Junius Brutus Booth

A great tragedian, Junius Brutus Booth (1796-1852) was also a great drunk. The English- born actor, who settled in America in 1821, was renowned for his performances of Shakespeare plays but while in New York often ended up paying a visit to the Tombs for his rowdy, inebriated behavior. An hour before curtain time, he would be released and sent back to the theater. As his cellmate notes in The Twilight Prisoner, Booth was the father of John Wilkes Booth, the infamous stage actor who ssassinated President Abraham Lincoln during a performance at Ford’s Theater in my current hometown of Washington, D.C. The photo above shows Junius (far right) in a 1864 production of Shakespeare's Julius Ceasar, which also starred John Wilkes Booth (far left).