The Somnabulist

The Somnabulist is a play in two acts by William Thomas Moncrieff (1794-1857)

Also found as The Somnambulist, or The Phantom of the Village

The original text
Called "A Dramatic Entertainment", it is in fact in a burlesque based on La Somnambule, ou L'arrivée d'un Nouveau Seigneur, a scenario for a ballet-pantomime by Eugène Scribe and Jean-Pierre Aumer, music composed by Ferdinand Hérold. Produced in 1827 and quite popular in Paris, the unpublished Scribe work inspired many more works, including Vincenzo Bellini's well-known Italian opera La Sonnambula, or The Sleepwalker.

Moncrieff's text was published as The Somnabulist in Issue 224 of Dicks' Standard Plays. Published as The Somnambulist, or The Phantom of the Village by J. Cumberland, 1899

Performance history in South Africa
1901: The Somnabulist performed in the Oddfellows Hall, Cape Town, by Morris Waxman and his Hebrew Artistes

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