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Dame Ellen Terry
Ellen Terry at 16.
Birth name	Alice Ellen Terry
Born	February 27, 1847(1847-02-27) Coventry, England
Died	July 21, 1928 (aged 81) Smallhythe, Kent, England

Dame Ellen Terry, GBE (February 27, 1847^[1] – July 21, 1928) was an English stage actress. Terry became the leading Shakespearean actress in Britain.

Contents 1 Life and career 1.1 Early career 1.2 Marriages, relationships and peak years 1.2.1 Watts, Godwin and Portia 1.2.2 Shakespeare, Irving and the Lyceum 1.3 Shaw, Ibsen and Barrie 1.4 Films and last years 2 Legacy 3 Notes 4 References 5 External links

Alice Ellen Terry (she reversed her names by the time of her first marriage) was born in Coventry, England, the third born child in a theatrical family.^[2] Her parents, Benjamin and Sarah (née Ballard), were comic actors in a touring company based in Portsmouth^[3] and had eleven children, at least five of whom became actors: Florence, Fred, Kate and Marion. Two other children, George and Charles, were connected with theatre management.^[4] Kate was a very successful actress until her marriage and retirement from the stage in 1867. Terry's great nephew (Kate's grandson) Sir John Gielgud, became one of the twentieth century's most respected actors.^[5]

Terry's first appearance on stage came at the age of eight, when she appeared opposite Charles Kean as Mamillius in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale at London's Princess's Theatre in 1856.^[6] She also played the juvenile roles of Prince Arthur in King John and Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream and continued acting at the Princess Theatre until the Keans' retirement in 1859.^[7] For the next two years, Terry and Kate toured in sketches and plays, accompanied by their parents and a musician.^[3]

Between 1861 and 1862, Terry was engaged by the Royalty Theatre in London, managed by Madame Albina de Rhona, where she acted with the Kendals, among other famous actors. In 1862, she joined her sister Kate in Bristol and began working with J. H. Chute's stock company, where she played a wide variety of parts, including burlesque roles requiring singing and dancing, as well as roles in Much Ado about Nothing, Othello, and A Merchant of Venice.^[5] In 1863, Chute opened the Theatre Royal in Bath, where Terry, now aged 15, appeared at the opening as Titania in A Midsummer Night's Dream and then returned to London to join the company at the Haymarket Theatre in Shakespearean roles.^[3]

Terry married three times and was involved in numerous relationships during her lifetime. In London, during an engagement at the Haymarket Theatre, Terry and her sister Kate had their portraits painted by the eminent artist George Frederick Watts, and he soon proposed marriage. Watts's famous portraits of Terry include "Choosing," in which Terry must select between earthly vanities, symbolised by showy, but scent-less camellias and nobler values symbolised by humble-looking, but fragrant violets. Other famous portraits include "Ophelia" and, together with her sister Kate, "The Sisters." Terry was impressed with the art and elegance of his lifestyle and wished to please her parents by making an advantageous marriage. They married on 20 February 1864, shortly before her 17th birthday, when Watts was 46. During her marriage to Watts, she was uncomfortable in the role of child bride. Terry and Watts were separated after only ten months of marriage, during which she took a break from the stage, returning by 1866.^[8]

In 1867, Terry performed in several pieces by the John Taylor, including A Sheep in Wolf's Clothing at the Adelphi Theatre, The Antipodes at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane and Still Waters Run Deep at the Queen's Theatre. Later that year, she played first played opposite Henry Irving in Katherine and Petruchio, David Garrick's one-act version of The Taming of the Shrew, at the Queen's Theatre.^[5] In 1868, Terry began a relationship with the progressive architect-designer Edward William Godwin, whom she had met some years before, and with whom she retreated to Hertfordshire, retiring from acting for six years. They could not marry, as Terry was still married to Watts and did not finalize a divorce until 1877, which was then a scandalous situation. With Godwin, she had a daughter, Edith Craig in December 1869 and a son, Edward Gordon Craig, in January 1872. The last name Craig was chosen to avoid the stigma of bastardy.^[8]

The relationship with Godwin cooled in 1874 amidst financial difficulties, and Terry returned to her acting career, separating from Goodwin in 1875. In 1874, Terry played in a number of Charles Reade's works, including as Philippa Chester in The Wandering Heir, Susan Merton in It's Never Too Late to Mend, and Helen Rolleston in Our Seamen. The same year, she performed at The Crystal Palace with Charles Wyndham as Volante in The Honeymoon by John Tobin and as Kate Hardcastle in She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith.^[5]

In 1875, Terry gave an acclaimed performance as Portia in The Merchant of Venice at the Prince of Wales's Theatre. Oscar Wilde wrote a sonnet, upon seeing her in this role: "No woman Veronese looked upon / Was half so fair as thou whom I behold."^[8] She recreated this role many times in her career until her last appearance as Portia at London's Old Vic Theatre in 1917. In 1876, she appeared as Lady Teazle in The School for Scandal and in a play called Olivia by William Gorman Wills at the Court Theatre, among other performances. Terry married again, in November 1877, to Charles Clavering Wardell Kelly, an actor/journalist, but they separated before his death in 1885.

In 1878, the 30 year old Terry joined Henry Irving's company at the Lyceum Theatre as its leading lady, beginning with Ophelia opposite Irving's Hamlet. Soon, Terry was regarded as the leading Shakespearean actress in Britain, and in partnership with Irving,^[9] reigned as such for over 20 years until they left the Lyceum in 1902.^[2][10] Their 1879 production of The Merchant of Venice ran for an unusual 250 nights, and success followed success in the Shakespeare canon as well as in other major plays.^[3]

Among her most celebrated roles with Irving were Portia, Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing, another of her signature roles (1882 and often thereafter),^[11] as well as Pauline in The Lady of Lyons by Edward George Bulwer-Lytton (1878), Juliet, Cordelia in King Lear, Jeanette in The Lyons Mail by Charles Reade (1883), Margaret in Faust by William Gorman Wills (1885), Lady Macbeth in Macbeth (1888), Queen Katharine in Henry VII (1892),^[12] Rosamund de Clifford in Becket by Alfred Tennyson (1893), Guinevere in King Arthur by J. Comyns Carr, with incidental music by Sir Arthur Sullivan (1895),^[13] Imogen in Cymbeline (1896) and the title character in Victorien Sardou and Emile Moreau's play Madame Sans-Gêne (1897).^[5]

Terry made her American debut in 1883, playing Queen Henrietta opposite Irving in Charles I. Among the other roles she essayed on this and several subsequent tours with Irving were Jeanette in The Lyons Mail, Ophelia, Beatrice, Viola, and her most famous role, Portia.^[14] She lived in Earls Court with her children and pets during the 1880s. She first lived in Longridge Road before moving to Barkston Gardens in 1889.^[15]

In 1900, Terry bought her farmhouse in Smallhythe, Kent, England, where she lived for the rest of her life.

In 1903, Terry formed a new venture, taking over management of the Imperial Theatre with her son, after her business partner, Irving, ended his tenure at the Lyceum in 1902. Here she had complete artistic control and could choose the works in which she would appear, as Irving had done at the Lyceum. The new venture focused on the plays of George Bernard Shaw and Henrik Ibsen, including the latter's The Vikings in 1903, with Terry as Hiordis. During this time, Terry struck up a friendship and a famous correspondence with Shaw during this time.^[2] Theatre management turned out to be a financial failure for Terry. She then toured England, taking engagements in Nottingham, Liverpool, and Wolverhampton, and appeared in 1905 in J. M. Barrie's Alice-Sit-by-the-Fire.^[5] Irving died in 1905 and, upset by his death, Terry again retired from the stage.^[3]

She returned to the theatre again in April 1906, playing Lady Cecily Wayneflete to acclaim in Shaw's Captain Brassbound's Conversion at the Court Theatre and then touring successfully in that role in Britain and America. On June 12, 1906, after 50 years on the stage, a star-studded gala performance was held at the Drury Lane Theatre for Terry's benefit and to celebrate her golden jubilee, at which Enrico Caruso sang, W. S. Gilbert directed a performance of Trial by Jury, Eleanora Duse, Mrs. Patrick Campbell, Lillie Langtry, Herbert Beerbohm Tree, and more than twenty members of Terry's family performed, among other performances.^[3]

Terry next appeared as Hermione in Herbert Beerbohm Tree's production of A Winter's Tale. In 1907, she toured America under the direction of Charles Frohman. During that tour, On 22 March 1907, she married co-star, American James Carew, who had appeared with her at the Court Theatre. She was thirty years older than Carew. Terry's acting career continued strongly, but her marriage broke up after only two years.^[16] She played as Nance Oldfield in a Pageant of Famous Women written in 1909 by C. Hamilton and her daughter, Edith. In 1910 she toured the U.S. again with much success, acting, giving recitations and lecturing on the Shakespeare heroines.

Returning to England, she played roles such as Nell Gwynne in The First Actress by Christopher St. John (Christabel Marshall; 1911). Also in 1911, she recorded scenes from five Shakespeare roles for the Victor Talking Machine Company^[17] In 1914, Terry toured Australia and the U.S., again reciting and lecturing on the Shakespeare heroines. She did this also in Britain. While in the U.S., she underwent an operation for the removal of cataracts from both eyes, but the operation was only partly successful. In 1916, she played Darling in Barrie's The Admirable Crichton (1916). During World War I she performed in many war benefits.

In 1916, she appeared in her first film as Julia Lovelace in Her Greatest Performance and continued to act in London and on tour, also making a few more films through 1922, including The Invasion of Britain (1918), Pillars of Society (1918), Victory and Peace, Potter's Clay (1922), and The Bohemian Girl as Buda the nursemaid, with Ivor Novello and Gladys Cooper (1922).^[11] She also continued to lecture on Shakespeare throughout England, the USA and Canada. Her last fully staged role was as the Nurse in in Romeo and Juliet at the Lyric Theatre in 1919. In 1920 she retired from the stage and in 1922 from film.

In 1925 Terry was made a Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire. In her last years, she gradually lost her eyesight and suffered from senility. Stephen Coleridge anonymously published Terry's second autobiography, The Heart of Ellen Terry in 1928.

Terry died at her home at Smallhythe Place, near Tenterden, Kent, England, at age 80. Her ashes rest in the churchyard of the actors' church, St Paul's, Covent Garden, London.^[11]

After her death, the Ellen Terry Memorial Museum was founded in her memory at Smallhythe Place near Tenterden in Kent, an early 16th century house that she bought at the turn of the century.^[16] The museum was taken over by the National Trust in 1939. Also following her death, Terry's correspondence with Shaw was published.

Terry's daughter Edith Craig became a theatre director, producer, costume designer and early pioneer of the women's suffrage movement in England; her son, Edward Gordon Craig, became an actor, scenery and effects designer, illustrator and director and founded the Gordon Craig School for the Art of the Theatre in Florence, Italy, in 1913; and her grandnephew, Sir John Gielgud became an actor. The singer Helen Terry and illustrator Helen Craig are also descendants of hers.

• Auerbach, Nina. Ellen Terry: Player in Her Time (1987) W. W. Norton; (1997) University of Pennsylvania Press ISBN 978-0-8122-1613-4
• Scott, Clement. Ellen Terry (1900) Frederick A.Stokes, New York
• "Drama: This Week." The Athenæum. 19 January 1895, p. 93.
• Goodman, Jennifer R. "The Last of Avalon: Henry Irving's King Arthur of 1895." Harvard Library Bulletin, 32.3 (Summer 1984) pp. 239-55.
• Hartnoll, Phyllis and Peter Found, The Concise Oxford Companion to the Theatre. (1992) Oxford University Press ISBN 0198661363
• Manvell, Roger. Ellen Terry. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1968.
• Prideaux, Tom. Love or Nothing: The Life and Times of Ellen Terry (1976) Scribner.
• Scott, Clement. Ellen Terry. New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1900.
• Shearer, Moira. Ellen Terry (1998) Sutton.

Autobiographies and correspondence

• The Story of My Life: Recollections and Reflections (1908) London: Hutchinson & Co.; (1982) Schocken Books
• The Heart of Ellen Terry (1928) Ed. Stephen Coleridge [anon.] London; Mills & Boon, ltd.
• Ellen Terry and Bernard Shaw : A Correspondence; and The Shaw-Terry Letters: A Romantic Correspondence (Christopher St. John, Editor)

• Ellen Terry at the Internet Movie Database
• Works by Ellen Terry at Project Gutenberg
• Ellen Terry at the Family Records Centre
• Find-A-Grave photos and biography
• Links to descriptions of Terry's performances with photos
• Profile and photos of Terry
• Terry bibliography
• Links to Photos and a review of Terry
• Photos of Terry and of her funeral
• Paintings and other images of Terry
• Drawing of Terry as Portia in The Merchant of Venice
• Drawing of Terry and Irving as Ophelia and Hamlet and information from the People Play website
• Photos of Terry's home at Smallhyth and of Terry

Persondata
NAME	Terry, Dame Ellen Alice
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Terry, Alice Ellen
SHORT DESCRIPTION	English actress
DATE OF BIRTH	February 27, 1847
PLACE OF BIRTH	Coventry, England
DATE OF DEATH	July 21, 1928
PLACE OF DEATH	Smallhythe, Kent, England