Love Panura in John Fletcher's The Island Princess. She probably played: Theodocia in Dryden's An Evening's Love Angellina in James Shirley's The Sisters. Hughes left the stage for Prince Rupert in 1669 or 1670. In 1676 she emerged from retirement for one busy year with the Duke's Company. For that company, she played: Octavia in Edward Ravenscroft's The Wrangling Lovers Gerana in Elkanah Settle's Pastor Fido Mirva in Elkanah Settle's Ibrahim Mrs Moneylove in Thomas Rawlins's Tom Essence Charmion in Sir Charles Sedley's Antony and Cleopatra Valeria in Aphra Behn's The Rover Leonora in Thomas Porter's The French Conjuror Cordelia in Thomas d'Urfey's A Fond Husband In popular culture A one-act play about Margaret Hughes, entitled The First Actress, was performed in 1911, at the Kingsway Theatre in London, by a group of suffragette actresses who called themselves the Pioneer Players. Ellen Terry played Nell Gwyn in this production. Jeffrey Hatcher wrote a play about Edward Kynaston entitled Compleat Female Stage Beauty (2000), and later adapted his play for the 2004 film Stage Beauty, directed by Richard Eyre and starring Claire Danes as Hughes. Hughes's first stage appearance is also discussed in the 2015 play Nell Gwynn, but she remains an offstage character. Hughes is the main character of Diana Norman's historical novel The Vizard Mask (1994). She is depicted as a stuttering American Puritan, Penitence Hurd, who becomes a successful Restoration actress. Notes and references Bibliography Gilder, Rosamond. Enter the Actress: The First Women in the Theatre. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1931. Halliday, F. E., A Shakespeare Companion 1564–1964. Baltimore, Penguin, 1964. Highfill, Philip H., Kalman A. Burnim and Edward A. Langhans. Volume 8 of A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers and Other Stage Personnel in London, 1660–1800. Southern Illinois University Press, 1982. Howe, Elizabeth. The First English Actresses: Women and Drama, 1660–1700. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992. Rennert, Hugo Albert. The Spanish Stage in the Time of Lope de Vega. Hispanic Society of America, 1909. Spencer, Charles. Prince Rupert: The Last Cavalier. London: Phoenix, 2007. . Thomson, Peter, et al., eds. The Cambridge History of British Drama. 3 Volumes, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004. Wilson, John Harold. All the King's Ladies: Actress of the Restoration. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1958 Macqueen-Pope, W. Ladies First; the Story of Woman's Conquest of the British Stage. London: Allen, 1952 1630 births 1719 deaths 17th-century English actresses English stage