Letters from Mary Anderson 1910-1940

ArchivalResource

Letters from Mary Anderson, 1910-1940

Letters from Mary Anderson 1910-1940

http://archives.nypl.org/the/21557

Mary Anderson was an American actress who performed in both the United States and England in the 1870s and 1880s, retired from the stage in 1889, married, and spent the remaining fifty years of her life in England. Born in Sacramento, California in 1859, Mary Anderson grew up in Kentucky, where her family moved during her childhood, and was educated at the Ursuline Convent in Louisville. She was determined to become an actress from an early age, and at age 15 read for Charlotte Saunders Cushman, who suggested she train in New York. Mary Anderson made her stage debut as Juliet in a Louisville production of ROMEO & JULIET in 1875, toured the country, then made her New York debut in THE LADY OF LYONS (1877). After touring the United States for the next six years, she made her London debut in INGOMAR (1883). During the six years which followed Mary Anderson travelled between America and England, becoming renowned for her Shakespearean performances, especially as Rosalind, Hermione, and Perdita, and starring in several plays by W.S. Gilbert. In 1889 she suffered a nervous breakdown and permanently retired from the stage. In 1890 Mary Anderson married Antonio de Navarro, settled in Worcestershire, England, and worked on occasional literary projects, including a memoir, A FEW MEMORIES (1896), a play, THE GARDEN OF ALLAH (1911), which she co-authored with Robert Smythe Hichens, and a second volume of memoirs, A FEW MORE MEMORIES (1936). Mary Anderson de Navarro died in 1940 at the age of 81. The Mary Anderson papers consist of letters written by Mary Anderson, or on her behalf, between 1910 and 1940, mostly during the last eighteen years of that period, all of them addressed to Charles L. Wagner of New York City. Wagner, who was the manager of Irish tenor John McCormack, supplied Anderson with newspaper clippings and news updates on theatrical and musical doings in the U.S., and in return she wrote him about her friends and acquaintances, including George Bernard Shaw, Helen Hayes, John Gielgud, Cedric Hardwicke, the Charles Dickens family, Neville Chamberlain, and others. She also includes commentary on the American and European political situations, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, and U.S. Ambassador Joseph P. Kennedy and his children. Several of the last letters, written when she was ill, were penned on Mary Anderson's behalf by family members or nurses.

.21 lf. (1 box)

The New York Public Library. Billy Rose Theatre Division.