Chris Enss's Blog - Posts Tagged "actresses"
Inventing Maude
Enter to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
“I wish you could have seen Maudie that night. She was simply wriggling with excitement. It was all I could do to keep her in her dressing-room until the cue came for her to go on.... Just before the curtain went up I made her repeat her first-act lines to me. She had learned them like a parrot, to be sure, but she spoke them like a true little actress.”
Annie Adams’s comments about her daughter Maude’s first full performance at the age of 5 in November, 1877 at the Metropolitan Theatre in San Francisco.
The Palmer Theatre House in New York was jammed to the doors by a curious clientele all there to see the new actress working opposite the most celebrated actor of the day, John Drew. It was October 3, 1892 when the stunning, elfin-like Maude Adams took to the stage in the play “The Masked Ball.” At the end of the evening Drew would be congratulated on his admirable acting job, but Maude would score a hit that would be greater than his entire career.
Her performance was so successful the applause lasted for a full two minutes after she made her exit. She was on her way to becoming a star and local newspapers predicted her talent would be talked about for years to come.
“Her performance (in the Masked Ball) was a revelation. There is one scene in the second act where in order to punish her husband for some ante nuptial remarks of his she has to pretend that she is drunk. It was just touch and go whether the scene ruined the play or not. It would have been hard to devise a more crucial test for an actress of even the wildest experience and the greatest skill. In order to carry off this scene successfully it was necessary for the wife to appear to be drunk and yet be a gentlewoman at the same time. Miss Adams achieved this feat. If Miss Adams had done nothing else throughout the entire play than that one scene it would have stamped her as a comedienne of the first order forever.”
The New York Daily News - October 4, 1892
Maude Adams’s stage career began at the tender age of nine months. The play was called “The Lost Child” and the baby that was playing the lead became fussy and could not continue in the show after the first act. Maude’s mother, Annie, who was the female lead in the production, suggested her daughter take the child’s place. Maude was so good that the other baby received her two weeks notice immediately after the play ended. For the remainder of that season all the infant roles were played by little Miss Maude.
To learn more about Maude Adams and the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
“I wish you could have seen Maudie that night. She was simply wriggling with excitement. It was all I could do to keep her in her dressing-room until the cue came for her to go on.... Just before the curtain went up I made her repeat her first-act lines to me. She had learned them like a parrot, to be sure, but she spoke them like a true little actress.”
Annie Adams’s comments about her daughter Maude’s first full performance at the age of 5 in November, 1877 at the Metropolitan Theatre in San Francisco.
The Palmer Theatre House in New York was jammed to the doors by a curious clientele all there to see the new actress working opposite the most celebrated actor of the day, John Drew. It was October 3, 1892 when the stunning, elfin-like Maude Adams took to the stage in the play “The Masked Ball.” At the end of the evening Drew would be congratulated on his admirable acting job, but Maude would score a hit that would be greater than his entire career.
Her performance was so successful the applause lasted for a full two minutes after she made her exit. She was on her way to becoming a star and local newspapers predicted her talent would be talked about for years to come.
“Her performance (in the Masked Ball) was a revelation. There is one scene in the second act where in order to punish her husband for some ante nuptial remarks of his she has to pretend that she is drunk. It was just touch and go whether the scene ruined the play or not. It would have been hard to devise a more crucial test for an actress of even the wildest experience and the greatest skill. In order to carry off this scene successfully it was necessary for the wife to appear to be drunk and yet be a gentlewoman at the same time. Miss Adams achieved this feat. If Miss Adams had done nothing else throughout the entire play than that one scene it would have stamped her as a comedienne of the first order forever.”
The New York Daily News - October 4, 1892
Maude Adams’s stage career began at the tender age of nine months. The play was called “The Lost Child” and the baby that was playing the lead became fussy and could not continue in the show after the first act. Maude’s mother, Annie, who was the female lead in the production, suggested her daughter take the child’s place. Maude was so good that the other baby received her two weeks notice immediately after the play ended. For the remainder of that season all the infant roles were played by little Miss Maude.
To learn more about Maude Adams and the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Entertaining Women
Enter to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Mary Todd Lincoln screamed. Clara Harris, seated in the balcony adjacent to President Abraham Lincoln’s wife, jumped out of her seat and rushed to the hysterical woman’s side. “He needs water!” Harris cried out to the audience at Ford’s Theatre staring up at her in stunned silence. “The President’s been murdered!” The full, ghastly truth of the announcement washed over the congregation, and the scene that ensued was as tumultuous and as terrible as one of Dante’s pictures of hell. Some women fainted, others uttered piercing shrieks and cries for vengeance, and unmeaning shouts for help burst from the mouth of men. Beautiful, dark-haired actress, Laura Keene hurried out from the wings dressed in a striking, maroon colored gown under which was a hoop skirt and number of petticoats that made the garment sway as she raced to a spot center stage. She paused for a moment before the footlights to entreat the audience to be calm. “For God’s sake, have presence of mind, and keep your places, and all will be well.” Laura’s voice was a brief voice of reason in a chaotic scene. Few could bring their panic under control. Mary Lincoln was in shock and sat on her knees beside her mortally wounded husband rocking back and forth. She cradled her arms in her hands and sobbed uncontrollably.
Laura ordered the gas lights around the theatre turned up. Patrons bolted toward the building’s exits. As they poured out into the streets, they told passersby what had occurred. Crowds began to gather, and there were just as many people coming back into the theatre as were trying to leave. Laura stepped down off the stage and began fighting against the current of people pressing all around her. Word began to pass through the frantic group that John Wilkes Booth was responsible for shooting the President. Sharp words were exchanged between the individuals coming in and going out the building. Insane grief began to course through the theatre, and ugly suppositions started to form. “An actor did this!” Laura wrote in her memoirs about what people were saying at the event. “The management must have been in on the plot! Burn the damn theatre! Burn it now!” Laura disregarded the remarks and somehow worked her way to the rear box where Mr. Lincoln was and stepped inside.
To learn more about Laura Keene and the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Attend the national launch of the book Entertaining Women on Saturday, October 17, 2015 at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum in Nevada City, California from Noon-2 p.m. For more information call 530-477-8859.
Mary Todd Lincoln screamed. Clara Harris, seated in the balcony adjacent to President Abraham Lincoln’s wife, jumped out of her seat and rushed to the hysterical woman’s side. “He needs water!” Harris cried out to the audience at Ford’s Theatre staring up at her in stunned silence. “The President’s been murdered!” The full, ghastly truth of the announcement washed over the congregation, and the scene that ensued was as tumultuous and as terrible as one of Dante’s pictures of hell. Some women fainted, others uttered piercing shrieks and cries for vengeance, and unmeaning shouts for help burst from the mouth of men. Beautiful, dark-haired actress, Laura Keene hurried out from the wings dressed in a striking, maroon colored gown under which was a hoop skirt and number of petticoats that made the garment sway as she raced to a spot center stage. She paused for a moment before the footlights to entreat the audience to be calm. “For God’s sake, have presence of mind, and keep your places, and all will be well.” Laura’s voice was a brief voice of reason in a chaotic scene. Few could bring their panic under control. Mary Lincoln was in shock and sat on her knees beside her mortally wounded husband rocking back and forth. She cradled her arms in her hands and sobbed uncontrollably.
Laura ordered the gas lights around the theatre turned up. Patrons bolted toward the building’s exits. As they poured out into the streets, they told passersby what had occurred. Crowds began to gather, and there were just as many people coming back into the theatre as were trying to leave. Laura stepped down off the stage and began fighting against the current of people pressing all around her. Word began to pass through the frantic group that John Wilkes Booth was responsible for shooting the President. Sharp words were exchanged between the individuals coming in and going out the building. Insane grief began to course through the theatre, and ugly suppositions started to form. “An actor did this!” Laura wrote in her memoirs about what people were saying at the event. “The management must have been in on the plot! Burn the damn theatre! Burn it now!” Laura disregarded the remarks and somehow worked her way to the rear box where Mr. Lincoln was and stepped inside.
To learn more about Laura Keene and the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Attend the national launch of the book Entertaining Women on Saturday, October 17, 2015 at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum in Nevada City, California from Noon-2 p.m. For more information call 530-477-8859.
The Talented Divorcee
Enter to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Shakespearean actor Edwin Forrest rifled through the desk drawer in the sitting room of the New York home he shared with this wife, socialite turned actress and theatre manager Catherine Norton Sinclair. The contents of the drawer belonged to Catherine, but Edwin wasn’t interested in maintaining her privacy. In his frantic search, he uncovered a worn and rumpled letter written to his bride from fellow thespian, George Jamieson. “And now, sweetest, our brief dream is over; and such a dream!” the correspondence began. “Have we not known real bliss? Have we not realized what poets have to set up as an ideal state, giving full license to their imagination, scarcely believing in its reality? Have we not experienced the truth that ecstasy is not fiction? And oh, what an additional delight to think, no, to know, that I have made some happy hours with you… With these considerations, dearest, our separation, though painful will not be unendurable; I am happy, and with you to remember and the blissful anticipation of seeing you again, shall remain so…” Jamieson’s declaration of his feelings for Catherine ended with a promise to do “my utmost to be worthy of your love.”
Edwin reread the letter with poised dignity and on its completion sank into the nearest chair, cursing the day he had met the woman he had married. After a few moments, he arose and frantically paced about the room. He denounced Catherine for her infidelity and fell to the floor weeping uncontrollably. According to Edwin’s biographer William Rounseville Alger, Edwin was “struck to the heart with surprise, grief, and rage.” Catherine’s take on Edwin’s reaction and the circumstances surrounding her husband reading the letter are vastly different from Alger’s account. Almost from the moment the pair met, Edwin was jealous of everyone Catherine knew in her social standing and did not shy away from making a scene.
Catherine was born near London in 1818 to Scottish parents who had four children in all. Her father, John Sinclair, was a well-known vocalist who had toured America in 1831 and 1833. Historical records note that Catherine was endowed with natural beauty, and, whatever the quality and quantity of her formal and social education, she had in her teens acquired a sparkle and vivacity that attracted men. She was popular and well-liked and attended formal soirees, theatre openings, and art exhibits with a myriad of friends from all walks of life.
To learn more about how Catherine Norton Sinclair’s acting career began and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Attend the national launch of the book Entertaining Women on Saturday, October 17, 2015 at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum in Nevada City, California from Noon-2 p.m. For more information call 530-477-8859.
Shakespearean actor Edwin Forrest rifled through the desk drawer in the sitting room of the New York home he shared with this wife, socialite turned actress and theatre manager Catherine Norton Sinclair. The contents of the drawer belonged to Catherine, but Edwin wasn’t interested in maintaining her privacy. In his frantic search, he uncovered a worn and rumpled letter written to his bride from fellow thespian, George Jamieson. “And now, sweetest, our brief dream is over; and such a dream!” the correspondence began. “Have we not known real bliss? Have we not realized what poets have to set up as an ideal state, giving full license to their imagination, scarcely believing in its reality? Have we not experienced the truth that ecstasy is not fiction? And oh, what an additional delight to think, no, to know, that I have made some happy hours with you… With these considerations, dearest, our separation, though painful will not be unendurable; I am happy, and with you to remember and the blissful anticipation of seeing you again, shall remain so…” Jamieson’s declaration of his feelings for Catherine ended with a promise to do “my utmost to be worthy of your love.”
Edwin reread the letter with poised dignity and on its completion sank into the nearest chair, cursing the day he had met the woman he had married. After a few moments, he arose and frantically paced about the room. He denounced Catherine for her infidelity and fell to the floor weeping uncontrollably. According to Edwin’s biographer William Rounseville Alger, Edwin was “struck to the heart with surprise, grief, and rage.” Catherine’s take on Edwin’s reaction and the circumstances surrounding her husband reading the letter are vastly different from Alger’s account. Almost from the moment the pair met, Edwin was jealous of everyone Catherine knew in her social standing and did not shy away from making a scene.
Catherine was born near London in 1818 to Scottish parents who had four children in all. Her father, John Sinclair, was a well-known vocalist who had toured America in 1831 and 1833. Historical records note that Catherine was endowed with natural beauty, and, whatever the quality and quantity of her formal and social education, she had in her teens acquired a sparkle and vivacity that attracted men. She was popular and well-liked and attended formal soirees, theatre openings, and art exhibits with a myriad of friends from all walks of life.
To learn more about how Catherine Norton Sinclair’s acting career began and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Attend the national launch of the book Entertaining Women on Saturday, October 17, 2015 at the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad Museum in Nevada City, California from Noon-2 p.m. For more information call 530-477-8859.
The Actress in Trousers
It’s time to enter to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
It was a cold evening in the early spring of 1859 when the well-known actress Charlotte Cushman debuted in Shakespeare’s Hamlet at the Metropolitan Theatre in San Francisco. The city’s most wealthy and influential people arrived by carriage. Throngs of curious bystanders eager to see the aristocrat hovered around the walkway leading into the building. The fine, brick edifice rivaled the most notable on the East Coast.
Inside, the grand hall was fitted with the most ornate fixtures and could seat comfortably upwards to a thousand people. From the private boxes to the gallery, every part of the immense building was crowded to excess. Charlotte Cushman was recognized by theatre goers as the “greatest living tragic actress,” and everyone who was anyone wanted to see her perform. Several women had won fame with their impersonations of male characters in various dramas, but critics and fans alike regarded Charlotte as the best of them all.
In 1845, a theatrical reviewer in London had written about one of Charlotte’s performances in glowing terms. “Miss Cushman’s Hamlet must henceforth be ranked among her best performances. Every scene was warm and animated, and at once conveyed the impression of the character. There was no forced or elaborate attempt at feeling or expression. You were addressed by the whole mind; passion spoke in every feature, and the illusion was forcible and perfect.”
The audience that flocked to see the exceptionally talented Charlotte in California was not only treated to a “forcible and perfect” interpretation of Hamlet, but that evening they were also treated to a display of the actress’ temper.
To learn just what caused Charlotte’s temper to explode, how her acting career began, and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
It was a cold evening in the early spring of 1859 when the well-known actress Charlotte Cushman debuted in Shakespeare’s Hamlet at the Metropolitan Theatre in San Francisco. The city’s most wealthy and influential people arrived by carriage. Throngs of curious bystanders eager to see the aristocrat hovered around the walkway leading into the building. The fine, brick edifice rivaled the most notable on the East Coast.
Inside, the grand hall was fitted with the most ornate fixtures and could seat comfortably upwards to a thousand people. From the private boxes to the gallery, every part of the immense building was crowded to excess. Charlotte Cushman was recognized by theatre goers as the “greatest living tragic actress,” and everyone who was anyone wanted to see her perform. Several women had won fame with their impersonations of male characters in various dramas, but critics and fans alike regarded Charlotte as the best of them all.
In 1845, a theatrical reviewer in London had written about one of Charlotte’s performances in glowing terms. “Miss Cushman’s Hamlet must henceforth be ranked among her best performances. Every scene was warm and animated, and at once conveyed the impression of the character. There was no forced or elaborate attempt at feeling or expression. You were addressed by the whole mind; passion spoke in every feature, and the illusion was forcible and perfect.”
The audience that flocked to see the exceptionally talented Charlotte in California was not only treated to a “forcible and perfect” interpretation of Hamlet, but that evening they were also treated to a display of the actress’ temper.
To learn just what caused Charlotte’s temper to explode, how her acting career began, and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
The Screen Siren
Enter to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Actress Jeanne Eagels was an attractive, petite entertainer with delicate features. According to her friends and peers she was childish, adult, reasonable, unreasonable – usually one when she should be the other, but always unpredictable. The Oscar nominated actress was born Amelia Jean Eagles on June 26, 1890, in Kansas City, Missouri. She was the second of four children born to Edward Eagles, a carpenter, and Julia Sullivan Eagles.* Edward and Julia were from Kentucky and both had an ancestry that could be traced back to France and Ireland.
As a child Jeanne was frail, but mischievous. There wasn’t a boy on the block that wasn’t afraid of her. According to the sole biography written about the famed thespian by Edward Doherty and entitled The Rain Girl, Jeanne was a tomboy. She liked to climb onto the roofs of barns, swing from the limbs of trees, walk fences, and skip from rafter to rafter in the attics of the buildings in the neighborhood.
“She was six or seven when she fell from a fence she and her sister were walking on,” Doherty wrote about Jeanne. “She broke her right arm and ran home to her mother. A doctor was called, but he wasn’t the best in the world. He set the arm, but it pained her all the rest of her life, especially when it was wet. And it was wet every night and every matinee for five years when Jeanne performed in her most recognizable stage role, that of Sadie Thompson in the play Rain.” Throughout the duration of her career, Jeanne told newspaper and magazine reporters that she had broken her arm while traveling with the circus. She claimed she’d fallen off a white horse she was riding around the ring. It was the first of many stories she herself would contribute to the legend of Jeanne Eagels.
To learn more about Jeanne Eagels and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Actress Jeanne Eagels was an attractive, petite entertainer with delicate features. According to her friends and peers she was childish, adult, reasonable, unreasonable – usually one when she should be the other, but always unpredictable. The Oscar nominated actress was born Amelia Jean Eagles on June 26, 1890, in Kansas City, Missouri. She was the second of four children born to Edward Eagles, a carpenter, and Julia Sullivan Eagles.* Edward and Julia were from Kentucky and both had an ancestry that could be traced back to France and Ireland.
As a child Jeanne was frail, but mischievous. There wasn’t a boy on the block that wasn’t afraid of her. According to the sole biography written about the famed thespian by Edward Doherty and entitled The Rain Girl, Jeanne was a tomboy. She liked to climb onto the roofs of barns, swing from the limbs of trees, walk fences, and skip from rafter to rafter in the attics of the buildings in the neighborhood.
“She was six or seven when she fell from a fence she and her sister were walking on,” Doherty wrote about Jeanne. “She broke her right arm and ran home to her mother. A doctor was called, but he wasn’t the best in the world. He set the arm, but it pained her all the rest of her life, especially when it was wet. And it was wet every night and every matinee for five years when Jeanne performed in her most recognizable stage role, that of Sadie Thompson in the play Rain.” Throughout the duration of her career, Jeanne told newspaper and magazine reporters that she had broken her arm while traveling with the circus. She claimed she’d fallen off a white horse she was riding around the ring. It was the first of many stories she herself would contribute to the legend of Jeanne Eagels.
To learn more about Jeanne Eagels and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
The American Beauty
Enter now to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
If a woman gets the reputation of being a professional beauty, it is hard work to live up to it.
Lillian Russell, The Theatre Magazine, 1905
The green silk robe shimmered in the light of the dressing room. Adjusting the neckline, Lillian Russell glanced into the mirror and considered the interviewer’s question about beauties never appreciating their good looks. “I think they do,” she countered. “They are glad to have it, as they are grateful for any other gift. I am pleased and gratified when someone says I look nice.”
Looking “nice” was a part of the job that the corn-fed beauty from America’s heartland never forgot. The costume she wore in the second act of Lady Teazle showed off her abundant charms to perfection. The green silk, the large plumed hat, and the ebony walking stick adorned with orange ribbons were but a pretty frame for the statuesque blond performer whose sumptuous exterior diverted attention from a sharp mind and a warm heart.
As she continued dressing for the second act of the play, she answered questions from Miss Ada Patterson, longtime reporter for The Theatre Magazine. “How,” asked Patterson, “had a girl from Iowa earned the name “America's Beauty”?
“I came away from Clinton when I was six months old, and I don’t remember much about it,” she told the reporter. A backward glance over a smooth white shoulder gave a glimpse of the famous smile, curving perfect lips. A spark of mischief flashed in the beautiful, blue eyes framed by long, thick eyelashes as she added, “Although there are Tabbies who say they remember my life there when I was six months old sixty years ago.”
The feature later published in The Theatre Magazine of February 1905 never came right out and said that America's most famous beauty was now forty-three years old. Behind her lay phenomenal success as well as heartbreak and failure, yet none of it dimmed the glow. The interviewer that day compared the throat and shoulders rising from the green silk to the Venus de Milo. The pure soprano voice still hit high C with ease, and, after more than twenty-three years on stage, the name Lillian Russell still drew people to the theater.
To learn more about Lillian Russell and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
If a woman gets the reputation of being a professional beauty, it is hard work to live up to it.
Lillian Russell, The Theatre Magazine, 1905
The green silk robe shimmered in the light of the dressing room. Adjusting the neckline, Lillian Russell glanced into the mirror and considered the interviewer’s question about beauties never appreciating their good looks. “I think they do,” she countered. “They are glad to have it, as they are grateful for any other gift. I am pleased and gratified when someone says I look nice.”
Looking “nice” was a part of the job that the corn-fed beauty from America’s heartland never forgot. The costume she wore in the second act of Lady Teazle showed off her abundant charms to perfection. The green silk, the large plumed hat, and the ebony walking stick adorned with orange ribbons were but a pretty frame for the statuesque blond performer whose sumptuous exterior diverted attention from a sharp mind and a warm heart.
As she continued dressing for the second act of the play, she answered questions from Miss Ada Patterson, longtime reporter for The Theatre Magazine. “How,” asked Patterson, “had a girl from Iowa earned the name “America's Beauty”?
“I came away from Clinton when I was six months old, and I don’t remember much about it,” she told the reporter. A backward glance over a smooth white shoulder gave a glimpse of the famous smile, curving perfect lips. A spark of mischief flashed in the beautiful, blue eyes framed by long, thick eyelashes as she added, “Although there are Tabbies who say they remember my life there when I was six months old sixty years ago.”
The feature later published in The Theatre Magazine of February 1905 never came right out and said that America's most famous beauty was now forty-three years old. Behind her lay phenomenal success as well as heartbreak and failure, yet none of it dimmed the glow. The interviewer that day compared the throat and shoulders rising from the green silk to the Venus de Milo. The pure soprano voice still hit high C with ease, and, after more than twenty-three years on stage, the name Lillian Russell still drew people to the theater.
To learn more about Lillian Russell and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
The Devine Sarah
Only four more days left to enter to win a copy of the book Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
The pliant figure leaned over the ship's rail, expressive eyes intent on the blue-green waters of the harbor. A mass of wavy light-brown hair with tints of gold lifted and curled with every breeze, its arrangement a matter of complete indifference to the angler. Suddenly the slender form froze, breath held, and then, with a quick yank and a breaking smile, lifted the rod and hauled a wriggling fish aboard the Cabrillo. Exclaiming in French, dark eyes sparkling with pleasure, Sarah Bernhardt ordered her catch, small as it was, to be prepared for dinner.
It was May 19, 1906, and the farewell production of Camille was scheduled for a few hours later at the ocean auditorium built on the water at Venice, California. Sarah stayed, and fished, at the hotel built like a ship, and she performed in the adjacent theater on the wharf at the seaside resort, Venice of America. Having caught a fish, Sarah wended her way to her quarters. Piled high in her dressing room were the results of a recent shopping trip to the Oriental bazaar nearby: silk and crepe matinee coats of pink and pale blue and mauve, all embroidered with butterflies and bamboo designs.
The tiny window in the dressing room provided a sparkling view of the ocean, and the streaming sunshine picked out details of the furnishings: a repoussé silver powder box, containers of pigment, eyebrow pencils, silver rouge pots, and scattered jewelry twinkling in the light. The tragedienne who attracted huge audiences wherever she went swooped up a small tan and white fox terrier, wriggling with joy at her return, and snuggled it close for a moment as she related the happy details of her fishing venture to a visiting reporter. Then she put down the small dog and closed her mind to the fun waiting outside the porthole.
Within moments Sarah became Marguerite Gautier, filled with the sadness and torment of the beautiful French courtesan in Camille, the play by Alexandre Dumas that became her signature role, performed all over the world more than three thousand times. Sarah’s ability to sink fully into the character of the play made the tragic death scene so convincing that it became a trademark for “the Divine Sarah.”
No one played tragedy with such believable intensity as Sarah Bernhardt, and no one brought as much passion and enthusiasm to the pursuit of pleasure. From fishing on the Southern California coast to bear hunting in the woods outside Seattle, on every western tour the French actress indulged in some kind of adventure. Sarah Bernhardt threw herself into life with the same characteristic energy she put into her stage appearances. Yet she often slept in a coffin, preparing for that final sleep.
To learn more about Sarah Bernhardt and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
The pliant figure leaned over the ship's rail, expressive eyes intent on the blue-green waters of the harbor. A mass of wavy light-brown hair with tints of gold lifted and curled with every breeze, its arrangement a matter of complete indifference to the angler. Suddenly the slender form froze, breath held, and then, with a quick yank and a breaking smile, lifted the rod and hauled a wriggling fish aboard the Cabrillo. Exclaiming in French, dark eyes sparkling with pleasure, Sarah Bernhardt ordered her catch, small as it was, to be prepared for dinner.
It was May 19, 1906, and the farewell production of Camille was scheduled for a few hours later at the ocean auditorium built on the water at Venice, California. Sarah stayed, and fished, at the hotel built like a ship, and she performed in the adjacent theater on the wharf at the seaside resort, Venice of America. Having caught a fish, Sarah wended her way to her quarters. Piled high in her dressing room were the results of a recent shopping trip to the Oriental bazaar nearby: silk and crepe matinee coats of pink and pale blue and mauve, all embroidered with butterflies and bamboo designs.
The tiny window in the dressing room provided a sparkling view of the ocean, and the streaming sunshine picked out details of the furnishings: a repoussé silver powder box, containers of pigment, eyebrow pencils, silver rouge pots, and scattered jewelry twinkling in the light. The tragedienne who attracted huge audiences wherever she went swooped up a small tan and white fox terrier, wriggling with joy at her return, and snuggled it close for a moment as she related the happy details of her fishing venture to a visiting reporter. Then she put down the small dog and closed her mind to the fun waiting outside the porthole.
Within moments Sarah became Marguerite Gautier, filled with the sadness and torment of the beautiful French courtesan in Camille, the play by Alexandre Dumas that became her signature role, performed all over the world more than three thousand times. Sarah’s ability to sink fully into the character of the play made the tragic death scene so convincing that it became a trademark for “the Divine Sarah.”
No one played tragedy with such believable intensity as Sarah Bernhardt, and no one brought as much passion and enthusiasm to the pursuit of pleasure. From fishing on the Southern California coast to bear hunting in the woods outside Seattle, on every western tour the French actress indulged in some kind of adventure. Sarah Bernhardt threw herself into life with the same characteristic energy she put into her stage appearances. Yet she often slept in a coffin, preparing for that final sleep.
To learn more about Sarah Bernhardt and about the other talented performers of the Old West read Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Entert to Win a Copy of Entertaining Women
Enter to win a copy of the book
Entertaining Women:
Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West
The pliant figure leaned over the ship’s rail, expressive eyes intent on the blue-green waters of the harbor. A mass of wavy light-brown hair with tints of gold lifted and curled with every breeze, its arrangement a matter of complete indifference to the angler. Suddenly the slender form froze, breath held, and then, with a quick yank and a breaking smile, lifted the rod and hauled a wriggling fish aboard the Cabrillo. Exclaiming in French, dark eyes sparkling with pleasure, Sarah Bernhardt ordered her catch, small as it was, to be prepared for dinner.
It was May 19, 1906, and the farewell production of Camille was scheduled for a few hours later at the ocean auditorium built on the water at Venice, California. Sarah stayed, and fished, at the hotel built like a ship, and she performed in the adjacent theater on the wharf at the seaside resort, Venice of America. Having caught a fish, Sarah wended her way to her quarters. Piled high in her dressing room were the results of a recent shopping trip to the Oriental bazaar nearby: silk and crepe matinee coats of pink and pale blue and mauve, all embroidered with butterflies and bamboo designs.
The tiny window in the dressing room provided a sparkling view of the ocean, and the streaming sunshine picked out details of the furnishings: a repoussé silver powder box, containers of pigment, eyebrow pencils, silver rouge pots, and scattered jewelry twinkling in the light. The tragedienne who attracted huge audiences wherever she went swooped up a small tan and white fox terrier, wriggling with joy at her return, and snuggled it close for a moment as she related the happy details of her fishing venture to a visiting reporter. Then she put down the small dog and closed her mind to the fun waiting outside the porthole.
Within moments Sarah became Marguerite Gautier, filled with the sadness and torment of the beautiful French courtesan in Camille, the play by Alexandre Dumas that became her signature role, performed all over the world more than three thousand times. Sarah’s ability to sink fully into the character of the play made the tragic death scene so convincing that it became a trademark for “the Divine Sarah.”
No one played tragedy with such believable intensity as Sarah Bernhardt, and no one brought as much passion and enthusiasm to the pursuit of pleasure. From fishing on the Southern California coast to bear hunting in the woods outside Seattle, on every western tour the French actress indulged in some kind of adventure. Sarah Bernhardt threw herself into life with the same characteristic energy she put into her stage appearances. Yet she often slept in a coffin, preparing for that final sleep.
To learn more about Sarah Bernhardt and about the other talented performers of the Old West read
Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Entertaining Women:
Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West
The pliant figure leaned over the ship’s rail, expressive eyes intent on the blue-green waters of the harbor. A mass of wavy light-brown hair with tints of gold lifted and curled with every breeze, its arrangement a matter of complete indifference to the angler. Suddenly the slender form froze, breath held, and then, with a quick yank and a breaking smile, lifted the rod and hauled a wriggling fish aboard the Cabrillo. Exclaiming in French, dark eyes sparkling with pleasure, Sarah Bernhardt ordered her catch, small as it was, to be prepared for dinner.
It was May 19, 1906, and the farewell production of Camille was scheduled for a few hours later at the ocean auditorium built on the water at Venice, California. Sarah stayed, and fished, at the hotel built like a ship, and she performed in the adjacent theater on the wharf at the seaside resort, Venice of America. Having caught a fish, Sarah wended her way to her quarters. Piled high in her dressing room were the results of a recent shopping trip to the Oriental bazaar nearby: silk and crepe matinee coats of pink and pale blue and mauve, all embroidered with butterflies and bamboo designs.
The tiny window in the dressing room provided a sparkling view of the ocean, and the streaming sunshine picked out details of the furnishings: a repoussé silver powder box, containers of pigment, eyebrow pencils, silver rouge pots, and scattered jewelry twinkling in the light. The tragedienne who attracted huge audiences wherever she went swooped up a small tan and white fox terrier, wriggling with joy at her return, and snuggled it close for a moment as she related the happy details of her fishing venture to a visiting reporter. Then she put down the small dog and closed her mind to the fun waiting outside the porthole.
Within moments Sarah became Marguerite Gautier, filled with the sadness and torment of the beautiful French courtesan in Camille, the play by Alexandre Dumas that became her signature role, performed all over the world more than three thousand times. Sarah’s ability to sink fully into the character of the play made the tragic death scene so convincing that it became a trademark for “the Divine Sarah.”
No one played tragedy with such believable intensity as Sarah Bernhardt, and no one brought as much passion and enthusiasm to the pursuit of pleasure. From fishing on the Southern California coast to bear hunting in the woods outside Seattle, on every western tour the French actress indulged in some kind of adventure. Sarah Bernhardt threw herself into life with the same characteristic energy she put into her stage appearances. Yet she often slept in a coffin, preparing for that final sleep.
To learn more about Sarah Bernhardt and about the other talented performers of the Old West read
Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
The Passionate Player
Enter to win a copy of the book
Entertaining Women:
Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West
My life has run in strange places. My years have been full of color. I have known the heights of success, but likewise I have known the depths of despair.”
Leslie Carter, Liberty magazine, 1927
Catherine Louise Dudley Carter sat at her desk and clutched a pen in her hand. Nothing was left of her life but the raw will to do the only quasi respectable thing open to a woman in her circumstances. She had lost the wealthy position and standing in society that she had taken for granted for so long. She’d been kicked out of her palatial home. She had failed in her divorce case and in obtaining the money to maintain her lifestyle; her nine-year-old son had been ripped from her arms, and her once good name had been scandalously linked to actor Kyrle Bellew and New York Senator James F. Pierce.
The scandal didn’t bother her too much—small-minded persons, including her husband, just did not understand. “There is great romance, there is great love, there is great passion—all things difficult to guide—and some men and women reserve the right to have these things, regardless of that sharp dividing line which makes it legal,” she later wrote, dramatically justifying her choices.
Unfortunately, she’d fallen to the wrong side of that sharp legal and moral dividing line and now knew the cost. Her husband, wealthy industrialist Leslie Carter, had won everything in what the New York Times, in June 1889, called the “most indecent and revolting divorce trial ever heard in the Chicago courts.” Louise Carter considered herself virtually penniless, her reputation shredded to ribbons by the press, while her husband gloated over winning his countersuit charging her with adultery.
She shuddered at the memory of the witnesses against her, a veritable parade of chambermaids, housekeepers, hotel guests, and other traitors her husband had somehow coerced into telling the most awful tales about her. He had taken everything from her. She decided to take the one thing he’d given her that could most embarrass him: his name.
The plan she conceived to become an actress did not stop short of stardom. Her name—no, his name—would be blazoned in lights for all to see. She would, forevermore, be known as Mrs. Leslie Carter. That, she thought, would make her husband’s impassive face show some expression. “Nothing ever happened to Leslie Carter; consequently, nothing ever happened to his face,” she recalled. The day would come she vowed, when the name she hated would be on marquee lights and his humiliation would be as great as hers was now.
Dreaming of revenge would not make it happen. Images of poverty and squalor rose in her mind. Somehow she must triumph over this ugly trick of fate that her husband and a jury had played. The theater offered the only way out, with the added attraction of mortifying her ex-husband. Shrugging away the fact that her first attempt at becoming an actress had been unsuccessful, she concocted a new plan to succeed.
Dipping her pen into a small bottle of ink, she wrote to a man who had promised to help. The plea Louise Carter sent to wealthy meatpacker Nathaniel K. Fairbank resulted in an offer to assist her to become an actress, and his influence secured an appointment with New York theatrical manager E. G. Gilmore, who agreed to handle her career.
To learn more about Leslie Carter and about the other talented performers of the Old West read
Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Visit www.chrisenss.com for more information.
Entertaining Women:
Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West
My life has run in strange places. My years have been full of color. I have known the heights of success, but likewise I have known the depths of despair.”
Leslie Carter, Liberty magazine, 1927
Catherine Louise Dudley Carter sat at her desk and clutched a pen in her hand. Nothing was left of her life but the raw will to do the only quasi respectable thing open to a woman in her circumstances. She had lost the wealthy position and standing in society that she had taken for granted for so long. She’d been kicked out of her palatial home. She had failed in her divorce case and in obtaining the money to maintain her lifestyle; her nine-year-old son had been ripped from her arms, and her once good name had been scandalously linked to actor Kyrle Bellew and New York Senator James F. Pierce.
The scandal didn’t bother her too much—small-minded persons, including her husband, just did not understand. “There is great romance, there is great love, there is great passion—all things difficult to guide—and some men and women reserve the right to have these things, regardless of that sharp dividing line which makes it legal,” she later wrote, dramatically justifying her choices.
Unfortunately, she’d fallen to the wrong side of that sharp legal and moral dividing line and now knew the cost. Her husband, wealthy industrialist Leslie Carter, had won everything in what the New York Times, in June 1889, called the “most indecent and revolting divorce trial ever heard in the Chicago courts.” Louise Carter considered herself virtually penniless, her reputation shredded to ribbons by the press, while her husband gloated over winning his countersuit charging her with adultery.
She shuddered at the memory of the witnesses against her, a veritable parade of chambermaids, housekeepers, hotel guests, and other traitors her husband had somehow coerced into telling the most awful tales about her. He had taken everything from her. She decided to take the one thing he’d given her that could most embarrass him: his name.
The plan she conceived to become an actress did not stop short of stardom. Her name—no, his name—would be blazoned in lights for all to see. She would, forevermore, be known as Mrs. Leslie Carter. That, she thought, would make her husband’s impassive face show some expression. “Nothing ever happened to Leslie Carter; consequently, nothing ever happened to his face,” she recalled. The day would come she vowed, when the name she hated would be on marquee lights and his humiliation would be as great as hers was now.
Dreaming of revenge would not make it happen. Images of poverty and squalor rose in her mind. Somehow she must triumph over this ugly trick of fate that her husband and a jury had played. The theater offered the only way out, with the added attraction of mortifying her ex-husband. Shrugging away the fact that her first attempt at becoming an actress had been unsuccessful, she concocted a new plan to succeed.
Dipping her pen into a small bottle of ink, she wrote to a man who had promised to help. The plea Louise Carter sent to wealthy meatpacker Nathaniel K. Fairbank resulted in an offer to assist her to become an actress, and his influence secured an appointment with New York theatrical manager E. G. Gilmore, who agreed to handle her career.
To learn more about Leslie Carter and about the other talented performers of the Old West read
Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
Visit www.chrisenss.com for more information.
The Screen Siren
Enter to win a copy of the book
Entertaining Women:
Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West
Actress Jeanne Eagels was an attractive, petite entertainer with delicate features. According to her friends and peers she was childish, adult, reasonable, unreasonable – usually one when she should be the other, but always unpredictable. The Oscar nominated actress was born Amelia Jean Eagles on June 26, 1890, in Kansas City, Missouri. She was the second of four children born to Edward Eagles, a carpenter, and Julia Sullivan Eagles.* Edward and Julia were from Kentucky and both had an ancestry that could be traced back to France and Ireland.
As a child Jeanne was frail, but mischievous. There wasn’t a boy on the block that wasn’t afraid of her. According to the sole biography written about the famed thespian by Edward Doherty and entitled The Rain Girl, Jeanne was a tomboy. She liked to climb onto the roofs of barns, swing from the limbs of trees, walk fences, and skip from rafter to rafter in the attics of the buildings in the neighborhood.
“She was six or seven when she fell from a fence she and her sister were walking on,” Doherty wrote about Jeanne. “She broke her right arm and ran home to her mother. A doctor was called, but he wasn’t the best in the world. He set the arm, but it pained her all the rest of her life, especially when it was wet. And it was wet every night and every matinee for five years when Jeanne performed in her most recognizable stage role, that of Sadie Thompson in the play Rain.”
Throughout the duration of her career, Jeanne told newspaper and magazine reporters that she had broken her arm while traveling with the circus. She claimed she’d fallen off a white horse she was riding around the ring. It was the first of many stories she herself would contribute to the legend of Jeanne Eagels.
To learn more about Jeanne Eagels and about the other talented performers of the
Old West read
Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
visit www.chrisenss.com for more information
Entertaining Women:
Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West
Actress Jeanne Eagels was an attractive, petite entertainer with delicate features. According to her friends and peers she was childish, adult, reasonable, unreasonable – usually one when she should be the other, but always unpredictable. The Oscar nominated actress was born Amelia Jean Eagles on June 26, 1890, in Kansas City, Missouri. She was the second of four children born to Edward Eagles, a carpenter, and Julia Sullivan Eagles.* Edward and Julia were from Kentucky and both had an ancestry that could be traced back to France and Ireland.
As a child Jeanne was frail, but mischievous. There wasn’t a boy on the block that wasn’t afraid of her. According to the sole biography written about the famed thespian by Edward Doherty and entitled The Rain Girl, Jeanne was a tomboy. She liked to climb onto the roofs of barns, swing from the limbs of trees, walk fences, and skip from rafter to rafter in the attics of the buildings in the neighborhood.
“She was six or seven when she fell from a fence she and her sister were walking on,” Doherty wrote about Jeanne. “She broke her right arm and ran home to her mother. A doctor was called, but he wasn’t the best in the world. He set the arm, but it pained her all the rest of her life, especially when it was wet. And it was wet every night and every matinee for five years when Jeanne performed in her most recognizable stage role, that of Sadie Thompson in the play Rain.”
Throughout the duration of her career, Jeanne told newspaper and magazine reporters that she had broken her arm while traveling with the circus. She claimed she’d fallen off a white horse she was riding around the ring. It was the first of many stories she herself would contribute to the legend of Jeanne Eagels.
To learn more about Jeanne Eagels and about the other talented performers of the
Old West read
Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.
visit www.chrisenss.com for more information
