The Bank Note

About the show

The Bank Note: Or Lessons for Ladies is a 1795 comedy play by the Irish writer and actor William Macready the Elder. Its plot draws inspiration from William Taverner's The Artful Husband as well as other earlier plays. Macready's play premiered at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden in London on 1 May 1795. The play is notable for including the first known printed use of the word 'smithereens':I join you with all my heart,—and wish he was hang'd, shot, cut in smithereens.