the management of H. L. Bateman, and then Bateman's widow. Despite early success with his scenery for the melodrama The Bells, in which Henry Irving made his name, Craven's opportunities were restricted until Irving became lessee and manager of the Lyceum in 1878. Craven, with Irving's support, carried scenic realism and stage illusion to new levels. For some productions, Irving commissioned designs from well-known painters, which Craven would then re-create as scenery. These artists included Ford Madox Brown, Edward Burne-Jones and Lawrence Alma-Tadema. For other productions, Craven created the original designs as well as executing them. For his scenes in Irving's 1888 production of Faust, he visited Nuremberg and the Harz mountains "with admirable results." Irving became well known for his Shakespeare productions, for which Craven painted strongly naturalistic scenery, which won critical applause and occasionally threatened to outshine the performers. His productions included Hamlet (1874 and 1878), The Merchant of Venice (1879), Romeo and Juliet (1882), Macbeth (1888), King Henry VIII (1892), King Lear (1892), Cymbeline (1895), and Coriolanus (1902). By the mid-1880s, Craven was recognised as among the élite of his art. The theatrical newspaper The Era wrote, "In the art of scene painting England stands paramount. Neither Paris, not Germany, nor New York can commence to approach, let alone rival, the work of the men who furnish London with its stage scenery. Such men as … Hawes Craven … are artists in the truest and best sense of the word." For Richard D'Oyly Carte, Craven painted the scenery for seven of the Savoy operas. Carte's new theatre, the Savoy, built in 1881, was lit by electricity, unlike the Lyceum, which remained gas-lit for some years. Craven adjusted his techniques to match the stronger light produced by electric bulbs. For the Savoy, Craven painted scenery for Princess Ida (1884), The Mikado (1885), Ruddigore (1887), a revival of H.M.S. Pinafore (1887), The Yeomen of the Guard (1888), The Gondoliers (1890) and Utopia, Limited (1893). Settings for these works ranged from a mediaeval Hungarian castle to a Japanese garden, the interior of a picture gallery, a Royal Naval ship modelled on H.M.S. Victory, the Tower of London, the Piazzetta in Venice, and a South Sea island. Also for Carte, Craven designed and painted scenery for Arthur Sullivan's grand opera, Ivanhoe, at the Royal English Opera House in 1891. Later years The pinnacle of theatrical realism was reached, with Craven's help,