ABSTRACT
John Rich, who had a compulsion to ‘larn’ others how to act, seems to have made little impression with his tuition of actors in the traditional lines, but many of the better Harlequins of the period – Arthur H. Scouten, Nivelon, Hippisley, Laguerre, as well as Woodward – profited from his training. The name of Rich has been so intimately linked with pantomime that one emerges from a superficial reading of theatre history of the time with the idea that he monopolized pantomime and that Drury Lane ignored it. Rich’s role in the production of processions and coronations is essentially similar to what it is in pantomime: primarily developer, to a lesser extent initiator. Since a stage coronation seems to require a real one, which in turn requires a new monarch, Rich’s opportunities were limited. Rich built, or as the legal documents have it, caused to be built, the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden.
