Boy Actors

Boy Actors, troupes of choirboys who performed in London in the 16th and early 17th centuries, and were an important element in its theatrical life. The Children of the Chapel (based on London's Chapel Royal) played regularly at Court from about 1517. The Children of Paul's (based on St Paul's Cathedral) played both at Court and in the cathedral courtyard and their school hall. Their repertory eventually included most contemporary dramatists. The first group to play in a theatre (the Blackfriars) was that from the Chapel Royal at Windsor in 1576. The Children of the Chapel, virtually professional, achieved great popularity in the second Blackfriars theatre in the early 1600s, giving the first performance of plays by Jonson, Chapman, and others. For several years the boys drew audiences away from the adult companies, and some of them—including Ezekiel Fenn and Nathan Field—became well known as adult actors. The last group to survive, they were disbanded in about 1615.

Individual boy actors played women's roles until after the Restoration, when women were finally allowed on the British stage.