1791
France declares itself a republic.
1791
Covent Garden reopens after renovations to extend its capacity.
1792
Mary Wollstonecraft writes A Vindication of the Rights of Women.
1793
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette are executed.
1793
English actor William Charles Macready is born.
1794
Charles Kemble makes his debut.
1794
Colman the Elder dies.
1794
William Blake publishes Songs of Experience.
1794
The third Theatre Royal Drury Lane, designed by Henry Holland, opens.
1794
Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho is published. Perfecting the formula for 'the female gothic', it inspires theatrical pieces.
1795
Napoleon Bonaparte enters Italy.
1795
Venice Preserv'd, produced by Kemble and Sheridan, is brought to an early close due to political unrest.
1796
Spain declares war on Great Britain
1796
The Monk, an early gothic novel, is published
1798
John Palmer dies on stage.
1800
Food riots take place in London and the provinces.
1801
Act of Union with Ireland.
1801
The first census of the British population is carried out.
1803 - 1815
Britain declares war on France, marking the start of the Napoleonic Wars.
1803
John Phillip Kemble becomes manager of Covent Garden.
1803
Glasgow theatre granted a patent.
1804
Theatrical censorship re-established in Paris.
1804
Napoleon crowned Emperor.
1804
English actor and stage-manager Samuel Phelps is born.
1804
George Legg, 3rd Earl of Dartmouth, enters the office of Lord Chamberlain.
1805
English actress Ellen Tree, later professionally known as Mrs Charles Kean, is born.
1805
Battle of Trafalgar. A British fleet commanded by Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson defeats a French-Spanish fleet off Cape Trafalgar, Spain.
1806
Coriolanus is performed at Covent Garden in London on 3rd November, using John Philip Kemble's famous 1789 script. Henry Irving would later own the prompt book for this production, and would use it for inspiration for his 1901 production with Ellen Terry.
1806
The Adelphi Theatre (Sans Pareil) in The Strand opens on the 17th November 1806.
1806
Well-known American Shakespearean actor Edwin Forrest is born.
1806
Olympic Pavilion opens.
1806
The Holy Roman Empire is dissolved.
1806
Charles Kemble marries Marie Therese De Camp.
1807
Birmingham Theatre is granted a patent.
1807
Russia declares war on Britain.
1807
The first passenger railway service begins in England.
1808
Covent Garden Theatre is destroyed by a fire.
1808
The Slave Trade Act of 1807 is passed, outlawing the trading of slaves in Britain.
1809
On the 24th February Drury Lane is destroyed by fire after standing only 15 years.
1809
Covent Garden reopens, after being rebuilt following extensive fire damage, with a performance of Macbeth.
1809
Old Price Riots after Covent Garden decided to raise prices from six to seven shillings for boxes and three to four shillings for the pit. After three weeks of continous rioting by audience members, theatre manager John Philip Kemble accepted their demands and offered a public apology on stage.
1809
Actress Fanny Kemble (Frances Anne) is born, daughter of actor Charles Kemble and his wife Marie.
1809
Sir Walter Scott purchases a share in Edinburgh Theatre.
1810
Sir Walter Scott publishes poem Lady of the Lake.
1811
Charles Lamb publishes On the Tragedies of Shakespeare. Lamb argues that Shakespeare should be read rather than acted.
1811
Richard Cumberland dies.
1811
Janes Austen publishes her first novel, Sense and Sensibility. She publishes anonymously under the title "A Lady".
1811
Charles Kean, son of actor Edmund Kean, is born in Waterford, Ireland.
1811
The Prince of Wales is made Regent in consideration of George III's mental health, marking the beginning of the 'Regency' era.
1812
United States declares war on Great Britain.
1812
Francis Ingram-Seymour-Conway, 2nd Marquess of Hertford, enters the office of Lord Chamberlain.
1813
Byron is appointed to the sub-committee at Drury Lane.
1813
Richard Wagner is born. The German composer was unusual in writing both the music and the libretto for his pieces.
1814
Napoleon is exiled to Elba after defeat.
1814
Debut of Edmund Kean as Shakespeare's Shylock at Drury Lane. His performance creates a sensation by transforming the character from comic villain, into a vicious, butcher's-knife wielding monster.
1814
Sir Walter Scott writes Waverly.
1815
Battle of Waterloo.
1816
American actress Charlotte Cushman is born.
1816
Spa Fields riots in London.
1816
Death of Richard Brinsley Sheridan.
1816
On the shores of Lake Geneva, Lord Byron challenges his friends to write a ghost story. The efforts of John Polidori becomes The Vampyre, the first vampire story to be written in English.
1817
John Phillip Kemble retires from the stage playing Coriolanus for the final time on the 23rd June 1817.
1817
Both Drury Lane and Covent Garden begin to use gas lighting.
1818
Publication of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
1819
Peterloo Massacre in Manchester. Cavalry charges into a protest calling for parliamentary reform killing an injuring members of the public.
1819
Sans Pareil is renamed the Adelphi Theatre.
1819
Byron's Don Juan is published.
1820
Edwin Forrest makes his acting debut at the Walnut Street Theatre aged 14 years.
1820
Edmund Kean performs in New York.
1820
George IV accedes the throne.
1821
The Manchester Guardian is established.
1821
Death of Napoleon.
1821
James Graham, 3rd Duke of Monrose, enters the office of Lord Chamberlain.
1821
The new Haymarket Theatre, redesigned by John Nash, opens with a production of Sheridan's The Rivals.
1821
Percy Bysshe Shelley writes A Defence of Poetry.
1822
The Paris Opera has gas lighting installed.
1823
Charles Kemble revives King John at Covent Garden.
1823
John Phillip Kemble dies.
1824
John Larpent, Examiner of Plays, dies, and his role is taken over by George Colman the Younger.
1827
Charles Kean makes his debut appearance playing Young Norval in a production of Douglas.
1828
Father and son, Edmund and Charles Kean, perform together for the first time in a production of John Howard Payne's Brutus in Glasgow.
1828
Edwin Forrest launches his playwriting contest for aspiring American writers.
1829
Fanny Kemble plays Juliet for the first time.
1830
Charles Kean makes a successful tour of America.
1830
Eliza Vestris becomes the first female actor-manager in London, running the Olympic Theatre.
1831
The Garrick Club is founded in London on the 17th August 1831 at a meeting held at the Drury Lane Theatre. The purpose of the Club was to "tend to the regeneration of the Drama" and to be a place where "actors and men of refinement could meet on equal terms".
1832 - 1834
Fanny Kemble tours America with her father Charles Kemble.
1833
On 25th March 1833, Edmund Kean makes his last stage performance, appearing at Covent Garden, where he plays Othello, while his son Charles Kean plays Iago. Edmund collapses on stage during the performance.
1833
Edmund Kean dies in Richmond following a successful stage career which was marred by his dependency on stimulants that gradually affected his ability to perform.
1833
American stage actor Edwin Booth is born in Maryland.
1834 - 1838
William Charles Macready is responsible for reverting productions of King Lear back to Shakespeare's original text, following 150 years of performances which favoured Nahum Tate's version, The History or King Lear, which concluded the tragic ending into a happy one.
1836
Edwin Forrest arrives in London and performs the part of Spartacus in The Gladiator at Drury Lane.
1836
At the age of eighteen, Charlotte Cushman appears as Lady Macbeth at the Tremont Theatre in Boston.
1836
American author and dramatic critic William Winter is born in Gloucester, Mass.
1837
Queen Victoria ascends the throne of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
1837
The Walnut Street Theatre in Boston installs gas footlights.
1837
Samuel Phelps makes his stage debut at the Haymarket Theatre in London playing Shylock.
1838
American dramatist and theatrical manager (John) Augustin Daly is born.
1838
On the 10th June William Charles Macready gives a memorable performance of Henry V.
1838
In January, Charles Kean plays Hamlet at Drury Lane.
1838
English stage actor and actor-manager Henry Irving (J.H. Irving) is born.
1839
Charlotte Cushman stars as Nancy in Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist.
1840
Polish actress Helena Modjeska is born.
1841
William Charles Macready's debut production as manager of Drury Lane, The Merchant of Venice, opens on 27th December.
1842
William Charles Macready's production of Othello is performed at Drury Lane in London on 23rd May.
1842
Charles Kean and Ellen Tree marry.
1843
The Theatres Act of 1843 is passed, also known as the Theatre Regulation Act. This Act restricted the powers of the Lord Chamberlain to prohibit the performances of plays.
1843
William Charles Macready stars alongside Charlotte Cushman in productions of Macbeth in Philadelphia and New York.
1843
Samuel Phelps becomes the actor-manager at Sadler's Wells Theatre. Due to the easing of restrictions bought about by the passing of the Theatre's Act (1843), Phelps is able to put on several Shakespeare productions at the theatre for the first time.
1844
Samuel Phelps puts on a production of Macbeth at Sadler's Wells Theatre using the original text from the First Folio.
1845
Charlotte Cushman stars opposite Edwin Forrest as Bianca in a production of Henry Milman's Fazio in London.
1845
Charles Kean and his wife (actress Ellen Tree) tour America.
1845
Samuel Phelps performs as King Lear, in the first performance that kept true to Shakespeare's tragic ending to be seen by audiences since the 1660s.
1847
Charlotte Cushman plays Romeo opposite her sister Susan's Juliet at the Theatre Royal in Nottingham.
1847
Actress Ellen Terry (Dame Alice Ellen Terry) is born.
1849
On the 10 September Edwin Booth, aged just 13, makes his stage debut at the Boston Museum. He takes on the role of Tressel in a production of Richard III that sees his father playing the lead.
1849
Samuel Phelps puts on a production of Anthony and Cleopatra at Sadler's Wells Theatre using the original text from the First Folio.
1849
On 10th May the Astor Place Riot breaks out at the Astor Opera House in New York. The civic disturbance, part of a run of similar events in the city, saw immigrants fighting against native New Yorkers and both groups rising up against the upper classes. However, the dispute was originally born out of the well-known theatrical rivalry between American actor Edwin Forrest and British actor William Charles Macready, who were both convinced they were the better actor of Shakespeare's major roles.
1850
Charles Kean becomes the manager at Princess's Theatre, London.