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Sarah Siddons |
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When Sarah was about seventeen, she fell in love with an actor called William Siddons, then a member of Kemble’s company. Her parents were so opposed to the prospect of their eldest daughter marrying a strolling player that they arranged for her to be sent away to live as a lady’s maid and companion in an aristocratic household in Warwick. But this separation did not deter the two young lovers; eventually William and Sarah were married. Despite many difficulties, Sarah succeeded in combining work and motherhood: she had seven children.
In 1775, Sarah Siddons made her metropolitan debut at Drury Lane Theatre, then under the management of the famous actor, David Garrick. But the season was not a success: the young actress was extremely nervous and the critics remained hostile. A few years later, however, Siddons was ready to take London by storm. Soon ladies began to hover outside her house hoping for a glimpse of this new celebrity; leading politicians and members of the nobility started flocking to her performances. By the end of the century, Sarah Siddons had become one of the most famous actresses in England.
Sarah and her father rehearsing in the Green Room
© Mary Evans Picture Library |
What was life like for an eighteenth-century actress? This was a profession which demanded great stamina and physical resilience not to mention an excellent memory. Women like Sarah Siddons also wanted to challenge the widespread belief that an actress was little more than a prostitute who sold her body on stage. In one incident, the actress Elizabeth Inchbald was so infuriated by the manager’s unwanted sexual advances that she threw a bucket of water over his head.
Like her brother John Philip Kemble, Siddons was determined to prove her own respectability. As a woman, she faced particular difficulties. For one thing, she found herself acting while heavily pregnant as well as suffering long separations from her children while playing in the provinces on tour. But in certain ways Sarah was lucky: for much of her career, her husband took on the often tiresome task of negotiating her salary with theatre managers. As a young woman in the provinces, she had earned about £3 a week. But at the height of her fame, Siddons was making the astonishing sum of £4000 to £5000 a year. She soon acquired a reputation as a hard bargainer who knew her own worth.
Words: Dr Jane Moody
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