Add MS 53008 O

'Our American cousin', comic drama in two acts by Tom Taylor. Licence sent November 1861 for performance at the Haymarket, but a note on the back of the title page includes both the name of the manager Benjamin Webster, and the date October 6^th 1852. It is just possible that this is the text licensed for the earlier performance, listed in LCO Day Book Add. 52703 for the Adelphi, with date of licence listed as 9 October 1852; there is no text surviving in the relevant volume of licensed scripts for that year. The title is also listed in the Day Book for 7 November 1860, for the Haymarket, but there is no surviving text in the volume for November 1861 either. First performed at Laura Keene's Theatre, New York, on 18 October 1858. The fame of the play for its comic character Lord Dundreary, who inspired a lasting fashion for bushy side-whiskers was eclipsed in tragic fashion when John Wilkes Booth chose a raucously received line by the play's title character in Act III Sc. 2 ("Don't know the manners of good society, eh? Well, I guess I know enough to turn you inside out, old gal—you sockdologizing old man-trap..." ) to fire the shot which killed President Lincoln as he watched the play in Ford's Theatre, Washington, D.C., on 14 April 1865. For a burlesque version under the title 'Our female American cousin', see Add. 52992 M. Privately printed edition extant.

ff. 99.

Tom Taylor, called 'John Roakes', dramatist and editor of 'Punch': Plays by, submitted: 1852-1867: Partly printed.