The Spectre Bridegroom, or A Ghost in spite of Himself

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A farce in two acts by William Thomas (W.T.) Moncrieff(1794-1857). Founded on a story of the same name in The Sketch Book by Washington Irving (published under the pseudonym Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. in serial form 1819 and 1820).

First performed at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on July 2nd, 1821.

Published in London and New York in 1821


Performance history in South Africa

1831: Performed by All the World's a Stage under the management of Mr Booth in the African Theatre on 17 December, 1831 as afterpiece to Der Freischütz (Weber) and The Lawyer in the Sack.

1833: Performed as part of a "Farewell Benefit" for Mr Booth by All the World's a Stage in the African Theatre on 5 March, 1833. The other pieces are Richard the Third (Shakespeare) and Wild Oats (O'Keefe).

1838: Performed by the English Amateur Company in the Cape Town Theatre on 13 October, 1838, as afterpiece to Ambrose Guinett, or a Sea-Side Story (Jerrold). The name of the author is wrongly spelled "Moncrieffe" in the source for this production. (According to Bosman (1928), this was to be the last production mounted in the African Theatre before it was sold and turned into a church, and it was also the last production by English amateurs in Cape Town till 1843, for the Methodist anti-theatre movement had temporarily won the battle.)

Translations and adaptations

Sources

Copy of the text in the Internet Archive[1]

Copy of Samuel French text[2]

Bosman, 1928: p. 208

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