The Taming of the Shrew in performance has had an uneven history. Popular in Shakespeare's day, the play fell out of favour during the seventeenth century, when it was replaced on the stage by John Lacy's Sauny the Scott. The original Shakespearean text was not performed at all during the eighteenth century, with David Garrick's adaptation Catharine and Petruchio dominating the stage. After over two hundred years without a performance, the play returned to the British stage in 1844, the last Shakespeare play restored to the repertory. However, it was only in the 1890s that the dominance of Catharine and Petruchio began to wane, and productions of The Shrew become more regular. Moving into the twentieth century, the play's popularity increased considerably, and it became one of Shakespeare's most frequently staged plays, with productions taking place all over the world. This trend has continued into the twenty-first century, with the play as popular now as it was when first written.
Performance history
Pre 20th century
The earliest known performance of the play is recorded in Philip Henslowe's diary on 11 June 1594, performed by the Lord Admiral's Men and the Lord Chamberlain's Men at Newington Butts Theatre; "begininge at newing ton my Lord Admeralle men & my Lorde chamberlen men as ffolowethe [...] 11 of June 1594 Rd at the tamynge of A Shrowe." This could have been either A Shrew or The Shrew, but as the Lord Chamberlain's Men were sharing the theatre at the time, and as such Shakespeare himself would have been there, scholars tend to assume it was The Shrew. The earliest definite performance of The Shrew was at court before Charles I and Henrietta Maria on 26 November 1633, where it was described as being "likt".
Aside from the court performance, evidence of the play's stage history during the seventeenth century is relatively sparse. The title page of the 1631 quarto states the play had been acted by the King's Men at both the Globe and Blackfriars. The King's Men only began performing at Blackfriars in 1610, suggesting the play was still popular enough to be performed at least sixteen years after its debut. However, there is no further information available. Apart from a possible production at Drury Lane in 1663 or 1664, the play's place on the stage was taken by John Lacy's adaptation, Sauny the Scot at some point during the seventeenth century. The original play seems not to have been performed at all during the eighteenth century, and instead a range of adaptations held the stage, most notably David Garrick's 1754 adaptation, Catharine and Petruchio.
Shakespeare's The Shrew was not performed again until 1844, the last of his plays restored to the repertory, 211 years after the last definite performance. That year, Benjamin Webster directed a production designed by J.R. Planché at the Haymarket Theatre. Starring Louisa Cranstoun Nisbett as Katherina and Webster himself as Petruchio, the production was staged in a minimalist Elizabethan manner, with only two simple locations; the outside of the alehouse, and the Lord's chamber in which the play is staged for Christopher Sly. The Induction was included in full, with Sly remaining at the front of the stage after Act 1, Scene 1, and slowly falling asleep over the course of the play. At the end, as the final curtain falls, the Lord's attendants came and carried him off-stage. Planché referred to his role in returning the play to the stage as "one of the events in my theatrical career on which I look back with greatest pride and gratification." The play received mixed reviews, with many criticising Webster's performance, and accusing the production of being overly bawdy, but it was a box office success and was revived in 1847.
Despite the financial success of Webster and Planché's production, Catharine and Petruchio continued to dominate the stage, and it was not until 1856 that Shakespeare's text was performed again, in a production directed by Samuel Phelps at Sadler's Wells, starring Emma Atkinson and Henry Marston. Phelpes himself played the role of Sly to general critical acclaim. In this production, Sly was carried off-stage at the end of Act 1, and although Phelps stuck to the First Folio text throughout the play, he "much abbreviated" Katherina's final speech.
In the United States, Shakespeare's The Shrew was first performed in 1887, directed by Augustin Daly at Daly's Theatre in New York, starring Ada Rehan and John Drew. Despite claims the production was pure Shakespeare, Daly made several alterations. For example, the Bianca subplot was heavily cut to allow more focus on the taming storyline. Daly also reorganised Act 4 so that Scene 2 (the arrival of the pedant in Padua) was followed by Scene 4 (the pedant confirms the dowry for Bianca), and Scene 1 (Petruchio and Katherina arriving at his house), Scene 3 (Petruchio begins taming Katherina) and Scene 5 (Petruchio and Katherina set out for Padua) formed one continuous sequence. He also included several snippets from Garrick, such as Katherina threatening to tame Petruchio in Act 2, Scene 1, and he edited Katherina's final speech in the same manner as Garrick. Another significant alteration was the omission of Katherina from Act 1, Scene 1. As such, the audience was not introduced to her in a crowded street scene where she is spoken of as if she is not present, but instead first meets her in Act 2, Scene 1, after she has tied Bianca's hands together. Critics praised this alteration, feeling it was a more explosive introduction to the character. The production was hugely successful and ran for 121 performances. It subsequently toured internationally and was performed to critical acclaim at the Gaiety Theatre, London in March 1888 and the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in August. It was also chosen as the inaugural performance at Daly's Theatre in London on 12 March 1893. Most critics consider the success of Daly's production as critical in breaking the dominance of Catharine and Petruchio on both sides of the Atlantic. Additionally, Rehan's performance is generally acknowledged as one of the finest depictions of Katherina ever seen. Elizabeth Schafer writes "Ada Rehan's Katherina was to haunt her successors, who were always found wanting alongside the fiery, imperious character she created." So popular was she in the role, that she continued to play it until 1905.
The first major production in England after Daly's success was that of F.R. Benson. Originally performed in the Prince's Theatre, Manchester in 1889, the production then moved to the Adelphi Theatre in London in 1890, before settling at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in 1893, where it became one of the most popular and often performed plays in Benson's repertory. The play was regularly performed there until the 1920s and was revived at theatres around the country up to 1932. Starring Benson's wife, Constance Benson and Benson himself as Petruchio, Benson followed Daly's example in rewriting and restructuring, such as truncating the Bianca subplot. Unlike Daly, however, Benson also removed the Induction. The production was very much a farce, with the emphasis on broad physical comedy in which Petruchio athletically leaps about the stage terrorizing a relatively passive Katherina. In its early days, it received generally strong reviews, but by 1910, the political climate had changed somewhat; the 1909 Stratford by-election had seen suffragette protests, and henceforth some critics expressed discomfort with Benson's use of farce to depict what had now become a socially relevant situation. Indeed, in the 1912 season, suffragette activist Violet Vanbrugh replaced Constance Benson in the role of Katherina, although her performance was roundly criticised for failing to bring the anticipated political edge to the character.
Early 20th century Another husband and wife team who had a long and successful run with the play was Oscar Asche and Lily Brayton. First staged in 1899 in the Theatre Royal in Wigan, the play became more prominent when performed at the Adelphi in 1904, directed by Otho Stuart. It subsequently went on a world tour, beginning in Australia, and Asche estimates it was performed about 1,500 times all over the world. Although a financial success, the production received mixed reviews. Many critics commented on the size difference between the large and imposing Asche and the diminutive Brayton, feeling the disparity lent the production an uncomfortable tone, especially insofar as Asche rejected Benson's farcical production in favour of a more psychologically real representation.
In the wake of the success of the Daly, Benson and Asche productions, the play began to be performed with much more frequency all over the world. A celebrated early twentieth-century Katherina was Margaret Anglin, who first performed the role in 1908 in Her Majesty's Theatre, Melbourne. Acting opposite Henry Kolker in a production she herself directed, Anglin is generally regarded as the first actress to have performed Katherina's final speech in an ironic manner. The play was a huge success in Australia, and in 1914, Anglin brought it on tour to New York. Of the last scene, Anglin wrote "when I run gaily in to do my lord's bidding in the last act, I do it with a twinkle in my eye. I don't play it as Shakespeare wrote that last scene." In a 1909 Max Reinhardt directed production at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin, starring Lucie Höflich and Albert Bassermann, the Induction was emphasised and the play was presented as a commedia dell'arte style farce, to the point of the male leads literally wearing clown costumes.
In 1913, Martin Harvey, in collaboration with William Poel, directed a production at the Prince of Wales Theatre. Starring Harvey's wife Nina de Silva and Harvey himself as Petruchio, the production was very much in the style of Poel's own minimalist and authentically Elizabethan productions. Harvey kept Sly on stage throughout, however, in a unique move, he neither incorporated text from A Shrew nor did he have Sly lose interest and fall asleep. Instead, Sly explicitly reacts to the play – laughing at certain points, attempting to climb onto the stage during the wedding before being restrained by his 'wife', and finally succeeding in getting onto the stage later in the play, at which point he shook Petruchio's hand and then introduced himself to Katherina (albeit without dialogue). In an "extremely conventional production" at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in 1919, starring Ethel Warwick and Edmund Willard, William Bridges-Adams stuck rigidly to the First Folio text, but completely removed the Induction and all references to Sly.