seven houses, these are all within or hard by the palace in Milan, and action seems to pass freely from one to another.[1]
The evidence available does not dispose one to dogmatism. But this is the general impression which I get of the history of the Paul's staging. When the performances were revived in 1599, the master had, as in the days before Lyly took the boys to Blackfriars, to make the best of a room originally designed for choir-practices. This was circular, and only had space for a comparatively small stage. At the back of this, entrance was given by a curtained recess, corresponding to the alcove of the public theatres, and known at Paul's as the 'canopy'.[2] Above the canopy was a beam, which bore the post of the music-tree. On this post was a small stand, perhaps for the conductor of the music, and on each side of it was a music-house, forming a gallery,[3] which could represent a window or balcony. There were at least two other doors, either beneath the music-houses or at right angles to these, off the sides of the stage. The master began with continuous settings on the earlier sixteenth-century court model, using the doors and galleries as far as he could to represent houses, and supplementing these by temporary structures; and this plan fitted in with the general literary trend of his typical dramatists, especially Marston, to unity of locality. But in time the romantic element proved too much for him, and when he wanted to enlist the services of writers of the popular school, such as Dekker, he had to compromise. It may be that some structural change was carried out during the enforced suspension of performances in 1603. I do not think that there is any Paul's play of earlier date which could not have been given in the old-fashioned manner. In any event, the increased number of houses and the not infrequent shiftings of locality from town to country, which are apparent in the Jacobean plays, seem to me, taken together, to be more than can be accounted for
- ↑ Woman Hater has (a) the Duke's palace (I. i, iii; IV. i; V. ii); (b) the Count's (I. iii); (c) Gondarino's (II. i; III. i, ii); (d) Lazarillo's lodging (I. i, ii); (e) a courtesan's (II. i; IV. ii, iii; V. ii); (f) a mercer's shop (III. iv); (g) Lucio's study (V. i). There is interior action below in (a), (e), (f), and (g), where 'Enter Lazarello, and two Intelligencers, Lucio being at his study. . . . Secretary draws the Curtain'. A window above is used at (e), and there is also action above at (c), apparently in a loggia within sight and earshot of the street.
- ↑ The term is used in The Faery Pastoral, Satiromastix, and Bussy d'Ambois (vide supra); but also in Sophonisba (vide infra), which is a Blackfriars play.
- ↑ I take it that it was in this stand that Andrugio's ghost was placed 'betwixt the music-houses' in 2 Antonio and Mellida.
