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EspañolBOLLHUSET
'Bollhuset', also called by the names 'Stora Bollhuset', 'Bollhusteatern', and 'Lejonkulan' during the centuries, was the name of the first theatre of Stockholm, Sweden; it was the first Swedish theatre and the first real theatre building in Scandinavia. The name "Bollhuset" means "The Ball House", and it was originally built in 1627 for ball sports and used in this way for forty years.
Between 1667 and 1792 it was used as a theatre until it was torn down in 1793; in 1773-1781 the Royal Swedish Opera was located here, in 1781 the national theatre was founded in the building, and from 1788 it was the home of the Royal Dramatic Theatre.
The building was located on Slottsbacken near the Royal palace Tre Kronor. During the 17th century, foreign travelling theatre companies often visited Stockholm, especially from Germany and the Netherlands, but they performed in temporary locals; the German theatre troop of Christian Theun l. Thum (or Thaumb) performed in the city from 1628 to 1655, but it is not known if they ever performed in Bollhuset. An English troupe, the troupe of Joris Jollifoot, also played in the city in 1648-1649.
Already, during the reign of Queen Christina of Sweden, ballets had ben performed in Bollhuset, the first time in 1649 by an Italian company led by Vincenzo Albrici, and a Dutch theatre-company acted there in 1652 which counted Ariana Nozeman among its members, but this was temporary. In those days, it was commonly known as "Lejonkulan" ("The Lion's Den"), because a lion, a tribute from the Thirty Years War, was kept there during the reign of Christina.
In 1667, when the mourning period for the queen dowager-regent Hedwig Eleonora of Holstein-Gottorp had ended and the Swedish court exploded with parties and a search for amusement, Bollhuset was turned into a theatre and decorated as such and foreign theatre companies were hired to perform for the court, often from France, Germany and the Netherlands, as Sweden did not have any theatre tradition and therefore no native actors. Plays had been performed at the universities by students long before this, though, and in 1686–1691, a group of students from Uppsala University played at the theatre.
The foreign actors at Bollhuset did play for the public occasionally, but as most people could not understand foreign languages, it remained mostly a theatre for the court. The building possibly (but this is disputed) burnt down with the royal palace in 1697, but it was very quickly rebuilt; it was a large, but simple structure. In the 18th century, it was called "Stora Bollhuset" (Big Bollhuset), as they were also the "Lilla Bollhuset", (Small Bollhuset), built in 1648, or simply "Bollhusteatern", (The Bollhus Theatre). The theater was closed in fifteen years during the Great Northern War when the economy made it imposible to pay the actors' wages.
The first Swedish play, ''Sprätthöken'', was performed in 1737, and during the 1740s, several plays with Swedish-speaking actors was performed at Bollhuset, which made it accessible for the public for the first time; at this point, the theatre had eight hundred seats. But this first attempt to start a native Swedish theatre was interrupted; though the Swedish actors were popular among the public, the native aristocracy, who were French-influenced, was less enthusiastic; in 1753, the Swedish actors were fired by queen Louisa Ulrika of Prussia, who hired a French theatre company instead, and the Swedish troop split in two; one, under Petter Stenborg, performed in smaller houses, "touring" around the city of Stockholm, and the other toured in the countryside under Johan Bergholtz and Peter Lindahl. The French troupe also followed the court and they stayed in Bollhuset only in winter.
In 1771, king Gustav III of Sweden fired the French theatre company, and the Swedish actors, now led by Carl Stenborg, then saw their chance and asked to perform a play at the opening of the parliament of 1772. The king liked it enough to allow them to perform another play, an opera, in 1773, ''Thetis and Phelée'', performed by Carl Stenborg and the concert-singer Elisabeth Olin, and the success was so great that the king decided to found a Swedish-speaking theatre and opera, and the Royal Swedish Opera was founded the same year and located in Bollhuset. This was an opera, not a theatre, and the attempts to perform speaking drama was not very successful.
In 1781 the king, in his effort to establish a Swedish theatre, hired a group of French actors, led by Jacques Marie Boutet de Monvel, to educate and perform with the first generation of new Swedish-speaking actors at Bollhuset; the opera was the year after moved to the new building of the Swedish Royal Opera and separated from the talking-part actors, and this is considered the beginning of the Swedish theatre.
Monvel left the country in 1786, and in 1788 the second director fled the country to escape his creditors, so the actors formed a company and asked for the king's protection; he became the formal director, placed the theatre under Royal protection, to be ruled by the actors themselves by votes every fourteenth day under the supervision of the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts; according to the reports made by the academy, this rule was quite chaotic, and the votings is described as capricious and temperamental; " ''The male actors arguing with each other, one of the ladies voting yes because another lady voted no, other of them counting their buttons and letting fate decide''", and in 1803, the actors themselves asked the system to be replaced by a director.
In 1792–1793, Bollhuset was deemed to be too old and decayed and was torn down; the actors moved to the palace Makalös, (also called The Arsenal), where the Royal Dramatic Theatre was to reside until 1825. In 1798–1842, the theatres and operas of Stockholm were united by a royal monopoly.
This troupe opened the Theater with the play ''Orontes en Satira'' by Magnon in February 1667.
★ Salomon Fino
★ Jan Baptista van Fornenberg, 1624-1697, director of the troupe.
★ Helena Heusen, 1622-1680.
★ Daniel Loodewicx
★ Anna Parkar-Boonefaes
★ Geertruyt Rijndorp-Boonefaes
This troupe performed the play ''Disa'' for the public in 1684, and thus, the theater is known to be more than a court theater from this point forward.
★ Gillis Nozeman, husband of Ariana Nozeman
★ Trial Parkar
★ Jacob Sammers, 1632-1689.
★ O. Rudbeck
★ Isak Börk
★ Carl Johan Ollieqvisth
★ Andreas Strömbergh
★ Georg Törnqvist-Adlercreutz
★ Ferdinand Egidius Paulusen
★ Johann Velthens
★ Frau Velthens
★ Claude Guilmois de Rosidor, director of the troupe.
★ Gabriel Müller
★ Charles Langlois, 1692-1762, later director of the Theater in 1737-1739.
★ Monsieur Landé, dancer.
★ Kreutzer
★ Martin Müller
★ Johan Bergholtz (d. 1774)
★ Margareta Maria Fabritz, (born 1716), one of the first Swedish-speaking actresses, mother of Margareta Seuerling.
★ Kristian Knöppel, dramatic.
★ Peter Lindahl, (1712-1792), comic and director.
★ Nils Flodell, (born 1714).
★ Petter Palmborg
★ Petter Stenborg, (1719-1781), one of the first Swedish-speaking actors, star.
★ Lisa Söderman-Lillström, one of Sweden's first professional actresses, prima donna, mother of Elisabeth Olin.
★ Didrik Trundman
★ Madame Baptiste, singer, prima donna, mother of Marie Louise Marcadet.
★ Angelique Madeleine Cénas, child actor (born 1757).
★ Gaspard Cénas, dancer, father of Angelique Madeleine Cénas.
★ Therese Antoinette Cénas, sister of Angelique Madeleine Cénas.
★ Monsieur Compani-Despierviére
★ Monsieur Chatillon
★ Madame Desroches
★ Madame Dulondel
★ Louis Gallodier, (1733-1803), dancing-master.
★ Barbe Marguerite Henry-Coudurier, comedienne, mother of Angelique Madeleine Cénas.
★ Monsieur Soligny
★ Francesco Uttini, 1723-1795, conductor of the Royal orchestra 1767-1788, composer of the orchestra in Bollhuset from 1772.
★ Rosa Scarlatti, 1727-1775.
This was an opera troupe, not a theatrical troupe.
★ Lovisa Augusti, (1756-1790), opera singer.
★ Charlotta Eckerman, (1759-1790), dramatic, (this actress was immortalized in a painting by Adolf Ulrik Wertmüller).
★ Anna Sophia Holmstedt, (1759–1807)
★ Kristofer Kristian Karsten, (1756-1827), singer.
★ Lars Samuel Lalin, 1729-1785, singing-master.
★ Elisabeth Olin, (1740–1828), daughter of Lisa Söderman-Lillström.
★ Ulrica Rosenlund
★ Charlotte Slottsberg, (1760-1800), the first Swedish ballerina, also a royal mistress of Charles XIII of Sweden.
★ Franziska Stading, (1763–1836).
★ Carl Stenborg (1752–1813), considered founder of the Swedish-speaking theatre and opera.
★ Diedrich Tellerstedt, singer.
★ Hedvig Wigert
★ Samuel Ahlgren, (1764-1816), often played the hero-parts.
★ Abraham de Broen, (1759–1804) one of the most dominant actors of his time in Sweden.
★ Louis Deland, (1772-1823), dancer, singer, comedian.
★ Francois Felix
★ Gertrud Elisabeth Forsselius, (1771–1850) comedienne and singer, married to Johann Christian Friedrich Haeffner in her first marriage.
★ Maria Franck, (1769–1847), dramatic actress, later director of the theatre school Dramatens elevskola.
★ Caroline Halle-Müller, singer.
★ Jeanette Fredrique Löf, (1760–1813) Counted as the most celebrated Swedish actress of her time.
★ Marie Louise Marcadet, (1758–1804), singer and tragedienne.
★ Anne Marie Milan Desguillons
★ Madame Rémy
★ Lars Hjortsberg (1772-1843), singer and dramatic comedian.
★ Kjell Waltman, comedian.
★ Andreas Widerberg (1766-1810), dramatic.
★ Inga Åberg, (d. 1837).
★ Bollhustäppan
★ Bollhusgränd
★ Finnish Church
★ History of Stockholm
★ Culture in Stockholm
★ Swedish theatre history
★ http://runeberg.org/sbh/b0454.html
★ Svensk Uppslagsbok, 1947 års utgåva.
★ Sources for the actors employed
★ Alf Henriksson, "''Fram till Nybroplan''".
★ http://runeberg.org/nfcg/0055.html
★ http://runeberg.org/samlaren/1889/0059.html
★ http://runeberg.org/samlaren/1900/0041.html (source for the troupes), (in Swedish)
★ http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/alba001lang01_01/alba001lang01_01_0015.htm, (source for the Dutch troupes) (in Dutch).
Between 1667 and 1792 it was used as a theatre until it was torn down in 1793; in 1773-1781 the Royal Swedish Opera was located here, in 1781 the national theatre was founded in the building, and from 1788 it was the home of the Royal Dramatic Theatre.
History
The building was located on Slottsbacken near the Royal palace Tre Kronor. During the 17th century, foreign travelling theatre companies often visited Stockholm, especially from Germany and the Netherlands, but they performed in temporary locals; the German theatre troop of Christian Theun l. Thum (or Thaumb) performed in the city from 1628 to 1655, but it is not known if they ever performed in Bollhuset. An English troupe, the troupe of Joris Jollifoot, also played in the city in 1648-1649.
Already, during the reign of Queen Christina of Sweden, ballets had ben performed in Bollhuset, the first time in 1649 by an Italian company led by Vincenzo Albrici, and a Dutch theatre-company acted there in 1652 which counted Ariana Nozeman among its members, but this was temporary. In those days, it was commonly known as "Lejonkulan" ("The Lion's Den"), because a lion, a tribute from the Thirty Years War, was kept there during the reign of Christina.
In 1667, when the mourning period for the queen dowager-regent Hedwig Eleonora of Holstein-Gottorp had ended and the Swedish court exploded with parties and a search for amusement, Bollhuset was turned into a theatre and decorated as such and foreign theatre companies were hired to perform for the court, often from France, Germany and the Netherlands, as Sweden did not have any theatre tradition and therefore no native actors. Plays had been performed at the universities by students long before this, though, and in 1686–1691, a group of students from Uppsala University played at the theatre.
The foreign actors at Bollhuset did play for the public occasionally, but as most people could not understand foreign languages, it remained mostly a theatre for the court. The building possibly (but this is disputed) burnt down with the royal palace in 1697, but it was very quickly rebuilt; it was a large, but simple structure. In the 18th century, it was called "Stora Bollhuset" (Big Bollhuset), as they were also the "Lilla Bollhuset", (Small Bollhuset), built in 1648, or simply "Bollhusteatern", (The Bollhus Theatre). The theater was closed in fifteen years during the Great Northern War when the economy made it imposible to pay the actors' wages.
The first Swedish play, ''Sprätthöken'', was performed in 1737, and during the 1740s, several plays with Swedish-speaking actors was performed at Bollhuset, which made it accessible for the public for the first time; at this point, the theatre had eight hundred seats. But this first attempt to start a native Swedish theatre was interrupted; though the Swedish actors were popular among the public, the native aristocracy, who were French-influenced, was less enthusiastic; in 1753, the Swedish actors were fired by queen Louisa Ulrika of Prussia, who hired a French theatre company instead, and the Swedish troop split in two; one, under Petter Stenborg, performed in smaller houses, "touring" around the city of Stockholm, and the other toured in the countryside under Johan Bergholtz and Peter Lindahl. The French troupe also followed the court and they stayed in Bollhuset only in winter.
In 1771, king Gustav III of Sweden fired the French theatre company, and the Swedish actors, now led by Carl Stenborg, then saw their chance and asked to perform a play at the opening of the parliament of 1772. The king liked it enough to allow them to perform another play, an opera, in 1773, ''Thetis and Phelée'', performed by Carl Stenborg and the concert-singer Elisabeth Olin, and the success was so great that the king decided to found a Swedish-speaking theatre and opera, and the Royal Swedish Opera was founded the same year and located in Bollhuset. This was an opera, not a theatre, and the attempts to perform speaking drama was not very successful.
In 1781 the king, in his effort to establish a Swedish theatre, hired a group of French actors, led by Jacques Marie Boutet de Monvel, to educate and perform with the first generation of new Swedish-speaking actors at Bollhuset; the opera was the year after moved to the new building of the Swedish Royal Opera and separated from the talking-part actors, and this is considered the beginning of the Swedish theatre.
Monvel left the country in 1786, and in 1788 the second director fled the country to escape his creditors, so the actors formed a company and asked for the king's protection; he became the formal director, placed the theatre under Royal protection, to be ruled by the actors themselves by votes every fourteenth day under the supervision of the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts; according to the reports made by the academy, this rule was quite chaotic, and the votings is described as capricious and temperamental; " ''The male actors arguing with each other, one of the ladies voting yes because another lady voted no, other of them counting their buttons and letting fate decide''", and in 1803, the actors themselves asked the system to be replaced by a director.
In 1792–1793, Bollhuset was deemed to be too old and decayed and was torn down; the actors moved to the palace Makalös, (also called The Arsenal), where the Royal Dramatic Theatre was to reside until 1825. In 1798–1842, the theatres and operas of Stockholm were united by a royal monopoly.
Actors and companies in the Theatre of Bollhuset
The Dutch troupe 1667-1674
This troupe opened the Theater with the play ''Orontes en Satira'' by Magnon in February 1667.
★ Salomon Fino
★ Jan Baptista van Fornenberg, 1624-1697, director of the troupe.
★ Helena Heusen, 1622-1680.
★ Daniel Loodewicx
★ Anna Parkar-Boonefaes
★ Geertruyt Rijndorp-Boonefaes
The Dutch troupe 1680-1684
This troupe performed the play ''Disa'' for the public in 1684, and thus, the theater is known to be more than a court theater from this point forward.
★ Gillis Nozeman, husband of Ariana Nozeman
★ Trial Parkar
★ Jacob Sammers, 1632-1689.
The Swedish student-troupe from Uppsala 1686–1691
★ O. Rudbeck
★ Isak Börk
★ Carl Johan Ollieqvisth
★ Andreas Strömbergh
★ Georg Törnqvist-Adlercreutz
The German troupe 1691–1697
★ Ferdinand Egidius Paulusen
★ Johann Velthens
★ Frau Velthens
The French troupe 1699–1706
★ Claude Guilmois de Rosidor, director of the troupe.
The German troupe 1721
★ Gabriel Müller
The French troupe 1723–1727
★ Charles Langlois, 1692-1762, later director of the Theater in 1737-1739.
★ Monsieur Landé, dancer.
The German troupe 1731–1737
★ Kreutzer
★ Martin Müller
The first Swedish troupe 1737–1753
★ Johan Bergholtz (d. 1774)
★ Margareta Maria Fabritz, (born 1716), one of the first Swedish-speaking actresses, mother of Margareta Seuerling.
★ Kristian Knöppel, dramatic.
★ Peter Lindahl, (1712-1792), comic and director.
★ Nils Flodell, (born 1714).
★ Petter Palmborg
★ Petter Stenborg, (1719-1781), one of the first Swedish-speaking actors, star.
★ Lisa Söderman-Lillström, one of Sweden's first professional actresses, prima donna, mother of Elisabeth Olin.
★ Didrik Trundman
The French troupe 1753–1771
★ Madame Baptiste, singer, prima donna, mother of Marie Louise Marcadet.
★ Angelique Madeleine Cénas, child actor (born 1757).
★ Gaspard Cénas, dancer, father of Angelique Madeleine Cénas.
★ Therese Antoinette Cénas, sister of Angelique Madeleine Cénas.
★ Monsieur Compani-Despierviére
★ Monsieur Chatillon
★ Madame Desroches
★ Madame Dulondel
★ Louis Gallodier, (1733-1803), dancing-master.
★ Barbe Marguerite Henry-Coudurier, comedienne, mother of Angelique Madeleine Cénas.
★ Monsieur Soligny
The Italian troupe 1754–1767
★ Francesco Uttini, 1723-1795, conductor of the Royal orchestra 1767-1788, composer of the orchestra in Bollhuset from 1772.
★ Rosa Scarlatti, 1727-1775.
The second Swedish troupe 1771–1781
This was an opera troupe, not a theatrical troupe.
★ Lovisa Augusti, (1756-1790), opera singer.
★ Charlotta Eckerman, (1759-1790), dramatic, (this actress was immortalized in a painting by Adolf Ulrik Wertmüller).
★ Anna Sophia Holmstedt, (1759–1807)
★ Kristofer Kristian Karsten, (1756-1827), singer.
★ Lars Samuel Lalin, 1729-1785, singing-master.
★ Elisabeth Olin, (1740–1828), daughter of Lisa Söderman-Lillström.
★ Ulrica Rosenlund
★ Charlotte Slottsberg, (1760-1800), the first Swedish ballerina, also a royal mistress of Charles XIII of Sweden.
★ Franziska Stading, (1763–1836).
★ Carl Stenborg (1752–1813), considered founder of the Swedish-speaking theatre and opera.
★ Diedrich Tellerstedt, singer.
★ Hedvig Wigert
The Swedish-French troupe 1781–1792
★ Samuel Ahlgren, (1764-1816), often played the hero-parts.
★ Abraham de Broen, (1759–1804) one of the most dominant actors of his time in Sweden.
★ Louis Deland, (1772-1823), dancer, singer, comedian.
★ Francois Felix
★ Gertrud Elisabeth Forsselius, (1771–1850) comedienne and singer, married to Johann Christian Friedrich Haeffner in her first marriage.
★ Maria Franck, (1769–1847), dramatic actress, later director of the theatre school Dramatens elevskola.
★ Caroline Halle-Müller, singer.
★ Jeanette Fredrique Löf, (1760–1813) Counted as the most celebrated Swedish actress of her time.
★ Marie Louise Marcadet, (1758–1804), singer and tragedienne.
★ Anne Marie Milan Desguillons
★ Madame Rémy
★ Lars Hjortsberg (1772-1843), singer and dramatic comedian.
★ Kjell Waltman, comedian.
★ Andreas Widerberg (1766-1810), dramatic.
★ Inga Åberg, (d. 1837).
See also
★ Bollhustäppan
★ Bollhusgränd
★ Finnish Church
★ History of Stockholm
★ Culture in Stockholm
External links and sources
★ Swedish theatre history
★ http://runeberg.org/sbh/b0454.html
★ Svensk Uppslagsbok, 1947 års utgåva.
★ Sources for the actors employed
★ Alf Henriksson, "''Fram till Nybroplan''".
★ http://runeberg.org/nfcg/0055.html
★ http://runeberg.org/samlaren/1889/0059.html
★ http://runeberg.org/samlaren/1900/0041.html (source for the troupes), (in Swedish)
★ http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/alba001lang01_01/alba001lang01_01_0015.htm, (source for the Dutch troupes) (in Dutch).
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