HISTORICAL CONTEXT- What was London like in Elizabethan times and who were the people attending the theatre?

London Life
I have already recorded that Shakespeare spent most of his working life in London and it is quite obvious why. London was buzzing with life- as the capital people came to sell and trade, it was home to royalty and nobility and it was where the new theatre mania would start. By 1600 the amount of theatre attendees number approximately 20000 per week. This was partly due to the amount of wealthy people living in London who could afford to go to the theatre. This type of setting made it the perfect backdrop for Shakespeare to build his career on.

The geography of London at the time was as follows: a thriving city growing each day due to migration from the countryside causing most of the land in London to be taken up by new constructions to accommodate the increasing population, with the city slowing spreading out into the countryside. The streets were hard to navigate, gloomy mazes full to the brim with hurried people, attracting crime and disease. Although London was prospering, full of excitement, there was an underlying presence of danger.

Shakespeare worked in different locations during his time in London: first, St Helen's a London church situated near the theatre and playhouses, then moving on to the Paris Gardens situated near the Globe, finally moving to Silver Street with Shakespeare renting from a French family who were in the business of making fine hats.

Audiences
Attending the theatre was the new trend- anyone and everyone was going. People of all class were welcome, although their position within the theatre may be separate, with the standing area being normally reserved for the working class who paid 1 penny to stand and watch and the higher galleries being reserved for the gentry with prices starting at 6 pence. There was an in-between- for 2 pennies you could on a bench in the lower galleries and for 3 pennies you could be seated on a cushion. Although the standing 'groundlings', as they were known, were watching in worse conditions than the rest, the conditions outside on the streets on which they lived were arguably worse anyway. The low cost of theatre was the reason it grew in popularity so much. The everyday man and women were often attendees of the performances, but so were royalty who, although not in public theatres, would have performances for them privately at court.

The theatre could be quite a rowdy experience. The audiences weren't afraid to speak their minds by clapping the heroes, booing the villains and showing their opinion of a play by claps and cheers at the end or throwing food and litter at the stage. Music was banned at the end of productions due to the dancing being described as outrageous.

What I learnt from this is that although our experience at the theatre may  be described as more civilised and London more modernised, reading this information has made me question- has it really changed that much? London is still a vibrant city, changing daily, brimming with life and colour and yet their is still a sense of keeping ones wits about them whilst out. And as for the theatre, although we may not receive a pelting of orange peel if we perform badly, the audience reaction can make or break a show. The theatre industry in such a city as London is as unpredictable as it ever was.