DAME SYBIL THORNDIKE.

Waikato Times, Volume 113, Issue 18874, 18 February 1933, Page 16 (Supplement)

DAME SYBIL THORNDIKE.

FAMOUB ENGLISH BTAR. Dame Sybil Thorndike has been associated in some way with the theatre since early youth. The daughter of Canon Thorndike, she was born at Rochester where her father was oarrying out his ecclesiastical duties, and as a child in the beautiful old Thamesside town, she and her authorbrother, Russell Thorndike, busied themselves with the production and acting of plays. She originally studied music with a view to becoming a professional pianist, but after obtaining brilliant success in one of London's leading musical academies, the lure of the theatre attracted her again and she joined the famous Repertory Company of Miss A. E. Horniman. in Manchester. There, in a wide variety of parts, she achieved great professional and popular fame. During the war, while her husband,. Mr Casson, was serving in France, she won the attention of London’s leading oritics and all ranks of play-goers by a remarkable series of Impersonations of Shakespearean and other leading roles at the now famous Old Vic Theatre, whose reputation her brilliant acting assisted In promoting. Shortly after the war, in association with Mr Casson, she succeeded in startling London by a superlatively presented series of Greek classic drama.

But no sooner had she won fame as a tragedienne than she switched over to comedy and farces, and proved herself again a past mistress in this entirely different line of work. During the last few years sho has performed in London and in the leading cities of the English provinces and on the Continent, of Europe a remarkable variety •of parts, and has shown alike in farce at the Criterion, in Shakespeare at the Empire and Princess, and In plays by modern authors such as Clemence Dane and Bernard Shaw, or in revivals of Shelley's “The Cenci,” her unexampled range of dramatic genius. In recognition of her signal services to the profession which she adorns and the artistic life of the British people, His Majesty King George recently conferred upon her the honour of “Dame of the Order of the British Empire,” while her achievements in the literary drama have been recognised by two English Universities conferring upon her the degree of LL.D.