Press Clippings for the week ending
Saturday, 1 November 2003
A random selection of cuttings
from newspapers and magazines
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South London music hall,
'One of the principal performers has been absent from his post for some few nights. Professor Thomas, the Champion Swordsman, was placed hors de combat through a cut on the knee, which was fortunately attended with no more serious consequences than loss of blood and a temporary retirement from the South London stage. Mr. Thomas addressed the audience on Monday night [12 September 1864], and, alluding to his late accident, promised to appear without fail at his benefit on the 14th. Professor Thomas has been for a considerable time a great attraction at Mr. Villier's establishment, and his numerous admirers will wish him a speedy restoration to health and strength, so that they may be again delighted with his broadsword feats. Miss Emma Kerridge's complimentary notice of divers gentlemen among the audience, in her fortune-telling song, seems to be a source of immense satisfaction to everybody but the "marked men" themselves. In spite of Miss Kerridge's archness and vivacity, it is not every bold Briton who can hear without some emotion the probable number of his future family certified to an admiring crowd. The public at the South London are constant to old favourites, especially songs; and seem never tired of hearing Mr. J.G. Forde detail the behaviour of his uncultivated spouse at a dinner table, or his personal experiences "when first he went to sea." In the minds of the majority of Mr. Forde's listeners, any one of his songs must seem a realisation of the assertion that "a thing of beauty is a joy for ever," but to the unfortunate minority a little novelty is sometimes refreshing. The names of Mr. and Mrs. Villiers appear in the bill for their new Duologue Entertainment. Signor Rimoleno's trapeze performances conclude the evening. The Signor does nothing new, but displays uncommon muscular power.'
* * * * * * * * The end of the Winchester music hall, London, 1882
'Mr. Mews, barrister, submitted plans and applied for leave to make alterations in the Winchester Music Hall Tavern, Great Suffolk Street, Borough. He said that it was the intention of the owners of the property to do away with the music-hall and convert it into shops, and the alterations submitted were necessary to cut off all access from these shops to the tavern. – In consideration of the music and dancing licence, which had seven months to run, being then and there given up, the Bench unanimously sanctioned the proposed alterations.'
* * * * * * * * A New York photographer on celebrity portraits, 1884 |
Adelaide Neilson (1848?-1880), English actress
(photo: Sarony, New York, circa 1875)
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'A well-known photographer of New York has been giving to the Herald his experience of the profits of photography. He says great politicians and philosophers rarely pay, but an actress is often in great demand. The mania for buying photographs began in 1866. "The first women for whose pictures there was any noted demand were Fanny Davenport, Clara Morris, and Adelaide Neilson. The greatest favourite of early times was Adelaide Neilson. I never shall forget the first time she sat for me. She was dressed in her magnificent Juliet costume, and, as she turned quickly, one breadth of her exquisite dress caught the charcoal on a frame behind, and by it was absolutely ruined. Throwing up her hands and her eyes at the same time, she said, 'Oh, dear, what shall I do? My dress is ruined!" I suggested, after examination, that all she would need was a single breadth, whereupon she became quieted and sat for pictures, thousands and tens of thousands of which were sold. I still sell pictures of Neilson." "Did you pay anything for that privilege?" "Certainly not. The first person I ever paid was Sarah Bernhardt." "How much did you give her?" "Three hundred pounds at first, and I sold thousands and tens of thousands of her pictures on European orders as well as local orders. It is a singular fact in connection with the sale of photographs that in Europe as soon as a celebrity dies the orders for his or her pictures increase marvellously, while here [in the United States] it is exactly the reverse.
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Clara Morris (1846-1925), Canadian-born American actress
(photo: Sarony, New York, circa 1875)
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'Patti sells enormously, "and will until she dies. She poses easily and gracefully, and makes a very fair portrait as well as a pretty picture." She was paid "200 for the privilege. But one of the greatest cards of recent years is Mrs. Langtry. Scores of thousands of her photographs are sold every year. She was paid £300, £200 of which was paid in cash, and £100 in works of art.
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Maud Branscombe (fl. 1870s-1890s), English actress
(photo: Mora, New York, circa 1880)
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'Perhaps the greatest favourite even known, however, was Miss Mary Anderson. Her pictures in every style, in every position, meet with instant popular favour on both sides of the Atlantic. In Europe she sells fast, and here it would be impossible to exaggerate the demand. Opera bouffe singers as a rule are not pretty women. While they and their names are in the papers every day they have a steady sale, but nothing of consequence, nothing at all to compare with the sales of Adelaide Neilson or Mary Anderson. With the local actresses, the members of stock companies, there is a regular, constant trade, but nothing of any consequence. In fact, a pretty-faced chorus girl, or a pretty-faced anything, sells better than a man, unless there is some special reason for their temporary or prominent popularity. Take the case of Maud Branscombe, for instance. Scores and scores, thousands and thousands of her pictures have been taken in every conceivable attitude – praying, supplicating, crying, hanging to the cross, looking this way, looking that way, doing this thing, doing that thing – nothing comes amiss to that face.
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© John Culme, 2003