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Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2002
Theater
New Jersey's theatrical history is for the most part a tale told by yellowed programs, dog-eared newspapers, and fading recollections. As elsewhere, the brightest glory of the local stage is that of its yesterdays. Today
the poor professional player seldom ventures into New Jersey but follows
the way to Manhattan, and the amateur is the hope for tomorrow and
tomorrow.
No brief candle, however, has the theater been in the State. It has
flickered and glowed for more than a century and a half and still sheds a beam that lights good deeds in the theatrical world. As the theater is always dying elsewhere, so is it always dying in New Jersey. And as it never
quite dies elsewhere, so it never quite dies in New Jersey.
Death by ecclesiastical edict was almost the fate of the Colonial theater
in New Jersey. Until the post-Revolutionary relaxing of official and self-appointed censorship, traveling English companies, vaudeville troupes,
animal acts and jugglers waged an uneven battle against the church. The
puritanical fathers injudiciously permitted church presentations of Biblical
dramatizations, which whetted the congregation's taste for the few Shakespearean companies that appeared in the State. The first professional production on record was that of a Shakespearean play by the Hallams, an
English touring company, in Perth Amboy in 1752. The meager professional theater that did exist before the Revolution was limited to the few
large towns, and was virtually in thrall to the British stage.
Apparently the Revolutionary veterans were confronted after the war
with an earlier-day "jazz age." Peace brought a feverish quest for the
types of amusement that previously had been banned. It is possible that
British soldiers contributed to the upheaval, for according to legend
Newark's earliest theatrical performance was a production of Hamlet
enacted by British officers at Gifford's Tavern.
The earliest recorded play of American origin to be produced in
Newark, and probably in New Jersey, was an untitled piece concerning a
miserly character named Gripus, written in 1792 by Captain Jabez Parkhurst and acted by his students at the South Street School. Although more
or less permanent companies acted in Newark, Perth Amboy, Trenton, and
other cities between 1790 and 1810, plays continued to be produced only
in taverns, schools, and churches.
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