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Ellen Terry
Dame Alice Ellen Terry (27 February 1847 – 21 July 1928) was an English actress of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Born into a family of actors, Terry began performing as a child, acting in Shakespeare plays in London, and toured throughout the British provinces in her teens. At 16, she married the 46-year-old artist George Frederic Watts, but they separated within a year. She soon returned to the stage but began a relationship with the architect Edward William Godwin and retired from the stage for six years. She resumed acting in 1874 and was immediately acclaimed for her portrayal of roles in Shakespeare and other classics.
In 1878 she joined Henry Irving's company as his leading lady, and for more than the next two decades she was considered the leading Shakespearean actress in Britain. Two of her most famous roles were Portia in The Merchant of Venice and Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing. She and Irving also toured with great success in America and Britain.
At the urging of George Bernard Shaw, Terry took over management of London's Imperial Theatre in 1903, opening a new play by Henrik Ibsen. The venture was a financial failure, and Terry turned to touring. She continued to find success on stage until 1920 and especial success in lecture tours discussing the Shakespeare heroines, she also appeared in several films from 1916 to 1922. Her career lasted nearly seven decades.
Terry was born in Coventry, England, the third surviving child born into a theatrical family. Her parents, Benjamin (1818–1896), of Irish descent, and Sarah (née Ballard; 1819–1892), of Scottish ancestry, were childhood friends and began as comic actors in a Portsmouth-based company, where Sarah's father was a master sawyer. She used the stage name "Miss Yerrett", The two made a poor living in touring companies in their early years. The couple had eleven children, two of whom died in infancy. They had been christened Kate and Ellen after their paternal and maternal grandmothers; these names were reused for their next two daughters. At least five of the surviving nine became actors: Kate (b. 1844), Ellen, Marion, Florence, and Fred. The eldest son, Benjamin (b. 1839), went into commerce and emigrated to Australia and then India, and Tom (b. 1860), a drifter, lived on the fringes of criminality and poverty, constantly helped by his parents and siblings. Two other children, George and Charles, were connected with theatre management. Kate was the grandmother of Val and John Gielgud.
Benjamin coached his children in good stage diction. Terry later recalled that he "always corrected me if I pronounced any word in a slipshod fashion, and if I now speak my language well it is in no small degree due to my early training." Kate began acting at age 3; by 1851 she had received enough notice in the British provinces that she was invited to audition for Charles Kean of London's Princess's Theatre, who engaged her, and then her father, in his company. The family moved to London, and Sarah worked in the theatre's wardrobe department. Kean and especially his wife, Ellen Kean, were excellent teachers and models for young actors. Ellen Terry made her first stage appearance at age nine, as Mamillius in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale in 1856 alongside her sister and father in small roles. She also played the roles of Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1856, with Kate as Titania), Prince Arthur in King John (1858), and Fleance in Macbeth (1859), continuing at the Princess's Theatre until the Keans' retirement in 1859. While at the Princess's, the Keans introduced the girls to a circle of artists and playwrights, including Charles Reade and Tom Taylor. During the theatre's summer closures starting in 1856, Terry's father presented farces in Portsmouth, starring Terry and Kate; Terry loved playing badly behaved boys onstage, delighting the provincial audience. In the summer of 1859, Benjamin Terry presented drawing-room entertainments featuring his daughters in the concert room of the Royal Colosseum, Regent's Park, London, and then on tour. Also in 1859, Terry appeared in Tom Taylor's comedy Nine Points of the Law at London's Olympic Theatre. She then played in melodrama at the Royalty Theatre, managed by Madame Albina de Rhona, while Kate starred in Mr and Mrs Alfred Wigan's company at St James's Theatre.
In 1862, Terry joined Kate in J. H. Chute's stock company at the Theatre Royal in Bristol, a strong company that also featured Marie Wilton and Madge Robertson, where she played a wide variety of parts, including burlesque roles requiring singing and dancing, as well as Nerissa in The Merchant of Venice and Hero in Much Ado About Nothing. In 1863, Chute opened the Theatre Royal, Bath, where 15-year-old Terry appeared as Titania in A Midsummer Night's Dream. The family then returned to London where Kate starred at the Lyceum Theatre, while Ellen joined J. B. Buckstone's company at the Haymarket Theatre in Shakespeare roles as well as Sheridan plays and modern comedies. Her lack of maturity, though, led to such a bad experience for her there, that she became disenchanted with theatre.
In London, while Terry was still engaged at the Haymarket, she and Kate were the subject of The Sisters, painted by the eminent artist George Frederic Watts at his studio home in the annex of Little Holland House, the home of Sara Monckton Prinsep and her husband. His famous portraits of Terry include Choosing, in which she must select between earthly vanities, symbolised by showy but scentless camellias, and nobler values symbolised by humble-looking but fragrant violets. His other famous portraits of her include Ophelia and Watchman. At first Watts was interested in Kate, but he soon transferred his attentions to Ellen. She, in turn, was impressed with Watts's art, sense of style and elegant lifestyle, and she wished to please her parents by making an advantageous marriage; her friend Tom Taylor also was in favor of the union. Though Watts was vain, self-centered, unattractive and three decades her senior, she agreed to marry him. She left the stage during the run of Tom Taylor's hit comedy Our American Cousin at the Haymarket, in which she played Mary Meredith.
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Ellen Terry
Dame Alice Ellen Terry (27 February 1847 – 21 July 1928) was an English actress of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Born into a family of actors, Terry began performing as a child, acting in Shakespeare plays in London, and toured throughout the British provinces in her teens. At 16, she married the 46-year-old artist George Frederic Watts, but they separated within a year. She soon returned to the stage but began a relationship with the architect Edward William Godwin and retired from the stage for six years. She resumed acting in 1874 and was immediately acclaimed for her portrayal of roles in Shakespeare and other classics.
In 1878 she joined Henry Irving's company as his leading lady, and for more than the next two decades she was considered the leading Shakespearean actress in Britain. Two of her most famous roles were Portia in The Merchant of Venice and Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing. She and Irving also toured with great success in America and Britain.
At the urging of George Bernard Shaw, Terry took over management of London's Imperial Theatre in 1903, opening a new play by Henrik Ibsen. The venture was a financial failure, and Terry turned to touring. She continued to find success on stage until 1920 and especial success in lecture tours discussing the Shakespeare heroines, she also appeared in several films from 1916 to 1922. Her career lasted nearly seven decades.
Terry was born in Coventry, England, the third surviving child born into a theatrical family. Her parents, Benjamin (1818–1896), of Irish descent, and Sarah (née Ballard; 1819–1892), of Scottish ancestry, were childhood friends and began as comic actors in a Portsmouth-based company, where Sarah's father was a master sawyer. She used the stage name "Miss Yerrett", The two made a poor living in touring companies in their early years. The couple had eleven children, two of whom died in infancy. They had been christened Kate and Ellen after their paternal and maternal grandmothers; these names were reused for their next two daughters. At least five of the surviving nine became actors: Kate (b. 1844), Ellen, Marion, Florence, and Fred. The eldest son, Benjamin (b. 1839), went into commerce and emigrated to Australia and then India, and Tom (b. 1860), a drifter, lived on the fringes of criminality and poverty, constantly helped by his parents and siblings. Two other children, George and Charles, were connected with theatre management. Kate was the grandmother of Val and John Gielgud.
Benjamin coached his children in good stage diction. Terry later recalled that he "always corrected me if I pronounced any word in a slipshod fashion, and if I now speak my language well it is in no small degree due to my early training." Kate began acting at age 3; by 1851 she had received enough notice in the British provinces that she was invited to audition for Charles Kean of London's Princess's Theatre, who engaged her, and then her father, in his company. The family moved to London, and Sarah worked in the theatre's wardrobe department. Kean and especially his wife, Ellen Kean, were excellent teachers and models for young actors. Ellen Terry made her first stage appearance at age nine, as Mamillius in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale in 1856 alongside her sister and father in small roles. She also played the roles of Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1856, with Kate as Titania), Prince Arthur in King John (1858), and Fleance in Macbeth (1859), continuing at the Princess's Theatre until the Keans' retirement in 1859. While at the Princess's, the Keans introduced the girls to a circle of artists and playwrights, including Charles Reade and Tom Taylor. During the theatre's summer closures starting in 1856, Terry's father presented farces in Portsmouth, starring Terry and Kate; Terry loved playing badly behaved boys onstage, delighting the provincial audience. In the summer of 1859, Benjamin Terry presented drawing-room entertainments featuring his daughters in the concert room of the Royal Colosseum, Regent's Park, London, and then on tour. Also in 1859, Terry appeared in Tom Taylor's comedy Nine Points of the Law at London's Olympic Theatre. She then played in melodrama at the Royalty Theatre, managed by Madame Albina de Rhona, while Kate starred in Mr and Mrs Alfred Wigan's company at St James's Theatre.
In 1862, Terry joined Kate in J. H. Chute's stock company at the Theatre Royal in Bristol, a strong company that also featured Marie Wilton and Madge Robertson, where she played a wide variety of parts, including burlesque roles requiring singing and dancing, as well as Nerissa in The Merchant of Venice and Hero in Much Ado About Nothing. In 1863, Chute opened the Theatre Royal, Bath, where 15-year-old Terry appeared as Titania in A Midsummer Night's Dream. The family then returned to London where Kate starred at the Lyceum Theatre, while Ellen joined J. B. Buckstone's company at the Haymarket Theatre in Shakespeare roles as well as Sheridan plays and modern comedies. Her lack of maturity, though, led to such a bad experience for her there, that she became disenchanted with theatre.
In London, while Terry was still engaged at the Haymarket, she and Kate were the subject of The Sisters, painted by the eminent artist George Frederic Watts at his studio home in the annex of Little Holland House, the home of Sara Monckton Prinsep and her husband. His famous portraits of Terry include Choosing, in which she must select between earthly vanities, symbolised by showy but scentless camellias, and nobler values symbolised by humble-looking but fragrant violets. His other famous portraits of her include Ophelia and Watchman. At first Watts was interested in Kate, but he soon transferred his attentions to Ellen. She, in turn, was impressed with Watts's art, sense of style and elegant lifestyle, and she wished to please her parents by making an advantageous marriage; her friend Tom Taylor also was in favor of the union. Though Watts was vain, self-centered, unattractive and three decades her senior, she agreed to marry him. She left the stage during the run of Tom Taylor's hit comedy Our American Cousin at the Haymarket, in which she played Mary Meredith.