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Though his career as a playwright began during the Caroline period, Thomas Killigrew is best remembered for his role in Restoration theater. A favorite of Charles II, he and Sir William Davenant secured royal patents to establish rival theater companies--in essence, to monopolize London theater--in 1660. Killigrew, as manager of the King's Company, staged many of the most memorable productions of the period, and he served as Master of the Revels from 1673 to 1677. These achievements have tended to overshadow his aspirations as a dramatist. A member of the literary court that surrounded Henrietta Maria, Queen to Charles I, and later of the court in exile, Killigrew wrote eleven plays, many of them inspired by French heroic romances and intended for a coterie audience. Only one, The Parson's Wedding, achieved popularity. The most ribald of his efforts, this play for a long time contributed to Killigrew's unwarranted reputation as a coarse and unprincipled libertine.
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