Promoting the Royal Coburg Theatre, 1822–1823: William Barrymore, William Hodgson and the Actor Portraits of Piercy Roberts

This article examines a previously unrecognised business relationship between a London theatre and a toy-theatre publisher. William Barrymore, the manager of the Royal Coburg (now the Old Vic) in 1822–23, seems to have given William Hodgson, the head of Hodgson & Co., exclusive rights to publish prints based on the Coburg's productions, in return for unprecedented coverage of them. This claim is based on circumstantial evidence, namely, the large number of Hodgson & Co. publications associated with dramas staged at the Coburg. It is explored through an analysis of twenty-seven twopence actor portraits, drawn and etched by Piercy Roberts, for Coburg productions. Twenty-three portraits publicised three new plays which were based on English history; they were intended to show that the Coburg could rival the ‘legitimate’ dramas of the patent theatres. Moreover, some of the actor portraits reflect the Radical and Foxite-Whig political ideas held by Barrymore and Hodgson.