Family Jars

Family Jars is a musical farce, in two acts by Joseph Lunn (1784–1863)[1].

The original text

Orinally entitled Family Jars, or The Double Mistake and the Triple Discovery and produced 26 August, 1822 at the The Little Theatre (or Theatre Royal) Haymarket, London, being acted nineteen times, with music by Perry. Performed at the Park Theatre and Burton's Theatre in New York in the same year it would seem.

There seems to be some confusion about the nature of the text however, for it is given as a one act farce by Gerald le Grys Norgate in Lunn's biography (Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 34[2]) as well as published version in Lacy's ‘Acting Edition of Plays,’ vol. xiv. 1850. However, various American editions - e.g. by Turner and Fisher, Philapdelphia in 18**; The Dramatic Publishing Company's series Sergels's Acting Drama No 230, Chicago, 1860 and De Witt's Acting Plays (circa 1860s) all give it as a play in two acts.

Performance history in South Africa

1855: Performed in Cape Town by Sefton Parry as afterpiece to Used Up, or The Peer and the Ploughboy (Boucicault), with a musical interlude. This was done on Wednesday 13 June, in a Drawing Room Theatre which he had constructed in the Commercial Rooms in Cape Town.