Fanny Kemble's Civil Wars - Hardcover

Chapter One: Enter Fanny Kemble

In 1809 Frances Anne Kemble was born into the most celebrated theatrical family in Europe. The decade of her birth, known among historians of the British theater as the Kemble era, marked the convergence of a powerful theatrical dynasty and the triumphant ascendancy of theater as an art form.

Led by patriarch Roger Kemble, the Kemble clan spearheaded the campaign waged by British actors throughout the eighteenth century to bring the theater into the rarefied circle of artistic esteem long accorded opera, ballet, and orchestral performances. Striving to reverse the prejudices his craft had faced for centuries, Kemble was steadfast in his efforts to help managers secure theater permits and establish permanent homes for acting companies. And he railed against the long-held stereotype that women who pursued careers on the stage were hardly a cut above the courtesans who filled the third tier of the gallery.

Roger Kemble defied that opinion in a most personal way, by taking an actress as his bride. He married Sarah Ward, the daughter of a popular actor acclaimed for his 1746 benefit performance at Stratford, Shakespeare's birthplace, to raise funds for the restoration of a monument to the playwright. The Kemble affinity for Shakespeare -- so evident in the superb performances of Roger's granddaughter Fanny Kemble -- had its roots in the world of eighteenth-century traveling troupes.

At that time, a royal license was required to operate a theater, and London supported just two patents: Covent Garden and the Drury Lane. Further, the Act of 1737 forbade performing plays for profit outside London, forcing theatrical companies to find a way around the law by transforming their troupes into musical companies that charged admission to concerts, but offered plays "free." The authorities turned a blind eye; by the end of the century, a crude circuit had been established among Bath, Bristol, and other provincial towns. It was into this bustling milieu that the Kemble clan threw its fortunes.

Roger Kemble and Sarah Ward produced twelve children, eight of whom survived childhood. Seven of the eight turned to the stage, but it was John, Sarah, and Charles who shone. Their father, however, prized education above celebrity, and if Roger Kemble had had his way, his children would never have achieved such fame. Hoping to achieve the distinguished status of father of a priest, he sent three of his sons to the seminary.

The oldest of the Kemble sons, John Philip, was the first to defy his father, leaving seminary in 1778 to join a reputable theatrical company in York. By 1783, he was ready to make his London debut at the Drury Lane, playing Hamlet. Just weeks before, his younger brother George had debuted at Covent Garden, as Othello. A theatrical sibling rivalry seemed imminent. But George's performances were less than memorable; John Philip went on to become the leading interpreter of Shakespeare for his generation.

John Philip Kemble's work at the Drury Lane made such an impression on its owner, the playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan, that by 1788 he offered John Philip Kemble the opportunity to manage the playhouse. Just as Roger Kemble had done in his day, John Philip seized the opportunity to innovate. He insisted on historical accuracy in costuming and staging, perfectly re-creating Elizabethan dress and décor. When Kemble broke with his mentor in 1802, he used his earnings from the Drury Lane to buy a one-sixth share of its rival.

Kemble's arrival at Covent Garden in 1803 seemed to assure the peak of the Kemble era. Sister Sarah and brother Charles claimed spots in the repertory company, and their popularity grew alongside John Philip's reputation. But other Kemble siblings, craving successes of their own, did not meet with the same good fortune. George, after his disastrous debut in London, reestablished himself in Edinburgh. Using his middle name, Stephen, he was founder of a successful theater company. Elizabeth Kemble Whitlock journeyed to America, where she won better roles than she could have expected at home. Frances married and retired from the stage entirely.

But it was Ann Kemble who found the most notoriety. She first married a bigamist, then embarked on a shady career as a public lecturer on sex which culminated in her being shot in the face in an altercation in a London bawdyhouse. The more distinguished Kembles put a stop to these antics by granting their sister an annuity, intended to prevent her from exploiting the family name on handbills. The payoff came at a high price -- expulsion from London.

In contrast, Sarah Siddons, born in a tavern in Wales while her parents were on tour, was destined to be John Philip Kemble's true rival. In 1773, traveling with her father's troupe, she married fellow actor William Siddons. But after an inauspicious London debut as Portia at the Drury Lane Theatre in 1775, she was banished to the provinces, where she remained for six full seasons.

It was her 1782 return to London, leading the popular tragedy The Fatal Marriage, that made her the most respected and awe-inspiring actress of her generation. Madame de Stael described Siddons's spellbinding performance: "At last comes the moment when Isabella, having broken free from her women, who wish to prevent her from killing herself, laughs, as she stabs herself, at the uselessness of their efforts. The effect of this laugh of despair is the most extraordinary and difficult achievement of dramatic art; it is far more moving than tears; misery finds its most heart-rending expression in its bitter irony."

A commanding presence on stage, Siddons was equally comfortable in the presence of aristocratic admirers. During her second season in London, Sir Joshua Reynolds painted her portrait as "the Tragic Muse." Edward Gibbon, Edmund Burke, and William Pitt the Elder all fawned over her, and King George III brought members of the royal family to her performances until she retired in 1812. Lord Byron exulted, "Nothing ever was or can be like her."

Despite her impeccable paternal bloodline, Fanny Kemble always believed that "whatever qualities of mind or character I inherited from my father's family, I am more strongly stamped with those I derived from my mother." A popular starlet in her own right, Maria Thérèse de Camp began performing song, dance, and theatrical roles at age six, when her Swiss mother and French father emigrated to England. Named for the archduchess of Austria because she was born in Vienna, Maria Thérèse displayed courtly manners well suited to entertaining in society parlors, including the drawing room of the prince regent's mistress, Mrs. Fitzherbert, where she would delight the future king with her dancing. When her father died, leaving her mother indigent, Maria Thérèse -- the eldest of five, though not yet in her teens -- became the family breadwinner. Two of her younger siblings, Adelaide and Vincent, later followed her on stage.

After her critically acclaimed theatrical debut at the Drury Lane, scandal struck in 1795 when a drunken theatrical manager burst in on the twenty-one-year-old Maria Thérèse in her dressing room. She was able to fight him off, but, like all actresses, she feared her reputation might be tainted by sexual innuendo. She demanded a formal apology from the offending cad, who was none other than John Philip Kemble. His fondness for drink had no ill effects on his stage performances, but all too often clouded his judgment offstage. Kemble apologized in the newspaper for his transgression and absolved Miss de Camp of any blame, and that seemed to be the end of the story.

But the entire family was shocked anew when Charles Kemble, after appearing with the young Maria Thérèse de Camp in several dramas, professed his love for the former object of his b