The theater was packed from curiosity, and this is what the Louisville Courier said of the performance next morning.

Louisville Courier, November 28th, 1875.

“We can scarcely bring ourselves to speak of the young actress, who came before the footlights last night, with the coolness of a critic and a spectator.  An interest in native genius and young endeavor, in courage and brave effort that arrives from so near us—­our own city—­precludes the possibility of standing outside of sympathy, and peering in with analyzing and judicial glance.  But we do not think that any man of judgment who witnessed Miss Anderson’s acting of Juliet, can doubt that she is a great actress.  In the latter scenes she interpreted the very spirit and soul of tragedy, and thrilled the whole house into silence by the depth of her passion and her power.  She is essentially a tragic genius, and began really to act only after the scene in which her nurse tells Juliet of what she supposes is her lover’s death.  The quick gasp, the terrified stricken face, the tottering step, the passionate and heart-rending accents were nature’s own marks of affecting overwhelming grief.  Miss Anderson has great power over the lower tones of her rich voice.  Her whisper electrifies and penetrates; her hurried words in the passion of the scene, where she drinks the sleeping potion, and afterward in the catastrophe at the end, although very far below conversational pitch, came to the ear with distinctness and with wonderful effect.  In the final scene she reached the climax of her acting, which, from the time of Tybalt’s death to the end, was full of tragic power that we have never seen excelled.  It will be observed that we have placed the merit of this actress (in our opinion) for the most part in her deeper and more somber powers, and despite the high praise that we more gladly offer as her due, we cannot be blind to her faults in the presentation of last evening.  She is, undoubtedly, a great actress, and last night evidenced a magnificent genius, more especially remarkable on account of her extreme youth; but whether she is a great Juliet is, indeed, more doubtful.  We can imagine her as personating Lady Macbeth superbly, and hope soon to witness her in the part.  As Juliet, her conception is almost perfect, as evinced by her rare and exceptional taste and intuitive understanding of the text.  But her enactment of the earlier scenes lacks the exuberance and earnest joyfulness of the pure and glowing Flower of Italy, with all her fanciful conceits and delightful and loving ardor.

“We could not, in Miss Anderson’s rendition of the balcony scene, help feeling in the tones of her voice, an almost stern foreboding of their saddening fates—­a foreboding stranger than that which falls as a shadow to all ecstatic youthful hope and joy.  Other faults—­as evident, undoubtedly, to her and to her advisers, as to us—­are for the most part superficial, and will disappear in a little further experience.  A first appearance, coupled with so much merit and youth, may well excuse many things.