From Garrick to Gluck: The Reform of Theatre and Opera in the mid-Eighteenth Century

Abstract

Several attempts to renovate the stage took place towards the middle of the eighteenth century. Goldoni was substituting written comedies of character for the improvised and stereo-typed roles of the Commedia dell' Arte. Diderot and Lessing were introducing serious contemporary subjects which perforce affected acting, setting and costume. Cahusac, Noverre and Angiolini were working, by precept or example, to create a more dramatic ballet. On English stages Garrick was perfecting a style of acting that broke sharply with the stately declamation and movement of the past. All these and other ‘reforms’ came to a head in the decade after 1750. I propose to consider some of them with a view to the light they may shed on the celebrated reform of opera.