Lilian Baylis
Lilian Mary Baylis CH (born May 9, 1874 in London , † November 25, 1937 in London) was an English theater director . The ensemble she founded the Old Vic Theater and the Sadler's Wells Theater go the Royal National Theater , the English National Opera and the Royal Ballet back.
Life
Lilian Baylis grew up in a family of musicians, received musical training at an early age and began performing in the entertainment band The Gypsy Revellers formed by her family as a teenager . In addition, as a teenager she was introduced to the reality of life in London's lower classes by her Aunt Emma Cons , who fought with the social reformer Octavia Hill for social housing and the promotion of quality of life in London's slums.
When the Gypsy Revellers were offered a long-term contract in South Africa in 1891 , the Baylis family emigrated there. They were initially on tour and then settled in Johannesburg , where Lilian Baylis was a successful music and dance teacher. In 1898 she traveled to London because of an illness. Her return to South Africa was delayed by the start of the Second Boer War .
She therefore helped Emma Cons run London's Royal Victoria Hall and Coffee Tavern , which offered cultural and educational events for the working class. Gradually, Cons gave her responsibility for more and more concerts, film screenings, readings and variety programs. Baylis therefore decided to stay in England and, after the death of her aunt in 1912, took over the management of the theater now known as the Old Vic until her own death . A Shakespeare cycle, which was presented from 1914 with The Taming of the Shrew and ended in 1923 with Troilus and Cressida, received much attention . The Old Vic was the first theater to perform all Shakespeare plays from the First Folio as a cycle. Music theater and dance productions were also presented at the Old Vic with their own ensembles.
In 1925 Baylis began to raise money for the reopening of the traditional but shabby Sadler's Wells Theater in the northern borough of Islington , which she was able to open on January 6, 1931 with a gala performance of Shakespeare's What You Want (with John Gielgud and Ralph Richardson ). In the following years the opera, drama and ballet companies played alternately in both theaters and became known as the "Vic-Wells companies".
From 1935 the Old Vic became the exclusive home of the theater; Sadler's Wells was now the venue for opera and ballet.
In 1928 Baylis hired Ninette de Valois , who established Sadler's Wells as a venue for high-quality dance theater in London and under whose direction the classical ballet in Great Britain experienced its greatest heyday. De Valois promoted dancers such as Margot Fonteyn and Robert Helpmann , and guests included Alicia Markova and Anton Dolin . Constant Lambert was the musical director, while de Valois and Frederick Ashton were responsible for the new choreographies . In 1946 this company moved to the Royal Opera House ; In 1956 it was renamed the Royal Ballet .
The opera company, which sang exclusively in English, also became a fixture in the London music and theater business. Eight years after Baylis' death, the most important British opera of the 20th century, Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes, premiered at Sadler's Wells Theater in 1945 . The English National Opera , which emerged from the ensemble, is considered to be one of the most important opera houses in Great Britain.
The Old Vic Company has produced some of the greatest stars of 20th century British theater including Laurence Olivier , John Gielgud , Peggy Ashcroft , Sybil Thorndike , Edith Evans , Alec Guinness , Michael Redgrave , Maurice Evans and Ralph Richardson . Major successes of Bayli's tenure included John Gielgud's debut as Hamlet in 1930 (the first production to be presented by the Old Vic in London's West End) and the casting of the title role in Henry VIII with the newly-starred Charles Laughton . This ensemble later became the Royal National Theater .
After a long illness, Baylis died after a heart attack in 1937, the day before the premiere of Macbeth with Olivier and Judith Anderson at the Old Vic . Her remains were cremated; the ashes were scattered around East London Cemetery at their own request . No tomb there commemorates them.
Honors
In 1924 Baylis was the second woman in the history of Oxford University to be awarded an honorary master's degree. In 1929 she was accepted into the Order of the Companions of Honor (CH). In 1934 she received an honorary doctorate from Birmingham University .
Baylis was posthumously chosen as the namesake for the new audience program of the English National Opera in 1985. The Baylis Program (later eno baylis ) promotes opera visits by people who previously had no access to the opera. After the renovation of the Sadler's Wells Theater, the newly built studio theater was named Lilian Baylis Theater . There is a Lilian Baylis terrace in the National Theater and a Lilian Baylis Circle in the Old Vic . A rehearsal building of the English National Opera in West Hampstead is called Lilian Baylis House . Several schools were named after her, including a street at London's Waterloo Station near the Old Vic called Baylis Street . the Royal Victoria Hall Foundation annually presents Lilian Baylis awards for young actors.
Fonts
- with Cicely Mary Hamilton : The Old Vic . Cape, London 1926
- Shakespeare's heroines . Ferrestone Press, London around 1930
literature
- Elaine Aston: Baylis, Lilian Mary (1874-1937) . In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2004 ( index entry )
- Edward J. Dent: A theater for everybody. The story of the Old Vic and Sadler's Wells . Boardman, London 1945
- Richard Findlater: Lilian Baylis. The Lady of the Old Vic . Allen Lane, London 1975 ( excerpts from Google Books )
- Elizabeth Schafer. Lilian Baylis. A biography . University of Hertfordshire Press, Hatfield 2006, ISBN 1-902806-63-8
- Sybil and Russell Thorndike: Lilian Baylis . Chapman & Hall, London 1938
- Harcourt Williams: Vic-Wells. The work of Lilian Baylis . Cobden-Sanderson, London 1938
Web links
- Portraits in the National Portrait Gallery
- History of the Old Vic at the Victoria & Albert Museum
Individual evidence
- ^ Richard Findlater: Lilian Baylis. The Lady of the Old Vic . Allen Lane, London 1975
- ↑ Cecily Hamilton, Lilian Baylis: The Old Vic . Cape, London 1926.
- ↑ Robert Tanitch: Olivier . Abbeville Press
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Baylis, Lilian |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Baylis, Lilian Mary (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English theater director |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 9, 1874 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | London |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 25, 1937 |
| Place of death | London |