THE

487

THE

ti

* 8 ion. In entering on this branch of the subject, I shouldI s h to anticipate a question, •which may possibly arise in the'nds of some persons, why we should not, in the form ofUr theatres, adopt the semicircle, which was generally in use■Hong the ancients, and which has evidently great advan-ces with respect to vision ? The answer to this is, that thecircle requires either that the stage-opening should beenormous width, or that the size of the house should bex trenaely small, and therefore it is inadmissible in our thea-It is inadmissible on the first point, namely, the enor-^ °us width of the stage as to opening, for the reasons whicha ^e been already shown (under the first head) upon that.“eject: and it is equally so upon the second point, because18 impossible to maintain a good theatre in this metropolisP°n such a revenue as would accrue from an extremely“■all house. So long as the public taste for spectacle shall°ntinue (and it is not likely to cease) all the objections to“teasing the stage-opening, and with it the magnitude andx pense of the scenery, must remain in force. The Greeks, “ Romans, in their theatres, made use of scarcely any^ang e 0 f SC enes, and their performances were given gratist|j ^ le public ; consequently, their theatres were not subjectm any of those considerations which are attached to ours,nder these circumstances, therefore, the semicircle is totally, 1 admissible for a principal theatre in London . The oval ande Wse-shoe, as well as some flat-sided forms, have beenj^PPpsed to be very advantageous in point of vision ; but it, “vident, that in the oval, a large proportion of the spec-l °rs must be placed with their backs inclining towards theer *e, and that in all of them (if the house be not of extremelyf a ‘l dimensions) the front boxes must be at a great distancethe stage; for, in proportion as the sides shall approxi-j. *te each other, the front must recede, provided the circum-r ®“ce be not varied.

o Hie fact is, there is no object connected with the forma-“ of a theatre, which, in all its bearings, is of more im-^'tance than that that part of the house which faces the scene^°old be within a moderate distance of the stage ; unlesstj at be the case, it is obvious that a very large proportion ofv - e spectators must be excluded from a clear and distinctvv of that play of the features which constitutes the prin-Pal merit of the actor in many of the most interestinge nes. If the actor’s merit in that particular be not fairlyiPteciated, he must, of course, be deprived of a proportion-0 ® “bare of the applause which might otherwise be bestowedty- r 1 *®, and this mortifying want of encouragement, bringingc a 1 a gradual and progressive defect of zeal and emulation,a “dot fail in the end to reduce the number of good actors,materially to injure the state of dramatic performances,ft ^ 0r sake of argument, let it be supposed for a moment,sis 1 a ? ova l> or horse-shoe, or flat-sided figure, is the best for“■vision, and the fact will then be, that, although in°pting either of those forms, provision may be made forof ter accommodation of spectators sitting on the sidesa 16 theatre, that accommodation will be given to them atMu'" 10118 ex P ense t0 those sitting in the front, for, while itSee ena ble those who may sit on the sides of the house to(tlj a S r eater proportion of the stage in cases of spectacles,not ’ n ordinary,) those who are placed in the frontft e proportionately excluded from that distinct view ofMt^r’s countenance which is not less desirable than to beWs* 11 reac h °f bis voice. But in point of fact, the oval,<. Ven e '“b°e, or flat-sided theatre, is not so well calculated,is tor side-vision, as that which I have chosen ; for therefo ria 6 Consideration of very great importance to each of thesetiru. s ’ a od which appears entirely to have escaped observa-obvious on reflection, namely, that although

fte

in either of them, the spectators who sit in the front row ofthe boxes on each side of the house, may be enabled to seerather more of the stage when extended to an extraordinarydepth, those who sit in the back-seats in all the boxes abovestairs, (which it should be remembered constitute in point ofextent the greater part of the house,) will see considerablyless of the stage than in a theatre of a circular form ; where,of course, the sides of the theatre will, from their swelling-shape, recede from the stage much more than in either of theothers ; for nothing can be more unquestionably true, thanthat the more the boxes on each side shall advance towardsthe centre-line of the theatre, the more must they necessarilyoverhang the stage, and all the objects on the stage; and thatthe more they shall overhang those objects, the more perpen-dicular the rays of sight (especially from the upper part ofthe boxes) must become, and, consequently, the less thosewho sit on the back-rows of the upper boxes will be able tosee of the performance on the stage. In proportion as thepoint of sight shall be at a greater distance from the stage,the visual rays will have an oblique direction towards thestage ; and a greater proportion of the breadth, as well asdepth of the stage, than appears in the plan, will be openedto view in all situations. However, the comparative advan-tage which has been stated, namely, of seeing one-fifth moreof the, breadth of the stage, will belong to the circular form,a fact which I wish to impress upon the mind of the reader.There is an exemplary instance of this in the House of Com-mons ; for, from the second row of seats on the side-gallery,(taking a position opposite the side of the table, or speaker’schair,) it is impossible to see the speaker, or any part of thefloor of the house, although the whole of the seats on theopposite side of the house, upon a level with the speaker, andeven below him, (being farther removed from the point ofsight,) are perfectly visible ; whence it is evident, that themore the position of the spectator shall recede from a per-pendicular point with respect to the objects below him, themore those objects will be opened to his view : and while itis thus clear, even for the purposes of side-vision, that theoval, horse-shoe, or flat-sided theatre, is inferior to the cir-cular form, it is, on the other hand, impossible for prejudiceitself to resist the proof, that in the form I have chosen,namely, three-fourths of a circle, a much larger proportionof the whole house will be placed immediately in front of thescene, than could be the case in either of the other threeforms which have been named. Impressed by the import-ance of all the foregoing considerations, I determined toadopt, in my design for a theatre, the form I have described;and although I was aware at the time when my drawingsand model were first made, that a certain proportion of thespectators in the boxes nearest to the stage, would have butan imperfect view of the stage, I considered that as anunavoidable inconvenience in all theatres, and not greater inthat projected by me, than all others; while on the otherhand, the form which I had chosen, possessed many advan-tages which could not be derived from any other shape.—Theangles, however, to which I allude, in the boxes nearest tothe stage, having appeared to several persons, who saw mymodel, as an imperfection to the design, and those personsseeming to view the defect more in its positive than in itscomparative bearing upon the perfection of a theatre, I wasled to reconsider, most attentively, this particular part of thedesign ; and after a great deal of reflection, and a variety ofexperiments, I determined to alter the shape of that partof the theatre adjacent to the stage, by opening the prosceniumfrom the back, instead of from the front of the boxes. Thescene (excepting in cases of spectacle) is seldom extended indepth beyond 30 feet from the front line of the stage.

I