{{Short description|English actress (1761–1831)}} {{For|the earlier actress known by this name|Mary Powell (actress)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Infobox person | name = Jane Powell | image = Jane Powell as Boadicea by Samuel De Wilde.jpg | caption = as Boadicea by Samuel De Wilde | birth_name = | birth_date = c. 1761 | birth_place = Cranbrook, Kent | death_date = 31 December 1831 | death_place = London | death_cause = | other_names = Mrs Farmer, Mrs Renaud | known_for = Acting | employer = | occupation = | spouse = Mr Powell | partner = | children = | parents = | relatives = | signature = | website = | footnotes = }} '''Jane Powell''' or '''Mrs Powell''' (c. 1761 – 31 December 1831) was a British actress. She was also known as Mrs Renaud and Mrs Farmer.
==Life== Powell was working as a maid in London for the family of Dr Budd circa 1778 when she shared a room with a younger maid named Emily Lyon. Powell's room-mate went on to become famous as Emma, Lady Hamilton, after marrying Sir William Hamilton (diplomat), the British Ambassador to Naples.<ref name="emily">{{Cite web|url=https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/who-emma-hamilton |title=Who is Emma Hamilton |website=www.rmg.co.uk|language=en|access-date=2024-11-29}}</ref>
Powell made her debut as Alicia in Nicholas Rowe's ''Jane Shore'' to mixed reviews in 1787, but her name was uncredited. She came to notice when she appeared at the Haymarket Theatre in the 1780s under the name of "Mrs Farmer" or "Mrs Palmer" as the papers failed to agree.<ref name="garr">{{Cite web|url=http://garrick.ssl.co.uk/names/SPO011|title=CollectionsOnline {{!}} Name|website=garrick.ssl.co.uk|language=en|access-date=2018-07-02}}</ref>
She is thought to be the first woman to take the title role of Hamlet in London in 1796 when she appeared at Drury Lane.<ref name=howard>{{cite book|last1=Howard|first1=Tony|title=Women as Hamlet : performance and interpretation in theatre, film and literature|date=2007|publisher=Cambridge Univ. Press|location=Cambridge [u.a.]|isbn=978-0521864664|page=39|edition=1. publ.|url=https://books.google.com/books?isbn=0521864666}}</ref> She then took the role of Edmunda in ''Vortigern and Rowena'' after Sarah Siddons refused the role. The newly discovered play that was said to be by Shakespeare proved to be a forgery.<ref name=oddd>{{Cite ODNB|title=Powell [Renaud], Jane (c. 1761–1831), actress|last=Crouch|first=K. A.|date=2004-09-23|series=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography|language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/22641}}</ref>
Mrs Powell had a benefit at Drury Lane on 2 May 1795 when she played Young Norval. This role was recorded in Norval's death scene from Act V in a painting by Samuel De Wilde.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://garrick.ssl.co.uk/object-g0691|title=CollectionsOnline {{!}} G0691|website=garrick.ssl.co.uk|language=en|access-date=2018-07-02}}</ref> Samuel De Wilde had made a painting of her as Mary Queen of Scots and another of her as Boadicea. However the Garrick Club who own the paintings say that she never appeared in those roles in London.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://garrick.ssl.co.uk/object-g0689|title=CollectionsOnline {{!}} G0689|website=garrick.ssl.co.uk|language=en|access-date=2018-07-02}}</ref> [[File:A foolish man kissing a ribbon and surrounded by sentimental Wellcome V0011316.jpg|thumb|A Cruikshank cartoon satirising the Duke of Cumberland's love for Mrs. Powell.]]
In the winter of 1800, Powell's former room-mate, Emma, Lady Hamilton attended one of her performances in Drury Lane with her lover Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson and his increasingly estranged wife Frances Nelson.<ref name="drury">{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RJYxAQAAMAAJ&q=emma+hamilton+jane+powell+1800|website=books.google.co.uk/books|language=en|access-date=2024-11-29 |title=Emma Lady Hamilton from New and Original Sources and Documents: Together with an Appendix of Notes and New Letters |last1=Sichel |first1=Walter |date=1907 }}</ref>
Up to 1811 she was a regular at Drury Lane Theatre until she moved her allegiance to the Covent Garden Theatre. In 1812 her husband died and the following year she married John James Renaud and became Mrs Renaud. In 1814 the marriage was over but she kept the new name.<ref name=oddd/>
In 1818 she moved to Edinburgh when she enjoyed being cast in leading productions.<ref name=oddd/>
Powell died in London at the end of 1831.<ref name=biog>{{cite book|title=The Annual Biography and Obituary, Volume 17|date=1833|page=451|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FOkKAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA451}}</ref> It was said that she was still being paid two pounds a week by her manager in Edinburgh.<ref name=oddd/>
==Selected roles== * Lady Douglas in ''Mary, Queen of Scots'' by John St John (1789) * Marcella in ''Marcella'' by William Hayley (1789) * Phaedra in ''The Rival Sisters'' by Arthur Murphy (1793) * Fishwoman in ''The London Hermit'' by John O'Keeffe (1793) * Eltruda in ''Edwy and Elgiva'' by Fanny Burney (1795) * Mrs Woodville in ''The Wheel of Fortune'' by Richard Cumberland (1795) * Cornelia in ''The Conspiracy'' by Robert Jephson (1796) * Hamlet in ''Hamlet'' by William Shakespeare (1796) * Edmunda in ''Vortigern and Rowena'' by William Henry Ireland (1796) * Victoria in ''Almeyda, Queen of Granada'' by Sophia Lee (1796) * Evelina in ''The Castle Spectre'' by Matthew Lewis (1797) *Agnes in ''Aurelio and Miranda'' by James Boaden (1798) * Mrs Esther Dorville in ''The Secret'' by Edward Morris (1799) * Mrs Ormond in ''The East Indian'' by Matthew Lewis (1799) * Matilda in ''The Castle of Montval'' by Thomas Sedgwick Whalley (1799) * Eliza in ''Hearts of Oak'' by John Allingham (1803) * Mrs Howard in ''The Marriage Promise'' by John Allingham (1803) *Mrs Prue in ''Five Miles Off'' by Thomas Dibdin (1806) * Arabella in ''Faulkener'' by William Godwin (1807) * Betty Barnes in ''Errors Excepted'' by Thomas Dibdin (1807) * Matilda in ''The Curfew'' by John Tobin (1807) * Mrs Mordaunt in ''Grieving's a Folly'' by Richard Leigh (1809) * Mrs Wallis in ''Debtor and Creditor'' by James Kenney (1814)
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Bibliography== * Burnim, Kalman A. & Highfill, Philip H. ''John Bell, Patron of British Theatrical Portraiture: A Catalog of the Theatrical Portraits in His Editions of Bell's Shakespeare and Bell's British Theatre''. SIU Press, 1998. * Howard, Tony. ''Women as Hamlet: Performance and Interpretation in Theatre, Film and Fiction''. Cambridge University Press, 2007.
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Powell, Jane}} Category:1831 deaths Category:Year of birth uncertain Category:18th-century British actresses Category:19th-century British actresses
Category:People from Cranbrook, Kent