LaHi presents: Seriously Trivial As a production of “The Maid’s Tragedy” was runni

LaHi presents: Seriously Trivial

As a production of “The Maid’s Tragedy” was running late in 1661, the manager had said, to explain the delay, that “The Queen is not shav’d yet.”

During the Monarchy Restoration, women started to play female roles in the theatre. One of the last males to take on female roles was Edward Kynaston, who took on the role as The Queen in “The Maid’s Tragedy” in 1661, King Charles II had come earlier than expected to a show of the play, and he began to get impatient as to why the play wasn’t starting yet. The manager, who thought that honesty was the best policy, explained to his majesty that “the Queen is not shav’d yet.”

Sources:

Crofton, Ian. History without the boring bits. London, Quercus, 2015.

Haggerty, G. E. ““The Queen was not shav’d yet”: Edward Kynaston and the Regendering of the Restoration Stage.” The Eighteenth Century, vol. 50 no. 4, 2009, pp. 309-326. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/ecy.0.0045

Poster by Nic Calilung