Career
A dramatist, was the son of a drysalter in Watling Street. After assisting
his father in business during the day, he was accustomed ‘to sally
forth in the evening with sword and bag to Ranelagh or some other public
place,’ giving himself the airs of a man of fashion. Gradually forming
higher connections, he engaged in certain very profitable speculations.
He became the constant companion of the dissolute Lord Lyttelton, and is
responsible for a story of the appearance to him of that nobleman's
ghost (see Ward's Illustrations of Human Life,
1837). He was the owner of powder magazines at Dartford, said to be the
most extensive in England, and became member of parliament for Bewdley.
Occupying a large mansion in the Green Park, formerly tenanted by Lord
Grenville, his grand entertainments and gala nights were of great
attraction to the fashionable world of London. He affected the society
of actors and authors, and was elected a member of the Beefsteak, the
Keep-the-Line, and other convivial clubs. He enjoyed a reputation for
wit and good humour, for kindliness and hospitality, while his temper
was said to be extremely irritable, and he was nervous, credulous, and
superstitious. He was the author of the following plays: the ‘Conjuror,’
a farce, produced at Drury Lane in 1774; the ‘Election,’ a musical
interlude, produced at the same theatre in the same year; ‘Belphegor, or
the Wishes,’ a comic opera, produced at Drury Lane in 1778; ‘Summer
Amusement, or an Adventure at Margate,’ written in conjunction with
William Augustus Miles, produced at the Haymarket in 1779; ‘Fire and
Water,’ a ballad opera, produced at the Haymarket in 1780;
‘Dissipation,’ a comedy, produced at Drury Lane in 1781; the ‘Baron
Kinkvervankotsdorssprakengatchdern,’ a musical comedy, founded on a
novel by Lady Craven, produced at the Haymarket in 1781; the ‘Best
Bidder,’ a farce, produced at the Haymarket in 1782; ‘Reparation,’ a
comedy, produced at Drury Lane
in 1784; ‘Better Late than Never,’ a comedy, produced at Drury Lane in
1790; the ‘Mysteries of the Castle,’ produced at Covent Garden in 1795.
In the two last-named works Andrews was assisted by Frederick Reynolds.
Andrews was less successful with his plays than with his prologues and
epilogues, which, although tawdry and vulgar enough, laden with slang
and with gross caricatures of the foibles of the day, were so skilfully
delivered by the popular comedians, Lewis and Mrs. Mattocks, as to
command great applause. Sheridan said of Andrews that he only succeeded
in the head and tail of a play and always broke down in the body. George
Colman the younger describes Andrews as ‘one of the most persevering
poetical pests,’ and his plays as ‘like his powder mills, particularly
hazardous affairs, and in great danger of going off with a sudden and
violent explosion.’ Andrews's ‘doggrel’ and ‘unmeaning ribaldry’ were
severely censured by Giffard in his ‘Baviad.’