'Op o' Me Thumb is a 1904 one-act play by the English authors Frederick Fenn and Richard Pryce. It was produced at the Court Theatre, London, on 13 March 1904, in a double bill with Robert Browning's A Soul's Tragedy. It transferred to the St James's Theatre on 24 April 1904. The leading role of Amanda was played by Hilda Trevelyan. [1] The play was staged in New York in 1905 with Maude Adams as Amanda. [2] It was filmed in 1920 as Suds , starring Mary Pickford in the role created by Trevelyan.
The play is set in a London laundry. One of the workers, Amanda, fantasises about being the sweetheart of a handsome client, Horace, and tells her colleagues tall stories of their supposed romance. Horace arrives to collect his laundry; she confesses her deceit to him. Out of kindness he kisses her, and then goes, leaving Amanda alone, with her fantasies shattered but with the consolation of the kiss and his gold, diamond and ruby tie pin that he has given her. [3]
The Second Mrs. Tanqueray is a problem play by Arthur Wing Pinero. It utilises the "Woman with a past" plot, popular in nineteenth century melodrama. The play was first produced in 1893 by the actor-manager George Alexander and despite causing some shock to his audiences by its scandalous subject it was a box-office success, and was revived in London and New York in many productions during the 20th century.
Sir Charles Henry Hawtrey was an English actor, director, producer and manager. He pursued a successful career as an actor-manager, specialising in debonair, often disreputable, parts in popular comedies. He occasionally played in Sheridan and other classics, but was generally associated with new works by writers including Oscar Wilde and Somerset Maugham.
Sir Nigel Ross Playfair was an English actor and director, known particularly as actor-manager of the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, in the 1920s.
Sir Charles Wyndham, néCharles Culverwell, was an English actor and theatre proprietor. Wyndham's Theatre in London is named after him, and he also built the New Theatre nearby.
Suds is a 1920 American silent comedy film directed by John Francis Dillon and starring Mary Pickford. The film is based on the 1904 English stage play 'Op o' Me Thumb, a one-act work first produced in London and presented the following year in New York with Maude Adams, a curtain raiser for her appearance in Peter Pan.
The Lyric Theatre is a West End theatre in Shaftesbury Avenue in the City of Westminster. It was built for the producer Henry Leslie, who financed it from the profits of the light opera hit, Dorothy, which he transferred from its original venue to open the new theatre on 17 December 1888.
Madge Titheradge was an Australian-born actress who became a leading actress in the West End of London and on Broadway.
Constance Emmeline Carpenter was an English-born American film and musical theatre actress.
A Kiss for Cinderella is a play by J. M. Barrie. It was first produced in London at Wyndham's Theatre on March 16, 1916, starring Gerald du Maurier and Hilda Trevelyan, enjoying great success over 156 performances, and with several annual Christmastime revivals.
Louise Hampton was a British actress. Although her career began when she was a child, it was for "the pathos and dignity of her elderly, motherly roles" that she was best known.
Dear Octopus is a comedy by the playwright and novelist Dodie Smith. It opened at the Queen's Theatre, London on 14 September 1938. On the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, the run was halted after 373 performances; after a spell in the provinces in early 1940, the play was brought back to London, and played two further runs there until 31 August 1940.
The Barretts of Wimpole Street is a 1930 play by the Dutch/English dramatist Rudolf Besier, based on the romance between Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett, and her domineering father's unwillingness to allow them to marry. Presented first at the Malvern Festival in August 1930, the play transferred to the West End, where it ran for 528 performances. An American production, produced by and starring Katharine Cornell, opened in 1931 and ran on Broadway for 370 performances. The play has subsequently been revived onstage and adapted for television and the cinema.
The Terry family was a British theatrical dynasty of the late 19th century and beyond. The family includes not only those members with the surname Terry, but also Neilsons, Craigs and Gielguds, to whom the Terrys were linked by marriage or blood ties.
Thomas Louis Buvelot Esson was an Australian poet, journalist, critic and playwright. He was a co-founder of the Pioneer Players. His second wife, Hilda Esson, had a career in theatre besides working as a doctor in the field of public health.
Sweet Lavender is a play in three acts by Arthur Wing Pinero, first performed in 1888. The sentimental and gently humorous story concerns the romance of Lavender Rolt and Clement Hale, and the complications impeding the course of true love.
Hilda Trevelyan was an English actress. Early in her career she became known for her performance in plays by J. M. Barrie, and is probably best remembered for creating the role of Wendy in Peter Pan.
The Great Adventure is a play by Arnold Bennett. It was first produced in London in March 1913 and ran for 674 performances. A Broadway production later in 1926 ran for 52 performances. The play depicts the complications that ensue when a famous artist adopts the persona of his dead valet to escape his unwelcome celebrity.
Frederick Fenn was an English playwright, journalist and drama critic. He was the librettist for one of the last Savoy Operas, A Welsh Sunset (1908), and had his greatest success with the musical comedy The Girl in the Taxi (1912).
Jennifer Gray was a British actress, frequently seen in the West End and on tour between 1934 and 1954. She made only two cinema films, but was often seen on BBC television in the late 1940s. Among the roles she created onstage were Daphne Stillington in Noël Coward's Present Laughter and Queenie Gibbons in his This Happy Breed, which premiered on successive nights in September 1942.
Carlotta Addison was an English actress. Stage appearances included leading roles in original productions of plays by T. W. Robertson, W. S. Gilbert, H. J. Byron and Arthur Wing Pinero.