Exit the Actress (7 page)

We stand with our backs to the stage. We line up and face out, and as the audience piles in—we begin. Each girl has her own technique. Alice Winthrop tugs down her bodice until she is nearly bursting out, leans low over the young men in the pit, and, breathing in their ears, asks them if they might care for an orange.
Of course
they might—unless she has been eating onions. Lily Beale (Mad Lil) used to sell oranges at the Duke’s Theatre (the Opera) and so is known to the regulars and has her patter down perfectly. She targets couples: “Go on, Mr. Weathercombe, buy your lady a lovely China orange! Don’t you be too cheap to treat her to something sweet.” Lil could sell water to a fish.

Meg, her skirts pinned high on her stocky frame to allow her greater mobility, is
everywhere
up and down the aisles, selling oranges, delivering messages, chatter, chatter, chatter: hats with the ladies, hunting with the men—and spreading gossip faster than any news sheet. She keeps a close eye on her girls, deciding where we stand and how many we sell, and when she feels like a pitch isn’t working she invents a new one. Laughing at my inexperience, she calls from the aisles: “You don’t have to do much. You’ve got the goods. Little bit sweet, little bit sharp: always honest, and pretty as a peach. Just get out there, and they’ll flock to you!”

And they
did
flock to me. I sold my basket before the end of the first act! I also sold some of Alice’s share, as she got waylaid on Jack Parson’s knee in Fop’s Corner through much of the second act—Mrs. Parson had stayed home with a head. I sold twenty-six oranges, ferried three love notes—one was rejected unopened by a thick-necked woman in a sour green dress—and brought a lovely girl in a lavender lawn gown a rose from a man in the
gallery with a bushy moustache. Then I got to watch the third act from the footlights. It was
marvellous.

Titania, Bottom, Helena, Demetrius, Hermia, Lysander, Oberon, Puck. Act One: Enchanted Forest. Act Two: Titania’s Bower. These words are
beautiful.

Tonight, just before the audience came in, Peg Hughes, in her costume as the honest fairy Puck (deep green hose, moss-green tunic, pale golden wings), came out from the tiring rooms and, leaning down from the stage, bought an orange from me. Meg saw it and refunded the money immediately—actors, actresses, and Mr. Killigrew get complimentary fruit.
Always.
A terrible mistake I shall not make again. Still, we spoke for a few minutes, and then Mr. Booth hurried her away for places.

So, what I know:

Charles Hart and John Lacy:
the two great leads. Hart, a man hung on an enormous frame, with thickly waved brown hair (although he often wears a periwig), has a booming voice and says he is the great nephew of Shakespeare—but then everybody says that. Lacy, a surprisingly nimble, bluff Yorkshire man was trained as a dancer before the war and never keeps still.

Theophilus (Theo) Bird and Edward (Teddy) Kynaston:
before the war, both trained in the old style to play the female parts, although Theo, with
his great drifts of snowy hair, must be at least sixty and so trained a half century ago. Theo is married to comely Anne, the actor and manager Will Beeston’s daughter, and she is forever patching everyone’s costumes and blacking their boots. Teddy is delicately featured, sweet-tempered, and very fond of Theo.

Nicholas (Nick) Burt:
also trained to play ladies but plays the hero very well (a good thing, since he is well over six feet high). He is pleased that King Charles has brought height back into fashion.

Michael Mohun:
also a leading man but smaller and somewhat owlish. He is married to Theo’s daughter Eliza.

Robert (Rob) Shatterell:
lives quite close to us in Playhouse Yard.

William Cartwright:
haven’t met him yet.

Mrs. Ann (Nan) Marshall and Mrs. Rebecca (Becka) Marshall:
sisters. Becka is the elder. Apparently, they are the daughters of a Presbyterian minister. One would never guess with their lewd talk and constant flirting. They are neither subtle nor pretty enough to make it endearing.

Mrs. Elizabeth Weaver:
the eldest of the women. She takes pains to hide her enormous hands and feet.

Mrs. Elizabeth (Lizzie) Knep:
small and bird-like. Teddy says she has a risqué past, but I have yet to see evidence of it. She does have an invalid husband who is always gambling away her money.

Mrs. Kathleen (Kitty) Mitchell:
pretty brunette with a sweet disposition and a fine actress (specialising in doomed heroines) but softly spoken and
impossible
to hear beyond the pit.

Mrs. Margaret (Peg) Hughes:
direct, popular, bright, and full of fun. And, they say, the first woman to act upon the stage—Desdemona.

This afternoon, Peg and Teddy heard me on the stairs and called me in to join them in the tiring room. Teddy was having trouble fixing his wig (he swears his head is too small to carry off a man’s wig, but I thought he looked splendid), and Peg needed me to help lace her into her silk wings. I did my best to appear nonchalant, but in truth I was delighted. Everything about their world fascinates me.

Note
—Peg loved the new way I tied her wings (crossed over in the back with a bow) and has asked me to help her dress again tomorrow!

In the tiring rooms:

Theo, who tried to sit quietly while Teddy painted his face with Venetian ceruse, announced, “The queen is with child.” Teddy heralded his announcement with trumpet noises and ended up spitting on Lizzie.

Kitty, applying more
crayon bleu
to her eyelids, looked up and said, “Maybe now she will settle in and stop being so … so … foreign.”