Theatre--Playbills

advertising theatrical performances (including the first adaptation of Nicholas Nickleby, by Edward Stirling at Theatre Royal, Adelphi in January 1839), musical performances (such as Mendelssohn's overture for A Midsummer Night's Dream at Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, 1841) and artistic attractions ("...The Living Talking Canary Bird!!!..."), sizes vary from 95 x 115mm. to 750 x 500mm., four playbills printed on silk, 1765 to 1914 but mostly mid-19^thcentury; [with] an album of ca.190 household receipts from the Monson family, 1738 to 1893; [also with] a collection of prints of actors, including Charles Kemble

Numerous actors and performers of the contemporary world of entertainment are represented in this collection. It includes playbills advertising Charles Kemble's last appearance on stage (in Much Ado About Nothing in 1836 at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden), Nellie Melba's appearance as Juliette in Romeo et Juliette at the Royal Opera House in 1897, and many others. The large and varied repertoire of the circus is represented, for example, by seven playbills for Astley’s pioneering circus dated between 12 May 1834 and 17 August 1846.