Britannia Prompt Book, Act 1, Page 1

Britannia Prompt Book, Act 1, Page 1

One of the important resources for this Octoroon project is the “Scudder” part of the Octoroon promptbook at the University of Kent's Templeman Library. The first page in Act I of this artifact features handwritten information about several performances in the Britannia theatre and their running times. These variation is running time tell us about the different types of performances that may have featured on those nights, which has helped us to understand that even though Boucicault reduced the running time in early 1862, subsequent productions of The Octoroon reverted back to the longer, five act versions, which ended either with the heroine’s death or with her happy union with her lover.