of the freehold of the theatre, Hare and the Kendals jointly took over the management of the house in 1879. For the first time, the theatre's reputation was steadily defied. The new lessees aimed both to amuse and to improve public taste, and in Wearing's view they achieved their aim. Under their management the St James's staged twenty-one plays: seven were new British pieces, eight adaptations of French plays, and the rest were revivals. Their first production, on 4 October 1879, was a revival of The Queen's Shilling, one of their Court successes, an adaptation of an old French comedy by Jean-François Bayard. Madge Kendal had the star part, but her husband's dashing army officer was also well liked, and The Morning Post praised Hare's "masterly" performance as the old colonel, giving "extraordinary zest and brilliancy" and "bring[ing] down the house in shouts of laughter and applause". The partnership had another early success at the beginning of 1880 with a revival of Tom Taylor's popular play, Still Waters Run Deep. The Kendals took the main roles but the laurels went to Hare in the comparatively small part of Potter, a performance described by the writer T. Edgar Pemberton as "a masterpiece of character-acting, faultless in get-up and, indeed, in all respects. … [A] keen instance of unexaggerated eccentricity". Wearing regards The Money Spinner (1881) as of particular importance to this period of the theatre's history, being the first of several of A. W. Pinero's plays staged there by Hare and the Kendals. It was regarded as daringly unconventional and a risky venture, but it caught on with the public, partly for Hare's character, the "disreputable but delightful old reprobate and card-shark" Baron Croodle. Other plays by Pinero given by the Hare-Kendal management at the St James's were The Squire (1881), The Ironmaster (1884), Mayfair (1885) and The Hobby Horse (1886). B. C. Stephenson's comedy Impulse (1883) was a substantial success and was revived by public demand two months after the end of its first run. There was a mixed reception of a rare excursion into Shakespeare, As You Like It (1885): Madge Kendal's Rosalind was much liked, Kendal's Orlando had a lukewarm reception, and Hare's Touchstone was considered by some to be the worst ever seen. Among the company in these years the actresses included Fanny Brough, Helen Maud Holt and the young May Whitty; among their male colleagues were