The Virtuoso
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Thomas Shadwell’s The Virtuoso is a Restoration comedy first produced at Dorset Garden Theatre in 1676 by The Duke’s Company. Well received in its original production, it was revived several times over the next thirty years and “always found Success.”
Thomas Shadwell is acknowledged as the most topical of the major Restoration playwrights and the uniqueness of The Virtuoso lies primarily in its highly relevant satire on contemporary science and on the Royal Society, which, founded in 1660, was of great interest to Restoration audiences.
Plot summary
Bruce and Longvil, two young men-about-town, described by Shadwell in the cast list as “Gentlemen of wit and sense,” have fallen in love with the two nieces of the virtuoso, Sir Nicholas Gimcrack. Bruce is in love with Clarinda and Longvil with Miranda. Unfortunately, Clarinda is in love with Longvil and Miranda with Bruce. Each lady also has a rival suitor. Clarinda is wooed by her uncle’s best friend, the absurd orator Sir Formal Trifle, and Miranda by a gallant fool, Sir Samuel Hearty.
In order to gain admittance to Sir Nicholas’s house where they can see their beloveds, Bruce and Longvil feign an interest in Sir Nicholas’s absurd experiments, which include learning to swim on dry land by imitating a frog, transfusing the blood of a sheep into a man (resulting in a sheep’s tail growing out of the man’s anus), and bottling air from various parts of the country to be stored in his cellar like wine.
While they attempt to pay their court the Miranda and Clarinda, Bruce and Longvil are in turn courted by Sir Nicholas’s promiscuous wife, Lady Gimcrack, who also keeps a lover, Hazard, on the side. Sir Nicholas similarly keeps a lover by the name of Mrs. Flirt, who in turn is having an affair with Hazard.
The cast is rounded out by Sir Nicholas’s curmudgeonly uncle Snarl, whose money Sir Nicholas hopes to inherit, and Snarl’s whore Mrs. Figgup.
There follow various contrivances and convolutions, including the seduction of both Bruce and Longvil by Lady Gimcrack, the attempted rape of Sir Samuel (disguised as a woman) by Sir Formal, the discovery that Snarl has a fetish for being beaten with rods, and an uprising of ribbon-weavers, upset because they fear Sir Nicholas has invented a machine that will put them out of business.
Ultimately, Bruce and Longvil pragmatically conclude that Bruce should transfer his affections to Miranda (who loves him) and Longvil should transfer his to Clarinda (who loves him.) Meanwhile, Sir Nicholas receives the terrible news that his estates have been seized to pay off debts incurred in his scientific pursuits. He first turns to his wife for help, but she abandons him in favor of Hazard, taking her money with her, then to his uncle Snarl, but Snarl reveals that he has married Mrs. Figgup and Sir Nicholas’s hopes of inheriting his money are dashed. Last, Sir Nicholas begs his nieces for their fortunes, but they reveal that they have settled guardianship of their estates with Bruce and Longvil. Hoping at least for continuing love from Mrs. Flirt, Sir Nicholas is once again disappointed, as she informs him that she “love(s) men but as far as their money goes.”
Sir Nicholas is left a ruined man, yet still hoping to discover the philosopher's stone, and Bruce and Longvil are happy in their hopes of eventual marriages to Miranda and Clarinda, respectively.
