Frederick George Younge

Frederick George Younge (12 February 1825 – 6 December 1870) was an English comic actor, in Australia for six years. History Younge was born in London, a son of Richard and Sarah Elizabeth Younge. Younge and his wife Emma arrived in Melbourne in February 1858 by the ship Norfolk, first playing at the Theatre Royal, Melbourne, where his first success was as the butler "Blenkinsopp", in Tom Taylor's An Unequal Match, starring Ellen Mortyn in the role in which Lillie Langtry made her American debut in 1882. He was a "hit" in a burlesque of Lalla Rookh as the villain "Khorsambad", not found in the poem, and "portrayed with the broadest of pencils and the strongest of colours". and James Planché's The Yellow Dwarf, though he and Miss Mortimer were badly let down by the rest of the cast and the show closed after a few nights. He left the Theatre Royal in May 1859, having leased the Olympic Theatre in conjunction with his brother R. Younge. His farewell benefit was disrupted by the band refusing to play, Younge having advertised that the bands of the two theatres would appear together. The ill-feeling between the two managements was still evident two months later when G. V. Brooke scotched plans to combine funds raised by the two theatres to benefit the daughter of Ellen Mortyn, who died 22 June 1859. At his own benefit he played a farce, The Windmill in September 1859, Melbourne's theatres were in a bind: because the play-going public was small in number, turnover of plays had to be rapid so the cost of mounting a new production could not be spread over weeks or months. Prevailing wisdom was that three theatres was one too many. Presentations at The Olympic in its first three months included Falconer's Extremes, Fitzball's The World and Stage, Boucicault's Janet Pride, Byron's Mazeppa and Brough's burlesque Medea. A partial solution was to take the productions to country areas: the gold-mining towns had an appetite for theatre and didn't mind spending money on a good show. Younge also had six seasons in New South Wales in the period 1862–1865. "A Determined Dogberry" The Sydney telegram in Tuesday's Argus informs us that " A criminal information has been laid against Mr FRED. YOUNGE, the actor, by Alderman ASHWORTH, of Bathurst, for impersonating him as an ass in a local farce." Let the Bathurst Alderman — think of a Bathurst Alderman ! — file an information for libel against himself forthwith.