Heroines of the Modern Stage

Though a stage career was inevitable for her, Mary Anderson did not come of theatrical people. Her father, who died when she was four, was of English birth and Oxford education,...

“The amazing variety of her artistry has been expressed,” says Huret, “by two famous portraits of her, one by Chartran, the other by Besnard. You could paint nothing more striki...

“The rôle which she played in the life of her times,” says Mr. Shaw, “can only be properly estimated when (perhaps fifty years hence) her letters will be collected and published...

“A poem has been composed especially for the occasion by Edmond Rostand, in which Bernhardt is allowed to address Dumas in a tone of familiar grandeur, as befits one genius in t...

In January (1873), came the annual elimination examination. Gabrielle, like the rest, submitted to the test that weeded out the less promising pupils. She had a rôle--that of Ag...

Trained for the stage from her earliest childhood, and destined unquestioningly for the career of an actress, her first appearance came and went so much as a matter of course th...

Madame Opid, for one, was not disappointed. The family was not so well off as it was before the fire and to Helcia fell a large share of the housework. But she studied and read...

But trouble was brewing, and the irrepressible Sarah was soon making difficulties for her _confrères_. She insisted on her right to give performances before private audiences on...

A marvelous exhibition of what Miss Adams and Mr. Frohman, when they put their heads together, could do in the way of contrast to Phœbe Throssell and Maggie Wylie, was the produ...

“Oh, that première! The beautiful theatre was crowded to the last inch with an audience that was restless and seemed none too good-natured. The journalists were furious because...

_Romeo and Juliet_ was the play determined upon for the next season in London. A trip to Verona in quest of local data and sketches was to occupy the summer. “What!” exclaimed J...

The suddenly achieved result was that Sienkiewicz sailed for America in a few months, and the others arranged to follow. Modjeska obtained leave of absence from the president of...

To say that she is the most valuable piece of theatrical property in the country is a brutally commercial way to speak of an artist; but that is the familiar and true, if one-si...

Where a more tolerant judgment would proclaim Sarah’s inalterable romanticism, Mr. Shaw, whose passion for truth and realism leave him little room for the sort of truth and real...

The place of Miss George[217] among American actresses is only partly indicated by the announcement that she is to direct her own theatre in New York. Though she merits that dis...

Miss Dow’s pupil endured the rigors of this training until the spring of 1887. Now, it was thought, the young actress was ready to bid for the public’s notice. It was the fixed...

[46] “The picture of this first professional trip stands vividly before my eyes. The weather was glorious!... We were young, full of spirit and hope, and the country enchanting....

For commanding figures in tragedy, for the Duses and Bernhardts of earlier days, we must look, as a rule, outside of England and America. There is, to be sure, always Sarah Sidd...

What sort of woman was Ada Rehan? Well, she was of the royal line of women, regal in her stature, opulent in bodily beauty, gracious and rich in her nature. Her face, like her c...

It is as Becky Sharp, in a play based on Thackeray’s _Vanity Fair_, that Mrs. Fiske is by many most gratefully remembered. The author was Langdon Mitchell, who several years lat...

[141] The list of parts played by Miss Rehan before she began the acquirement of her more famous repertoire cannot, and need not, be made complete here. Some of them were: Isabe...

Early in the last century an English girl of good family eloped with her music teacher. Here, perhaps, began Minnie Maddern’s artistic career, for this girl was her grandmother....

Produced by Charlie Howard and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Arch...

[95] Mme. Réjane recalls that her costume on this occasion was the object of much solicitude on the part of Regnier. On the day of the contest he came to her house at nine in th...

[177] “During a rehearsal her poodle entered the theatre and calmly and unconsciously crossed the stage, keeping at a respectful distance from her, however, only condescending t...

Adams, Maude, 324–46; parentage and birth, 325; career as a child actress, 325–29; goes to New York, 329; with E. H. Sothern, 330; _A Midnight Bell_, 331; in Charles Frohman’s c...