WALKING GENTLEMAN, WALKING LADY

Walking Gentleman, Walking Lady: translation

These 19th-centurylines of businesswere considered a step abovesupernumeraryin that the characters that fell to these actors might occasionally speak lines. In his 1880 memoirThe Stage,James E. Murdochnotes that a walking gentleman would play a character who is "essential to the progress and development of the plot," but who has "a merely mechanical part in the dialogue" (204-5). These parts, like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern inHamlet, were useful for giving young actors the opportunity to observe the techniques of their betters at close range.