Royal Queen's Theatre and Opera House Edinburgh, February 26 and 27, 1862

Royal Queen's Theatre and Opera House Edinburgh, February 26 and 27, 1862

This playbill from Royal Queen's Theatre and Opera House Edinburgh, February 26 and 27, 1862, is just a couple of months after the London premier of Boucicault's "rewritten" version where Zoe survives. This bill announced: "[t]he great sensation drama in five acts entitled the Octoroon." This playbill features an account of a purported "true story" of a Miss Winchester who, like the fictional Zoe, was described as "the natural child of the planter by a quadroon slave; she was inventoried in chattels of the estate and sold; the next day her body was found floating in the Ohio river." The playbill declared, "[s]uch is the truth which underlies the story of the Octoroon." Presumably, the production of The Octoroon advertised in this manner would feature a mixed-race heroine who commits suicide but the scenes listed on the same playbill also include the duel that Boucicault introduced in the final act in the version in which Zoe survived, which complicates ways in which The Octoroon produced in each locale participated in debates about race and slavery. The story of "Miss Winchester" was reprinted in a later playbill from Birmingham December 14, 1865. Special Collections, Templeman Library, University of Kent.

February 26, 1862/February 27, 1862

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