FOOTLIGHT NOTES
(11th year in cyberspace -
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Theatre -Variety
Music Hall -Vaudeville
Musical Comedy
Revue - Circus
Ballet - Opera
and other popular entertainment
portraits - biographies
reviews - recordings
1850s-1920s
George Graves (1876-1949)
English musical comedy comedian and singer, as he appeared as General Des Ifs in succession to Willie Edouin (1846-1908) in The Little Michus, Daly's, London, 1905
(photo: Alfred Ellis & Walery, London, 1905)
Footlight Notes no. 566
contents
for the week ending
26 July 2008
Home - FOOTLIGHT NOTES, images of theatre and other popular entertainment, 1850s-1920s - a 'Fielding's Cardette' of Hetty King (1883-1972), the celebrated English male impersonator in private attire
Celebrity of the Week - Happy Fanny Fields (1884-1961), American vaudeville comedienne, appears in a short film entitled Happy Fanny Fields and the Four Little Dutchmen, 1913
Postcard of the week - Eric Rae as Prince Zara and Julia Neilson as Queen Frederique in The Popinjay, a play by Boyle Lawrence and Frederick Mouillot, based on Alphonse Daudet's Les Rois en Exil, New Theatre, London, 2 February 1911
Esther Walker (1894-1943)
Please use the above image © John Culme, 2008
Cigarette Card of the week - Cissy Hargreaves (fl. late 19th/early 20th Century), actress
Minor Player / Variety Act of the week - Harry Gunn (fl. circa 1915-1925), British music hall artist
Press Clippings of the week - Little Tich returns to New York, 1901 / The story of a ghost recalled after Evie Greene's death, 1917 / Irene Castle's latest film appearance and her advice to women, 1919
A selection of Footlight Notes handmade greetings cards for you to buy.
'Just to let you know the cards arrived safely this morning.
Frankly they are delightful and even finer than I thought they would be . . .
They are so good I hardly like to use them!' - Tim Taylor
American musical comedy actress and singer
(photo: unknown, probably New York, 1919)
Sound file (2.4 mb) - Esther Walker burst into the presence of Broadway audiences as Daisy in the Shuberts' production of the musical comedy Monte Cristo Jr, which began its run at the Winter Garden Theatre, New York, on 19 February 1919. Following this initial success, Miss Walker made a number of recordings of which this week's is a striking example: 'What'ya Gonna Do When There Ain't No Jazz?' (Victor 18680B, mx B-24108-3, recorded Camden, New Jersey, 12 May 1920)
More celebrity recordings from the Footlight Notes Collection, including Norah Bayes, Lee White and Clay Smith, Elsie Janis and Basil Hallam, J.W. Rickaby, Jay Laurier, Blanche Ring, Bonita and Lew Hearn, Dorothy Dickson, Odette Myrtil, John Steel and more.
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Footlight Notes Archive A - H (updated 16 April 2005)
Footlight Notes Archive I - P (updated 18 May 2003)
Footlight Notes Archive Q - Z (updated 27 April 2003)
Footlight Notes Press Clippings Archive, 2002
Footlight Notes Press Clippings Archive, 2003
Read about Kurt Gänzl's latest biography, EMILY SOLDENE: IN SEARCH OF A SINGER, which has just been published. This long-awaited and detailed study of a fascinating Victorian theatrical celebrity and her contemporaries includes almost 700 illustrations. (This page is best viewed in Internet Explorer.)
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