Theatre and the Development of Spa Tourism in Eighteenth-Century Tralee

On Saturday, 6 March 1756, Shakespeare’s 1 Henry IV was staged in the Assembly Room on Castle Street in the town of Tralee in county Kerry. Far from being a one-off, this heralded the start of a season of theatrical performances by a troupe of actors who had travelled from Dublin. There were thirty nights of performances between the opening on 6 March and the final entertainment on Monday 10 May 1756. Why were Shakespeare’s and other plays being performed in a small town on Ireland’s south-west Atlantic coast, and what might have been the social, cultural, and commercial circumstances of their performance? It is suggested that the plays may have been staged as part of an effort on the part of the town’s proprietor and local landowner, Sir Thomas Denny, to develop Tralee as a destination for medical tourism and spa sociability.