Alastair Sim
(b. Edinburgh, 9 Oct. 1900; d. London, 19 Aug. 1976)Actor and director, a professor of elocution who began a stage career at 30 and a film career at 35 ...
Arthur Bourchier
(b. Speen, Berks, 22 June 1863; d. South Africa, 14 Sept. 1927)Actor and manager; one of the founders of the Oxford University Dramatic Society. He had a busy and ...
Billie Whitelaw
(b. Coventry, 6 June 1932)Actress. The leading English-speaking interpreter of Samuel Beckett's dramas, she performed, at the Royal Court or the National Theatre, in Play (1964), Not I (1973) ...
Cathleen Nesbitt
(1888–1982), actress.The beautiful, worldly English leading lady, once reputed to be the mistress of Rupert Brooke, made her American debut in 1911 with the Irish Players of the Abbey ...
Cecil Beaton
(1904–80), designer.The noted English scenic and costume designer sometimes provided both sets and costumes for Broadway productions, as with Lady Windermere's Fan (1946), The Grass Harp (1952), ...
Charles Frohman
(1860–1915)American manager. After a series of show business jobs, Frohman and his brothers Daniel and Gustave took over Steele MacKaye's Madison Square Theatre in 1877. They devised a production ...
Comedy Theatre
London, in Panton Street, off the Haymarket. This theatre, seating 820 on four tiers, opened in 1881 and housed a series of light operas until in 1887 Beerbohm Tree took ...
Cyril Francis Maude
(1862–1951)English actor-manager. One of the best comic actors of the Edwardian period, Maude was adept at light comedy and in elderly roles. He first appeared in London in 1886 ...
Daniel Frohman
(1851–1940),American manager, who started work as a journalist but in 1880 became business manager of the Madison Square Theatre. He went into independent management in 1885 with his brother ...
‘Dot’ Boucicault
(1859–1929),English actor and dramatist, elder son of Dion Boucicault and Agnes Robertson. He made his first appearance in his father's company in New York in 1879, and was then ...
drama schools
In Britain‘Actors are born, not made’ is an oft-quoted maxim; but there is no doubt that any actor or actress, whatever natural gifts he or she may possess, can ...
Emma Gramatica
(1872–1965) and(1867–1962)Italian actresses. Emma played Sirenetta in D'Annunzio's Gioconda (1899), acted in top touring companies with Duse, Ruggeri, and her sister Irma, and formed her own troupes. ...
Empire Theatre
New York playhouse designed by J. B. McElfatrick for Charles Frohman, completed in 1893 at Broadway and 40th Street, heralding the theatre district's move uptown. Featuring electric lighting and a ...
eroticism in the theatre
Some intrinsic link between theatre and sexuality has often been proposed. One might look at the déclassée actresses of Schnitzler's Vienna with their dizzying whirl of class and sexual transgression ...
Ethel Barrymore
(1879–1959), actress.Born in Philadelphia, daughter of Maurice Barrymore and Georgiana Drew Barrymore, she made her stage debut in 1894 playing opposite her grandmother Mrs. Drew in The Rivals. After ...
farce
A form of popular comedy with its distant roots in the improvisations which actors introduced into the text of medieval religious dramas (the word is derived from the word farce, ‘stuffing’). Later ...
Garrick Theatre
London.1 In Leman Street, Whitechapel. This theatre, which took its name from its proximity to the old Goodman's Fields Theatre where Garrick made his début, opened in 1831. Burnt ...
George Alexander
(b. Reading, 19 June 1858; d. Chorley Wood, Herts, 16 March 1918)Actor and manager. Having acted with Irving at the Lyceum, he became manager of the Royal Avenue and ...
George Arliss
(1868–1946),English actor, now chiefly remembered for his films, who also had a successful career on the stage in London and New York. He made his first appearance in 1886 ...
Gladys Cooper
(b. Lewisham, London, 18 Dec. 1888; d. Henley, Oxon, 17 Dec. 1971)Actress and manager. She was a much photographed postcard beauty when she was in the chorus and later ...
