Lampooning James

Figaro in London was a satirical paper and a predecessor of Punch. This non-too-flattering portrait of James was published on Saturday, 30 April 1836.

James' pupils had been the subject of public conjecture for at least thirty years now. Some of his ballets may not have been as straight forward as they at first appear. For instance La Cruche Cassée - performed on 7 January 1826 - really has little to do with broken jugs. The subject of the 1771 painting by Jean-Baptiste Greuze would have been familiar to most sophisticated gentlemen.

Morris does not know what to be up to. He has been told that he is a twaddling manager of the old school, and that the old school will no longer do,—a truth that his considerably diminished coffers have for the last few seasons been painfully teaching him. He has been in the habit for the last sixty years of playing old comedies, and laying out nothing but a few shillings now and then for a yard of white satin, to give a fresh lining to Mr. F. Vining's old light comedy coat; and every time he has fresh lined this said coat, he has fancied himself very liberal, and hugged himself in his own conceit as an enterprising manager. Latterly, he has discovered that nobody comes to his theatre, and, as his receipts have diminished, he has refused even the satin lining to his actors coats; but though he has discontinued trimming their coats, the critics have been very active in trimming their jackets. However, at last, having grown desperate by repeated losses, he lugs out Winston, kicks out F. Vining from the stage-managership, cuts a caper round his own stage, and, in a paroxysm of poignant agony, takes apas seul down to the house of D'Egville. 'Damme,' says Morris, 'I'm ruined if I don't have a ballet at the Haymarket;' and he gave a faint pirouette, which ended in his slipping down flat upon some oil-cloth, under the ex-dancing master's sideboard. D'Egville, having picked him up, cut a few useless and empty capers, poised himself upon one foot clumsily, and threw out his arms like the sails of a ricketty windmill. 'I'm your man' cried the danseur of former days; ' I'll get up ballets.' Morris clutched at the bait, and thought that, in securing poor old D'Egville, he had ensured all the splendour of spectacle, and all the allurements that the train of Terpsichore can offer. D'Egville engages a few of his own pupils, gives them a few French names, and mixes up with them a few of the old stout and sturdy shilling per night Coryphees of some of the miner theatres. The superannuated couple think, by this trick, to make people believe that they have got a French ballet at the Haymarket. No such thing. The corps is as wretched a mixture as four-shilling tea, and they waddle about the stage as clumsily as bugs on a bolster. Morris cannot manage with spirit, even if he were to try ; and his effort to compete with the King's Theatre in the ballet department is about as good a joke as Hunt's putting up for Westminster against five other candidates. Morris had better stick to the payment of his salaries, without attempting the wretched farce of trying to earn them. If he wishes to make money he must let his theatre, but if he likes losing his cash he has only to keep it open. In these days ofmanagerial activity and competition, such a twaddler as Morris ought to have nothing lo do with a theatre, and we very much fear the experience of the season he has just commenced will give him good reason to agree with us. The most judicious thing he has done is to take half-price, but, as an act of justice, he should do so at the very commencement of the performance. What he means by engaging poor Russell as stage-manager we cannot divine. The fact is, that Morris has got about him more twaddlers of the old school, if possible, this season than any previous one.