Cartoon, Blowing up the Pic Nics

Cartoon, Blowing up the Pic Nics, or, Harlequin Quixotte attacking the Puppets, Vide Tottenham Street Pantomime, by James Gillray. Showing the interior of a theatre in Tottenham Street, London, home of an amateur dramatic club called the Pic-Nic Society, whose aristocratic members were frequently ridiculed in the press, and accused of immorality. They are shown here taking part in an orgy, dressed in costumes relating to the play Tom Thumb. The playwright and politician Richard Brinsley Sheridan is depicted as Harlequin, taking revenge on the society for his assumed loss of income. Other revengers include John Philip Kemble (manager of Drury Lane Theatre) and the actress Mrs Siddons, while the ghost of the legendary actor David Garrick emerges through the broken floorboards

1802 Amateur Amateurs Aristocratic Aristocrats Blowing Brinsley Comment Criticism Dilettante Drury Floorboards Garrick Gillray Harlequin Harsh Immoral Immorality Kemble Orgy Picnics Plump Puppets Quixote Raiding Ridicule Ridiculed Scandal Theatricals Thumb Vide

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