7 - Touching All the Bases

Summary

For the next two years, 1843 and 1844, Aldridge persisted in touring with his small troupe and only occasionally accepted engagements with local acting companies. Even when he did perform in regular theaters, he seldom experimented with new roles, preferring to stick with those in which he had already established a reputation—usually black characters such as Othello, Gambia, Zanga, Karfa, Antoine, and, to balance the heaviness, Mungo and Ginger Blue. Only in his farewell benefit at Alnwick in Northumberland on January 30, 1843, did he appear in a new black role: Caesar in the “Pantomimic Melo-Drama” of Black Beard the Pirate; or, The Captive Princess.

Caesar, the faithful accomplice of the dastardly Blackbeard, assists in the capture of a Turkish vessel and keeps watch over two prisoners taken on board—a Mogul prince and princess. Blackbeard instantly falls in love with the princess, preferring her to his wife, Orra, and threatening to kill Orra if she should interfere with his courtship of the beautiful captive. When he later discovers Orra attempting to murder her rival, he stabs his wife to death, and Caesar carries her body away. Caesar also protects Blackbeard from an assault by the Mogul prince, whom he drives away with a sword. The pirate ship is then attacked by a British war vessel, and rather than surrender, Blackbeard orders Caesar to blow up his ship. Caesar advances toward the powder magazine with a lighted match but is slain before he can reach it. In the furious battle that follows, Blackbeard is killed and thrown overboard.

This was a typical melodramatic nautical pantomime with plenty of vigorous action, much singing, and very little dialogue. Caesar seldom spoke and never sang, but he was involved in most of the fi ghting and loyally supported his malevolent master. This would not have been a diffi cult role for Aldridge to assume, but there is no evidence that he ever played it again. He may have been content to let this Caesar die a quick and bloody death.