John Philip Kemble

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John Philip Kemble

by Gilbert Stuart
oil on canvas, feigned oval, circa 1785
29 1/2 in. x 24 1/2 in. (749 mm x 622 mm)
Given by John Thadeus Delane, 1858
Primary Collection
NPG 49

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  • Gilbert Stuart (1755-1828), Painter. Artist or producer associated with 61 portraits.

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Kemble's ambitions were not confined to acting. In 1788 he took over the management of Drury Lane and then defected to Covent Garden Theatre in 1803. Theatre management included producing plays and Kemble, who had antiquarian interests, was among the first to champion historically accurate productions of Shakespeare.

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Events of 1785back to top

Current affairs

George Prince of Wales secretly marries his mistress Maria Fitzherbert in contravention of the Royal Marriages Act of 1772.
Prime Minister William Pitt introduces a bill proposing parliamentary reform and the abolition of 'rotten boroughs' but is defeated.

Art and science

William Cowper publishes his best -known poem The Task.
James Boswell publishes The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, narrating his travels with the late writer Samuel Johnson.
Physician and naturalist James Hutton presents his studies of local rocks to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, launching the era of scientific geology.

International

Warren Hastings resigns as Governor-General of Bengal and returns to England. His trial begins on charges of corruption in the administration of India.
French sculptor Jean Antoine Houdon crosses the Atlantic to sculpt a statue of George Washington.
British government establishes a permanent land force in the Eastern Caribbean, based in Barbados.

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