In 1700 the London theatrical world was in crisis. The quality of English plays had deteriorated during the 40 years of restored Stuart rule. Playwrights, believing themselves to be working in the tradition of the finest Elizabethan and Jacobean dramatic poets, were churning out ranting tragedies, stripped of the subtle heroes and comic relief of Shakespeare, and amoral comedies, rarely showing the sparkling wit of Jonson. The two London theatre companies were locked in bitter competition for the small, mostly aristocratic audience, and managers compromised the poets and actors by introducing into their plays music-hall entertainments, from ventriloquists to tumblers. At the center of the crisis, however, was not the lack of playwrights of genius nor a fickle, world-weary audience; rather British drama was seriously weakened by a tradition that had since 1660 allowed the play to become the vehicle not only for spoken drama, but for large quantities of music and dance as well.