On this day in 1687, at 10:00 p.m., to be precise, Nell Gwyn, one of the first actresses on the British stage and Charles II's most well-known mistress, died in her house in Pall Mall, London. Why am I bringing her up? Well, last spring I was casting about my metaphorical fishing line to see if any vivid story ideas would bite; I'd had a curious interest in this woman for years, noticing various references to her in history and literature, and as I wondered if some inspiration would come, she grasped the end of my line, yanking me in headlong. I was captivated by her spunk and zest for life; by the end of the summer, I'd completed a screenplay of 63 pages, which I then revised to create the current version (77 pages, the longest work I've ever written). It traces her rise from serving drinks in her mother's bawdy house, to treading the boards of the stage at the King's Playhouse (the current Theatre Royal in Drury Lane), to strolling the halls of Whitehall, Charles II's palace.
In my narrative, I chose to focus on her good qualities, since too often she's seen as a stupid strumpet who used her sexual allure to get whatever she wanted, and there was much more to her than that. Her mind was especially keen; she was known for her wit, and became one of the most beloved actresses of her time, delighting audiences with her spot-on comedic timing. True, she made some less-than-moral life choices, but the Restoration period in England (from 1660, when Charles II returned from exile and restored the monarchy after Oliver Cromwell's death, to circa 1688, when Charles's younger brother, James II, abdicated) was a very decadent era - after the Puritanical interval known as the "Interregnum," during most of which Cromwell held power (1649 -1660), people were ready to cut loose. And cut loose they did, especially when Charles set the fashion with his own rather reckless pleasure-seeking - among his good deeds, though, was his 1662 decree that women's roles should be played by women. He got the idea from the French theatres (he'd been living in France for much of the Interregnum).
His relationship with Nell, from all accounts, was one of genuine affection and love; on his deathbed, in fact, he told James, "Let not poor Nelly starve." She wrote to James later that Charles "was my friend and allowed me to tell him all my griefs and did like a friend advise and told me who was my friend and who was not," and that she had "never loved your brother or your self interestedly," that is, merely for her own gain.
I shan't give away all the details (I'm not even sure if my work will amount to anything), but I didn't want the day of her death to pass without giving it some acknowledgment. In the name of all actresses, both established and aspiring, who enliven their audiences' hearts with great good humor, I say: "Thanks, Nelly!"
Image: A close up of Sir Peter Lely's portrait of Nell, titled Mrs. Eleanor Gwyn ("Mrs." was sometimes a courtesy title, especially for actresses).
