Petter Stenborg
| Petter Stenborg | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Petter Stenborg 1719 Sweden |
| Died | 1781 (aged c. 62) Sweden |
| Spouse(s) | Anna Sara Krüger |
Petter Stenborg (1719 – 6 November 1781) was a Swedish actor and theater director who played an important role of the continuation of the native speaking theater in Sweden. He is regarded as one of the greatest pioneers in the theatre-history of his country; during the period of "exile" for the native-language theatre in the reign of king Adolf Frederick of Sweden, he kept the Swedish-speaking theatre alive during the 1750s and 1760s, and thus was the link between the closure of the first Swedish theatre in Bollhuset in 1753, and the opening of the first lasting theatre/opera in 1773.
Originally a soldier in the Royal guard, he became a member of the first troupe of Swedish actors at the theater of Bollhuset in in 1746. In the Bollhus Theater he performed in Syrinx by Lars Lalin or Peter Lindhal, composed by Johan Ohl, opposite Elisabeth Lillström in 1747–48, (also the debut for Elisabeth Olin), were called one of the most valuable of the theater's actors by the director Charles Langlois in 1748 and is believed to have had the leading role in Slafve-ön (The Slave island) by Marivaux in 1749–50, though the details of his occupation in Bollhuset are unclear.
When the Swedish troupe, active on the theater since 1737, was fired in 1753 and replaced with a French troupe, the Du Londel Troupe, half of the staff left for the country side to work as a travelling theater company under Peter Lindahl and Johan Bergholtz. After an attempt to be an inkeeper, Petter Stenborg applied and was given permission to lead a theater company in the city of Stockholm, and between 1758 and for twenty years forward, he performed as the director of a troupe of native actors in both Stockholm, in temporary locals, and touring the country, mostly in Finland, in companionship with the tight-rope-walker von Carl Fredrik von Eckenberg; when the troupe visited Åbo in 1761, it was probably the first time a theatre troupe visited this part of the country.
He is most known for his activity in Stockholm, where he preserved a Swedish speaking theater, just as the theater company of Peter Lindahl did in the country side, during a period when the French culture otherwise dominated the Swedish stage. His theater company did not have a very good reputation; the actors were from: "jail, soldiers, alcoholized lawyers, servants and washing-women", the costumes was from ragshops and the music from public-houses, (were they often performed) and the plays was described as vulgar. This judgements, however, was given by members of the upper classes, who preferred the French Theatre in Bollhuset, but the Stenborg Company was appreciated by the public, who could not understand the French troupe at Bollhuset, and they represented a native speaking theater in the 1750s and 1760s. They are also perhaps the first troupe to have performed in Finland, though this was only temporary.
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