The Company He Kept

In 1825, an eighteen-year-old from New York walked onto the stage at London's Royal Coburg and played Oroonoko. American theatres would not have him. He stayed.

By 1828 he was managing the Theatre Royal Coventry, the first Black manager of a British theatre. In 1833 he stepped in as Othello at Covent Garden when Edmund Kean collapsed mid-performance. The London press suggested he try street-sweeping. He toured Ireland instead, billed as the African Roscius, and then he simply kept going east.

He played Lear in whiteface. He played Shylock with his hands left black so the audience would see the parallel. He played in English while his Polish supporting cast answered him in Polish; how this was supposed to work is unclear, and the reviews said the audience understood everything from his face.

In 1853, Frederick William IV of Prussia awarded him the Gold Medal of the First Class for Arts and Sciences. Only three foreigners had ever received it.

Alexander von Humboldt. Gaspare Spontini. Franz Liszt.

And the American actor no American theatre would book.