When I was in
here last some time ago (let's just say Margaret Thatcher
was not yet Prime Minister), this was a very different
place. I remember it being all velvet curtains and
very Victorian, with a plank floor. The plank floor
remains, but it is more like a little club now, with
young whipper-snappers behind the bar. The only nod
to its theater roots is the inclusion of a few play
advertisements on the walls.
As you can see from the
main photograph here, the Garricks Head is intimately
related to the Theatre Royal, with the pub actually
being attached to the theater building. (The pub,
by the way, is down the alley there, with the black
sign above).
The pub seemed to echo
rather a lot for such a small space, maybe because
the floors were made of a cheap pine that had probably
been discarded by some theater company. The pub as
a whole had very much the feel of a wine bar rather
than what we have come to understand as being a pub,
which we only encouraged by buying halves and moving
on.
David Garrick,
whom the pub is named after, was indisputably the
finest English actor of the Eighteenth Century, being
especially noted for his Shakespearian roles. He made
up part of 'The Club', which gained some notoriety
in London at the time. The Club was made up of Diderot,
Oliver Goldsmith and, wait for it, Samuel Johnson.
Yes, there he is again, for the third time on this
one website! Diderot apparently only went by one name
like Pele or Prince, but his real name was Denis,
so that is maybe why. He received the French Government
stamp of approval by having his books burned by official
decree. French Government.... now there's an oxymoron.
It must have been
an interesting night in the pub with that crowd. Samuel
Johnson, no doubt drinking a porter, one of the finest
orators of his generation, spouting on about the virtues
of pubs and the definitions of obscure words; Diderot
(with a little glass of Pinot Noir), fresh from his
latest visit with Catherine of Russia (who once paid
him fifty years' salary in advance), swinging wildly
from licentious tales of the seedy side of Paris to
hitting the nail on the head with the most daring
ethical and metaphysical speculations; Oliver Goldsmith
(a lager lout if ever there was one who only ever
wrote one decent thing, 'She Stoops to Conquer') extolling
the virtues of 'damn good British comedies'; and Garrick
himself, quietly supping his ale, practicing his lines
for King Lear.
They all died
within five years of each other.
