Adelaide Neilson - Theatre

Theatre

When she was about 15 years old Neilson left her home and made her way to London. Soon after she reached London, she obtained employment, because of her beauty, as a member of the ballet at one of the theatres, and in that way she began her professional career. Various romantic tales were printed concerning her way of life at that time.

She married Philip Henry Lee, the son of a clergyman resident at Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire, in December 1864.

In Spring 1865, after having received some instruction from the veteran actor, John Ryder, she appeared at Sarah Thorne's Theatre Royal (Margate), long a training-school for novices, where she made a favourable impression. In 1865, at Theatre Royal (Margate), she appeared as Julia in The Hunchback, a character with which her name was long to be associated.

For the next few years, she played at London and provincial theatres in various roles, including Rosalind, Amy Robsart and Rebecca (in Ivanhoe), Beatrice, Viola and Isabella (in Measure for Measure). In July 1865 she was brought out at the New Royalty Theatre, London, in the character of Juliet. Her achievement was not considered extraordinary, but it attracted some favourable attention, and she was thus enabled to proceed in practice of the art to which she had determined to devote her life.

She was a part of a production of The Hugenot Captain by Watts Phillips given by the Princess Theatre on 2 July 1866. Neilson played the role of Gabrielle de Savigny, the heroine of the story. In November 1866 she received favourable reviews for her portrayal of Victorine, another character in The Hugenot Captain. This time the play was performed at the Adelphi Theatre. She also played Nelly Armroyd, in Lost in London. Phillips was pleased with her acting; so was the critic Joseph Knight and the dramatist, Dr Westland Marston; and all of them exerted a friendly influence to promote her professional advancement. Dr Marston, in particular, was able to offer her much practical advice and guidance.

In 1868 she had become an experimental travelling star, acting Rosalind, Bulwer's Pauline, and Knowles' Julia; but she was not at first successful in her ambitious endeavour, and during the next three or four years she strove with circumstance as best she might, sometimes acting in metropolitan stock companies, and sometimes taking a position of more prominence. One of the expedients that she early adopted was that of a dramatic recital, given at St. James' Hall, London. Long afterwards she repeated that recital in America, with brilliant effect. Some of the parts that she played, at various London theatres, were: Lillian, in Dr Marston's Life for Life; Madame Vidal, in A Life Chase, by John Oxenford and Horace Wigan; and Mary Belton, in Uncle Dick's Darling. In 1870 she gained a conspicuous success as Amy Robsart, a part that admirably suited her, in a play based on Sir Walter Scott's novel Kenilworth; and in 1871 she obtained critical admiration as Rebecca, in a play based on Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe.