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Edwin Booth
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==Career== In early appearances, Booth usually performed alongside his father, making his stage debut as Tressel or Tressil in [[Colley Cibber]]'s version of ''[[Richard III (play)|Richard III]]'' in [[Boston]] on September 10, 1849. His first appearance in [[New York City]] was in the character of Wilford in ''[[The Iron Chest]]'', which he played at the [[Chatham Theatre|National Theatre]] in Chatham Street, on September 27, 1850. A year later, on the illness of the father, the son took his place in the character of Richard III.<ref name=EB1911>{{EB1911|wstitle=Booth, Edwin Thomas |volume=4 |page=239}}</ref> After his father's death in 1852, Booth went on a worldwide tour, visiting [[Australia]] and [[Hawaii]], and finally gaining acclaim of his own during an engagement in [[Sacramento, California]], in 1856.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} Before his brother [[Assassination of Abraham Lincoln|assassinated]] Lincoln, Edwin had appeared with his two brothers, John Wilkes and Junius Brutus Booth Jr., in ''[[Julius Caesar (play)|Julius Caesar]]'' in 1864.<ref>{{cite news| last1=Roberts| first1=Sam| title=As Booth Brothers Held Forth, 1864 Confederate Plot Against New York Fizzled| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/nyregion/as-booth-brothers-held-forth-1864-confederate-plot-against-new-york-fizzled.html| newspaper=[[The New York Times]]| access-date=December 7, 2016| date=November 24, 2014| url-access=subscription}}</ref> John Wilkes played [[Marc Antony]], Edwin played [[Marcus Junius Brutus|Brutus]], and Junius played [[Gaius Cassius Longinus|Cassius]].<ref>{{cite web| title=The Booth Brothers Play Julius Caesar| url=https://ephemeralnewyork.wordpress.com/2008/09/24/the-booth-brothers-play-julius-caesar/| website=Ephemeral New York| access-date=December 7, 2016| date=September 24, 2008}}</ref> It was a benefit performance, and the only time that the three brothers appeared together on the same stage.<ref>{{cite web| last1=Duggan| first1=Bob| title=Man's Final Lore: How Shakespeare Shot Lincoln| url=http://bigthink.com/Picture-This/mans-final-lore-how-shakespeare-shot-lincoln| website=Big Think| date=April 14, 2011| access-date=December 7, 2016}}</ref> The funds were used to erect a [[Statue of William Shakespeare (New York City)|statue of William Shakespeare]] that still stands in [[Central Park]] just south of the Promenade. Immediately afterwards, Edwin Booth began a production of ''[[Hamlet]]'' on the same stage, which came to be known as the "hundred nights ''Hamlet''", setting a record that lasted until [[John Barrymore]] broke the record in 1922, playing the [[Prince Hamlet|title character]] for 101 performances. From 1863 to 1867, Booth managed the [[The Winter Garden Theatre (1850)|Winter Garden Theatre]] in New York City, mostly staging Shakespearean [[tragedy|tragedies]]. In 1863, he bought the [[Walnut Street Theatre]] in [[Philadelphia]].<ref>{{cite web| title=Historic Photo Gallery: 1850 to 1899| url=http://www.walnutstreettheatre.org/about/gallery/?ch=2&id=11| website=Walnut Street Theatre| access-date=November 23, 2015}}</ref> After John Wilkes Booth's assassination of President Lincoln in April 1865, the infamy associated with the Booth name forced Edwin Booth to abandon the stage for many months. Edwin, who had been feuding with John Wilkes before the assassination, disowned him afterward, refusing to have John's name spoken in his house.<ref name=Clarke>{{cite book| author=Clarke, Asia Booth| author-link=Asia Booth| editor=Terry Alford| title=John Wilkes Booth: A Sister's Memoir| publisher=University Press of Mississippi| location=Jackson, Miss.| year=1996| isbn=978-0-87805-883-9| page=ix| url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/johnwilkesbooths00clar_0}}</ref> He made his return to the stage at the Winter Garden Theatre in January 1866, playing the title role in ''Hamlet'',{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} which would eventually become his signature role. In 1874, he played the titular role in ''[[Othello]]'' in Chicago, trading off with [[James O'Neill (actor, born 1847)|James O'Neill]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Burke |first=Mary M. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=z1WbEAAAQBAJ&dq=Race,+Politics,+and+Irish+America:+A+Gothic+History&pg=PA91 |title=Race, Politics, and Irish America: A Gothic History |date=January 6, 2023 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-285973-0 |pages=91 |language=en}}</ref> Casting O'Neill, an Irish American actor who was called [[Black Irish (folklore)|Black Irish]] because of his black hair, has been marked as one possible origin of disputes about whether the character [[Othello (character)|Othello]] was meant to merely to have black hair and swarthy skin, rather than to be of sub-Saharan African origin.<ref name=":0" />
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