until well into the film era of the 20th century that actors became the kind of celebrities who could be welcome even in the highest social circles. You could even suggest that maybe they still aren’t there. Prince Harry did marry Meghan Markle, the actress he loved, but not everyone has been happy about that. I’m not fully up on all the drama (nor do I want to be), but I suspect that her profession was not really the issue.
Anyway, the next time you see a show, especially if it’s Othello, give a thought to Anne Marshall Quin and Margaret Peg Hughes. Whoever played Desdemona in 1660 took a very big risk when she stepped out on stage as the very first English actress. It’s scary enough to make your stage debut under normal circumstances. To do it when you don’t even know if audiences will accept any woman in that role must have been terrifying. Fortunately, it turned out well.
I have a special thanks today to Stacy, who signed up as a supporter on Patreon. Supporters like Stacy help keep the women’s history coming for everyone. If you are able, please consider supporting as well either by signing up on Patreon or as a one-time donor on Buy Me a Coffee.
Selected Sources
Goodman, Jennifer Robin. British Drama before 1660. Twayne Publishers, 1991.
Highfill, Philip H.., Burnim, Kalman A.., Langhans, Edward A.. A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Volume 8, Hough to Keyse: Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers, and Other Stage Personnel in London, 1660-1800. United States: Southern Illinois University Press, 1982.
Highfill, Philip H, Kalman A Burnim, and Edward A. Langhans. A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers & Other Stage Personnel in London, 1660-1800. 12, Pinner to Rizzo. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1987. https://archive.org/details/biographicaldict0000high_h0i6/page/244/mode/2up.
Leicester City Council. “Jewry Wall Roman Baths – Story of Leicester.” http://www.storyofleicester.info, n.d. https://www.storyofleicester.info/leisure-entertainment/jewry-wall-roman-baths/.
Spencer, Charles. Prince Rupert: The Last Cavalier. HarperCollins UK, 2020.
Thomson, Peter. The Cambridge Introduction to English Theatre, 1660-1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Wilson, John Harold. All the King’s Ladies. University of Chicago Press, 1958.