Little Bo-Peep, or Harlequin and the Little Girl who Lost her Sheep

Little Bo-Peep, or Harlequin and the Little Girl who Lost her Sheep is a comic Christmas pantomime by John Baldwin Buckstone (1802-1879)[1].

Also found as Little Bopeep, or Harlequin and the Girl who Lost her Sheep

The original text

Based on "Little Bo-Peep" (or "Little Bo-Peep has lost her sheep"), the popular "Mother Goose" English language nursery rhyme[2], the play was first performed in London at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket 26 December 1854.

The text published by S.G. Fairbrother in 1854

Translations and adaptations

Performance history in South Africa

1861: Billed as a "Grand Comic Pantome" it was performed as Little Bo-Peep, or Harlequin and the Little Girl who Lost her Sheep by Sefton Parry and his company in the Theatre Royal, Harrington Street, Cape Town, on 15 July, becoming one of his most popular and memorable productions of the period. According to Parry's expansive advertising, the production featured "(T)wenty respectable young girls" and had "upwards of 50 persons employed in the Gorgeous Spectacle". The set was locally designed and painted by Richard Cooper.

1861: Performed by Sefton Parry and his company in the Theatre Royal, Harrington Street, Cape Town, on 18 July, with The Loan of a Lover (Planché).

1861: Performed by Sefton Parry and his company in the Theatre Royal, Harrington Street, Cape Town, on 20 July, as a morning performance.

1861: Performed by Sefton Parry and his company in the Theatre Royal, Harrington Street, Cape Town, on 22 July, with Time Tries All! (Courtney).

1861: Performed by Sefton Parry and his company in the Theatre Royal, Harrington Street, Cape Town, on 29 July, with The Middy Ashore (Bernard).

Sources

"The Lord Chamberlain's Plays, 1852 - 1866. January-March 1854", Royal Holloway. [3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Baldwin_Buckstone

D.C. Boonzaier, 1923. "My playgoing days – 30 years in the history of the Cape Town stage", in SA Review, 9 March and 24 August 1932. (Reprinted in Bosman 1980: pp. 374-439.)

F.C.L. Bosman. 1980. Drama en Toneel in Suid-Afrika, Deel II, 1856-1912. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik: pp.98, 105-109, 111.

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