Illustrations -- Preface -- Abbreviations -- A John Rich Chronology -- Family Tree of John Rich -- Introduction -- I Management -- 1 John Rich as Manager and Entrepreneur -- 2 The Finances of an Eighteenth-Century London Theatre: The Lincoln's Inn Fields Company under John Rich in 1724-1725 -- 3 What the Prompter Saw: The Diary of Rich's Prompter, John Stede -- 4 John Rich, Theatrical Regulation, and the Dilemma of the Commercial Stage -- II Dance Theatre -- 5 John Rich, French Dancing, and English Pantomimes -- 6 Harlequin Choreographies: Repetition, Difference, and Representation -- 7 Pierrot Strikes Back: François Nivelon at Lincoln's Inn Fields and Covent Garden, 1723-1738 -- III Musical Theatre -- 8 Good for the Garden: The Composition of Handel's Ariodante -- 9 "Heathen Gods and Heroes": Singers and John Rich's Pantomimes at Lincoln's Inn Fields -- 10 The Beggar's Opera in London s Theatres, 1728-1761 -- 11 Beyond The Beggar's Opera: John Rich and English Ballad Opera, 1728-1736 -- IV Dramatic Theatre -- 12 The Impact of the Shakespeare Ladies Club on John Rich's Repertory in the 1737-1738 Theatrical Season: Shakespeare versus Pantomime? -- 13 The Nation in Breeches: Actress Margaret Woffington -- V Scenography and Iconography -- 14 Scenographies behind the Scenes: Mapping, Classifying, and Interpreting John Rich's 1744 Inventory of Covent Garden -- 15 Harlequin Newton: John Rich's Necromancer and the Public Science of the 1720s -- 16 Hogarth and Rich: Gesture and Expression in The Beggar's Opera -- 17 Picturing Rich -- Appendix 1. John Rich, Preface to The Rape of Proserpine (1727) -- Appendix 2. Members of the Sublime Society of Beef Steaks -- Contributors.