Chapter Fifteen
In which rumors sweep
London, we perform Macbeth
at the Globe, and another new
drama by Master Shakespeare
both puzzles and dismays
audiences
Working with Master Shakespeare in private had been a great assistance in my preparations for personating Lady Macbeth, assistance for which I would remain forever grateful. But it was a very different matter when the time came to rehearse with Burbage, who would, of course, be playing my husband, Macbeth, along with the rest of the King’s Men, including Alexander, who was given the prime role of Macduff.
Performing and even rehearsing with Burbage was, each time, an intensely intimidating experience for me, regardless of how often we worked together. Burbage was renowned as the finest tragedian of our time, having played and made his name, along with those of the plays, personating Richard III, Othello and Hamlet. Each role differed completely from the other, yet each was so fully inhabited and personated by Burbage that it was difficult to believe that the same actor played them.
It was known by all that Burbage so transformed himself into whichever character he was asked to portray, that from the moment he was costumed until the moment the play was complete, he was never himself, only his character. And it was said, too, that audiences were never more delighted than when he was speaking on stage, or more sorry than when he was silent. Yet even then, through the power of his movements and very presence, they were still fully in his thrall.
It was then regardless of the fact that I had been paired with Burbage on more than one occasion, albeit in smaller roles for myself, and regardless of the fact that I had been acquainted with him for almost two years, that I remained in awe of his talent. I was intimidated by the masculine force that emanated from his very soul, and unsure if I, now fifteen years of age, could perform the role of his wife. Could I not only stand up to him as an actor, but also portray the kind of power that the lady had over Macbeth, a power that would help convince him to ignore his conscience and murder the king?
I need not have worried. Burbage, sensing my unease at taking control from him, made it easier than I would have imagined. And since he, from the first moment of our first rehearsal became the Macbeth that was Shakespeare’s creation, I was able to become the Lady Macbeth that was Shakespeare’s creation just as smoothly. Although, I admit, it would not have been possible without my earlier tutoring from the playwright himself.
To my surprise, it was a mere matter of reading Shakespeare’s lines as he meant them to be read and making the leap of imagination necessary to perform an internal form of negation to think of myself not as John Rice, nor to think of the actor opposite me as Richard Burbage, more than twenty years my elder, but to think of myself as Lady Macbeth, ambitious for her husband and herself, and willing to do whatever was necessary to push him forward.
It was a startling feeling of power during our first rehearsal to express the lady’s outraged scorn, her questioning of his very masculinity, and to then see and hear Burbage respond fully, not as the actor I had become friends with over the last years, but as Macbeth. When hesitating to go forward with their plans, he tells her of his fears, and with my own eyes I saw Burbage, or in actuality, Macbeth, blanch and tremble in response to my words of scorn. At that moment, I could feel not only the lady’s power, but my own power as an actor. It was a moment I have never since forgotten.
It was in the midst of our preparations on the 22nd of March, with tensions still high after the revelation of the Gunpowder Plot, that rumors swept through the city that King James I had been assassinated. The uproar was instantaneous and amazing, as fear of mob violence reached every corner of London. Soldiers were placed in every ward and armed guards at each of the city’s gates. Fortunately for all, the rumors were false. The king was very much alive, and upon hearing the news of his demise, he presented himself to the public at Knightsbridge, where his subjects, I among them, fell to our knees, speechless with tears of joy.
The sounds of bells and fireworks were heard throughout the city, and Jonson, whose seeming contempt for me had not diminished in the least despite or perhaps because of Shakespeare’s patronage, took it upon himself to ingratiate himself with our king. He wrote a poem, “To King James, Upon the happy false rumor of his death, the two and twentieth day of March, 1606,” that was such an obvious attempt at currying favor that it diminished him greatly in the eyes of all who knew him, something from which, I must confess, I took an unhealthy satisfaction.
The day the poem appeared for sale at one of the bookstalls at St. Paul’s, Heminges sent me out to purchase a copy. When I returned, quickly as he requested, he read it to himself, started laughing, then presented it to Master Shakespeare, who was standing close by. Shakespeare read it, burst out laughing and then called upon us all to attend him while he read it aloud:
That we thy loss might know, and thou our love,
Great heaven did well to give ill fame free wing,
Which, though it did but panic terror prove,
And far beneath least pause of such a king;
Yet give thy jealous subjects leave to doubt,
Who this thy ’scape from rumour gratulate,
No less than if from peril; and devout,
Do beg thy care unto thy after-state.
For we, that have our eyes still in our ears,
Look not upon thy dangers, but our fears.
At which point Master Shakespeare gazed at us all solemnly for but a moment, then allowed a gigantic smile to slowly make its appearance before he exploded in helpless, raucous laughter.
“Heminges,” he said, “Jonson calls himself a poet? With this?” He shook his head. “‘Look here, Your Highness. Nobody loves you as much as your good servant Ben Jonson’ is what he is saying by rushing this so-called poem into print. Of all the obsequious …”
Shakespeare’s rant against Jonson’s poem and attempt to curry favor with the court of King James went on for what seemed like minutes, as his multitudinous talent with words and language poured forth in amused contempt towards his fellow poet.
But when he had finished, it was time for us all to return to work, for our first performance of Macbeth was just two days away.
As I stood behind the stage in the tiring-house with the rest of the King’s Men, I heard the single blast of a trumpet signaling that the performance would shortly commence. Then a second blast as the crowd came in. And then the third, triumphantly announcing that we were about to begin. I ran my hands over my gown, the corset tightly wrapped to shape me into a woman’s form, and examined myself closely in a small looking glass to ensure that the white makeup completely covered my skin, making my eyes look even larger and more expressive than normal, or so I hoped.
I heard my cue, Banquo’s lines:
Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome:
It is a peerless kinsman.
I waited for him to exit the stage and made my entrance, gliding out in my most womanly manner, clutching the letter from my husband, Macbeth. I was now no longer, in my own mind and heart, John Rice. I was Lady Macbeth, learning of my husband’s encounter with the witches. I began reading softly at first, and then with steadily increasing excitement and passion.
“They met me in the day of success: and I have learned by the perfect’st report …”
The rest of the performance disappeared into mystery for me. John Rice was not himself on the stage. Instead John Rice was personating Lady Macbeth, saying her words, feeling what she felt, raging and pushing at her husband — at my husband — to be great, cleaning blood from the daggers used in the murders, and finally, overcome by guilt at what I had done, falling into madness and death.
I do remember the hush that fell over the crowd during that first performance as the news of the murder of King Duncan was announced. I remember Burbage�
��s hands — my husband, Macbeth’s, hands — on me, and his pain and rage. I remember how during the sleepwalking scene my hand shook as I held the candle, as the lady’s emotions became mine, or perhaps mine became hers. I remember the roar of the crowd at play’s end, when Macduff, who had bested my husband in battle and ended his evil reign, entered carrying Macbeth’s head in his hand.
I remember the moment of silence at Macduff’s final words announcing the death of Macbeth and the naming of the new king, and then when we all returned to the stage, I remember the roar of applause. I saw Shakespeare smiling proudly at us, perhaps at me in particular, while also taking in the reaction of an audience whose pleasure at his play pleased him as well.
And finally, I remember dancing the jig with Burbage, signaling to the audience that the performance was over, then walking back to the tiring-room where he shook my hand, then hugged me and kissed me on the cheek, as though uncertain who it was he was acknowledging, and telling me that for those hours on stage I had been Lady Macbeth.
I could not have been, God forgive me, more proud of myself and what I had done.
Shakespeare was not, however, the only playwright whose plays we staged at the Globe. Over the next several months, we performed plays of varying quality, including two more performances of Macbeth, yet another revival of All’s Well That Ends Well, dramas such as The Miseries of Enforced Marriage, along with others performed once or twice and then forgotten.
There was, though, another new play of Master Shakespeare’s, The Tragedy of King Lear, which we presented for the first time in late spring of 1606, and it did not receive the same reception as Macbeth.
I know not what inspired Master Shakespeare to compose this play, but whatever darkness drove him to it was not something to which audiences responded well. The play tells the story of an elderly king, whose decision to divide his kingdom among his daughters opens the gates of hell upon his land, leading to death and despair for nearly all concerned.
I portrayed Cordelia, Lear’s youngest daughter, the only one who is brave enough to tell him the truth. And for doing so, by play’s end, she pays with her life.
In the last moments of the play, the darkest of which I ever performed, Burbage, who played my father, Lear, carried my dead body on stage. His lines were truly heartbreaking:
And my poor fool is hanged, No, no, no life.
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life,
And thou no life at all? O thou wilt come no more.
Never, never, never, never, never. Pray you, undo
This button. Thank you, sir.
At which point, written on the roll, were the simple sounds “O, O, O, O!” These were Master Shakespeare’s cues to Burbage to let loose and to give it his all, to let the audience in the Globe understand his pain before speaking his last words. Standing over my, or Cordelia’s, dead body, he in truth appeared to will his own death, saying, “Break heart, I prithee break.”
The silence from the audience at play’s end led us to understand that the play had, perhaps, been too much to bear, with too much pain, too much darkness. Unlike any other of Shakespeare’s plays, the tragedy ended without giving the audience the slightest glimmer or hint of hope. They appeared to hate it, this being the first occasion I ever witnessed this when one of his plays was staged.
He never talked about the failure of Lear, in the same manner in which he never talked about the success of his other plays. And while he remained silent, I sensed from his demeanor and the look in his eyes after the first performance that the failure of the audience to respond and his failure to reach them hurt him a great deal.
Master Shakespeare later revised the play. He gave the “O, O, O, O!” to another actor, gave Lear’s line asking that his heart break to the character Kent, and even granted the audience a hint of relief, not only allowing Lear’s suffering to end, but giving him the grace of dying with the hope, deluded though it might be, that his beloved Cordelia is still alive:
And my poor fool is hanged! No, no, no life?
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life,
And thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never!
Pray you undo this button. Thank you sir
Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,
Look there, look there!
I never had the opportunity to play Cordelia with the changes Shakespeare made, and it was an odd sensation to witness another actor personate the role I had originated. It was as if I was watching myself as someone else.
But even with the changes, the play, whose greatness I later came to appreciate, was seldom revived. It was the rare occasion in which Master Shakespeare failed to reach his audience.
And it is perhaps odd that the play did not do so, for within weeks of our first performance of Lear, the plague once again returned to ravage London, leading the entire city to a state of complete despair.
Chapter Sixteen
In which there is yet another
outbreak of the plague, we
perform Macbeth before King
James and King Christian of
Denmark, and I offer a brief
look at my life off the stage
In July, the theaters were shut down because of the plague, forcing us once again to lower the flag at the Globe and lock our doors. In the outbreak of two years earlier, more than thirty thousand residents of London had lost their lives, forcing the Privy Council to order that all public playing would cease when deaths in the course of one week rose above thirty. In the summer of 1606, deaths reached a height of 116 during the last week of August before the disease, as it had so often before, ran its course with the return of colder weather.
This was one of many epidemics I witnessed during my life, and although, praise be to God, I was fortunate enough never to have fallen ill, I still remained fearful that like my brother William and many of my classmates at home and acquaintances in the city, I would fall victim.
It was a disease that could only have been sent by the Devil himself, for the suffering it caused its victims was beyond all human reckoning and, apparently, beyond the power of God himself to ease except unto death.
A fever of unimaginable intensity was the first sign that one had fallen ill. The sufferer’s heartbeat became rapid, making it impossible to catch one’s breath. Severe, even excruciating pain began in the back and legs, and the throat became parched and dry with a thirst impossible to quench. Some victims suffered from an inability to walk properly; others from great unrelenting pain in nearly every part of the body. Next there were eruptions of plague sores found around the victim’s armpits, neck and groin. These sores often swelled up until they burst, causing such agonizing pain that victims with alarming regularity took their own lives rather than suffer any longer — a mortal sin for which, I pray, God would forgive them.
In the last days of the disease, it became impossible to speak normally, and because of constant pain and fever, the victims raved like lunatics or became delirious, before, finally and blessedly, their hearts gave out and their agonies came to a merciful end.
It is no wonder then that when the plague struck, panic-stricken residents of the city fled to the surrounding countryside, for not only was the disease itself to be dreaded, but during the worst days, if anyone in your house fell ill, everyone else in the house was held under quarantine along with them. A cross was painted on the doorway to warn others to stay away, while all residing there were forced to remain inside until the disease ran its course, or until, as was more often the case, all inside succumbed.
And although the days when the epidemics were at their worst appear to have come to an end, I shall never forget what those years were like — the moans and shrieks and screams of agony emanating from the houses under quarantine; the smell of death everywhere as bodies piled up too quickly to be disposed
of by city authorities; and finally, the creaking wheels of the carts making their way slowly down the near-empty streets, piled high with corpses, with more added as the drivers of the carts (employed at a profession I cannot imagine myself doing even at the threat of death) cried out, “Bring down your dead.”
We were fortunate to be out of London for the worst of it, with performances at Oxford and Leicester, at Marlborough and Dover and Maidstone, and, of primary importance, at Greenwich and Hampton Court before King James and his most honored guest, King Christian IV of Denmark.
We stayed several days at Greenwich, where King James spent what appeared to be a goodly fortune and then some in hosting King Christian, who was the brother of his wife, Queen Anne. Much to everyone’s sorrow, she had recently suffered the loss of her newborn daughter, Sophia, who had during the previous month been interred at Westminster Abbey.
Even with the gloom and pall of Sophia’s death hanging overhead, the festivities were of a kind, I was told, reminiscent of the descriptions of paradise common among Mohammedans. There were women of great beauty, and there were magnificent feasts.
On one occasion wines and liquors of the highest quality were so plentiful that even the ladies of the court abandoned their good sobriety and could be seen rolling about on the ground in a state of utter intoxication, much to the amusement of King Christian, as well as the seeming dismay of King James, who, it must be said, did not appear to enjoy the festivities as much as did the others.
On one such evening, after our afternoon’s performance of Hamlet, in which I personated Ophelia, presenting a tragedy about the prince of Denmark in front of the current king of Denmark, we were invited to remain to watch the evening’s entertainment. It was a masque that told the story of the Queen of Sheba, not so much through the use of language as with Master Shakespeare, but through poetry, song, costume and dance.
I Was Cleopatra Page 10