HENRY IRVING CENTENARY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23529, 18 June 1938, Page 32

HENRY IRVING CENTENARY

TRIBUTE TO GREAT ACTOR INTERESTING PEOPLE PRESENT SOME RELICS AND REMINISCENCES (From Our Own Correspondent) (By Air Mail) LONDON, May 25. Five months’ intensive work was necessitated in the preparation for the Henry Irving Centenary Matinee, which took place at the theatre—-the Lyceum—for so many years associated with that consummate master of the stage. The programme consisted of 15 scenes, and 350 actors and actresses gave their services on behalf of the “ Henry Irving Memorial Fund.” Queen Mary was present. On both sides of the footlights were reunited people who had not seen one another for a generation. . One of the afternoon’s most charming spectacles, says the Daily Telegraph, was Mr John Gielgud presenting simultaneously to the audience one of the oldest Irvingites, Miss Catherine Lewis, and nine-year-old Gweneth Behenna, a third cousin of Irving. Miss Lewis is 85. She played with Irving in one of his earliest successes. “Jingle.” Gweneth Behenna had come up Specially ; from Cornwall, where Irving spent his childhood. She displayed as much self-possession as anyone on the stage. While Mr Gielgud was turning to Miss Lewis the child broke away from his shepherding hand and ran up to the footlights to make her curtsey. Queen Mary was presented with a bouquet by Miss Pamela Irving, a great-granddaughter of the famous actor. The matinee was organised by the Daily Telegraph and Morning Post. It is interesting to read in that journal that the audience was .not the usual one to be seen at charity matinees. All over the house were elderly theatregoers who remembered Irving in some of his greatest successes. One woman was carried up to .the grand circle In an old-fashioned sedan chair. Another, in one of the cheaper seats, could not. afford to pay for her programme, and offered in payment an original autograph by Irving. Her offer was, accepted. The audience also Included several veteran theatre employees of Irving’s day. Among them was Mr Freddie Hayes, who worked for years as the great actor’s call boy, and who. when eight years of age, played small parts with “the chief.” Standing at the back were many young actors and actresses who had come specially to the matinee to pick up points from older and more experienced members of their profession. QUEEN MARY’S LIST During an interval Queen Marj? received Lord and Lady Camrose with Mr Laurence Irving and Lady Brunner; grandchildren of Sir , Henry, in her box. and talked to them for some time about the matinee and the brilliant career of the old-time actor. _ in the course of conversation her Majesty took from her bag a little slip of paper and gave it to Lady Brunner. On it she had written the following list of plays in which she saw Irving 1 perform:—“ Louis XI,” “ Charles I,’ “The Lyons Mail,” “The Bells,” “The Merchant of Venice,” “The Corsican Brothers,” “Two Roses,” "Faust,” “Henry VIII” “Becket,” and “Madame Sans-Gene.” “Here’s to our Enterprise" was the title of the stage tribute. , It opened with a prologue in which Irvings great work for the social standing of the actor was celebrated. On one side of the stage a group of old-time players, shabby and poor, bewailed the hardships of their lot. On the other, a party of confident and smart young moderns showed that they had neither need nor intention to apologise for themselves or their art. To each half of the play there was a spectacular finale, with a crowded stage. At the end of the first part JohnGielgud led on some of Irving’s old players, and one of Irving’s youngest relations; and Edith Evans, entering as the Spirit of the Lyceum, brought down the curtain on a fine, spirited piece of verse-speaking. Sybil Thorndike' came on as a Chronicler in the second half, and carried the story forward with another finely declaimed set of verses. And the whole play was brought to a close with Wesley’s anthem, “Let Us Now Praise Famous Men,” sung by the choir of the London College for Choristers. RELICS USED In the scene at the Midland Hotel, Bradford, which was played : by Sir Seymour Hicks and Edward Chapman, the chair on which Irving died was used. It was bought by Sir Seymour Hicks, and the scene in which he appeared is based on an actual experience. The bells, used in the excerpt from “The Bells,” which Was produced bj Robert Atkins, with Godfrey Tearlu as Mathias, belonged to Sir John Mar-tin-Harvey’s production. They are now on exhibition at the Irving Exhibition at the London Museum, WIG-MAKER’S STORIES Sir Henry Irving’s meticulous care with his make-up was described to a waiter in the Daily Telegraph by Mr Arthur Harris, the,son of the man who for years was his wig-maker. “This wig is an example of Irving's imagination' and care, typical of all he did,” said Mr Harris, taking from a drawer the wig which Irving wore as Cardinal Richelieu. “The hair of the wig is attached, not to a false scalp, bu to the crimson biretta. This is an example of Irving’s thought and creative ability. Any other actor would have worn a wig and a biretta above it. BEFORE GREASE PAINT "My father told me that he would often spend hours with Irving trying some particular make-up. There was no grease paint in those days. Black from the lamp and red from the brick was the motto, and make-up was dry powder of various kinds, which played havoc with the skin. Irving’s dressing table to-day would seem ridiculously primitive. “My father went to America and to Australia with Irving, and was responsible for the wigs and costumes for perhaps 10 different shows. I now own some of the dresses used in ‘Becket,’ ’The Lyons Mail’ and ‘Louis Xl.’ Irving was really a man of simple tastes. His receptions at the Lyceum were famous; He had a ‘ flair ’ for such functions, and liked the good food and wine—for his guests. But my father told me that afterwards, !n the early hours of the morning, Irving would go upstairs to his room and cook himself a haddock.”