Restoration theatre

Restoration theatre is the English commercial stage that flourished after Charles II returned to the throne in 1660. It is known for professional actresses, elaborate staging, and comedies of wit and sexual intrigue.

Theatre Royal, Drury Lane: A London playhouse opened in 1663 under the management of Thomas Killigrew. It was one of the two patent theaters authorized to perform spoken drama in London.
The Country Wife: A comedy by William Wycherley, first performed in 1675. Its sexual intrigue and social satire exemplify Restoration comedy.
Aphra Behn: An English playwright and novelist whose stage career began in the 1670s. She became one of the period's most prolific and successful women dramatists.
English Interregnum: The period of republican and protectorate rule in England between the execution of Charles I and the Restoration. Its closure of public theaters created the rupture that the 1660 reopening reversed.
Caroline theatre: English theater produced during the reign of Charles I, before the theaters closed in 1642. It supplies the immediate pre-closure comparison for Restoration staging and repertoire.
Theatre Royal, Covent Garden: A London theater opened in 1732, later known as the Royal Opera House. Its later history extends the institutional legacy of the Restoration patent theaters.
The Man of Mode: A comedy by George Etherege, first performed in 1676. Its fashionable characters helped define the rake and wit of Restoration comedy.
William Congreve: An English playwright best known for comedies of manners written in the late seventeenth century. His plays refined the period's comedy of wit and social negotiation.
Theatres Act 1642: An English parliamentary ordinance that suppressed public stage plays during the Civil War. Its prohibition explains why reopening theaters became a defining act of the Restoration.
Sentimental comedy: A comic dramatic genre that emphasizes virtue, tender feeling, and morally approving outcomes. Its emotional moralism displaced much of Restoration comedy's sexual frankness and cynical wit.

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