Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Actress who decided to go on stage at age five after seeing Sarah Bernhardt, and later performed with Ellen Terry.
On the island
Eight records
I believe while still in your teens at that theatre you appeared with Ellen Terry.
You had a long run in a musical when you did get back to the West End.
My first part in the West End… was Sweetie in Too True to Be Good.
The keepsakes
No book or luxury recorded for this episode.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:35How did you set about it? Did you go to a drama school?
A rather bad one. I persuaded my mother to send me there instead of to a finishing school in Switzerland, I thought was the worst of two evils. It was useless, this rather silly little school I went to, because it was so ungifted that I was given the two leading parts in my first term, and so I was allowed to leave after that first term.
Presenter asks
1:57What was your first engagement?
I played The Prince's Attendant in Romeo and Juliet at the Everyman Theatre at Hampstead. … I'm afraid I didn't get that because of any histrionic ability, but because my legs were straight.
Presenter asks
2:40When did you make your first West End appearance?
Uh well, shortly after that, just as a maid. In The Way of an Eagle … Ethel M. Dell, with Varlet Vanbrugh, one of the great actresses of her time, playing the lead. She was very sweet to me.
Presenter asks
And you were in the production of The Lady of the Camellias, in which Tallulah Bankhead starred. That must have been a rewarding engagement.
Definitely a lot happened, both on and off stage. My little boy had just been born. … Tallulah used to be fascinated by this little boy. She used to have him in her dressing room while she was stripping. I think he was certainly the youngest person to see us.
Presenter asks
4:19Ellen, which was the first Shaw role you played?
Well, uh when I was eighteen I was on tour with the Magdona Players, which was the Bernard Shaw Repertory Company, and I played three or four small parts in that. But my first part in the West End … was Sweetie in Too True to Be Good, which was the plum of the autumn season.
Presenter asks
5:58It's been said that you've acted more Shaw heroines than any other actress. Is that fair comment?
Yes, I believe it is. That's not only in the West End, you know, it's counting all the parts I've played, and … every year we go to Shaw's Corner on the Saturday and Sunday nearest to his birthday. And we do a scene from one of his plays there. … I would certainly think that this is … absolutely so, yes.
Presenter asks
6:44And you paint, too?
I used to paint. I don't I don't paint any more, really.
Presenter asks
6:51Now, as the wife of a painter, James Pranwood, did he allow you to use his studio, or did you have little studio view?
Oh, no, no, no. I painted in his studio, or else we'd go out painting together, and I'd paint a landscape, and he'd stand behind, painting me, painting the landscape. But, um oh, I I did have, you know, one or two little modest paintings in exhibitions, but I don't think it's my real forte.
Presenter asks
7:20Why did you give it up?
Well, I really didn't have time because I took up something else. I went into the antique business. So I got a stall at the Chelsea Antique Market, and it's most wonderfully interesting, but it's really full time, you know, apart from the theatre, which is my first love.
“I was taken to the Coliseum, which was then a theatre of varieties. We were taken particularly to see the Sea Lions, and a glorious double act, I think it was called Beatty and Babs.”
“When I was five years old I was taken to the Coliseum … and quick as a flash I answered, 'Well, then I'll be her niece.' … I never for one moment wanted to do anything else but act from that moment.”
“I turned to my mother and said I want to go on the stage. And my mother said, 'What do you mean?' I said, 'I want to be Sarah Bernhardt's daughter.' My mother said, 'Well, you can't be her daughter. Your name is Ellen. Her daughter might indeed be called Sarah Bernhardt,' and quick as a flash I answered, 'Well, then I'll be her niece.' … I never for one moment wanted to do anything else but act from that moment.”
“He used to give you notes first as to what he thought was the choir, or tell you how the rhythm had gone quite awry, or emphasising a certain word made for clarity. And then if you didn't get it from the note, he'd act it for you. So you would often pretend not to get it from the note because one longed to see him act it was so wondrously good. And he played old men and women, young men and girls, anything.”