Career
Emms adopted the name Hetty King when she first appeared on the stage of the Shoreditch Theatre, at the age of six with her father, William Emms (1856–1954), a comedian who used the stage name of Will King. By 1905, she was appearing in music halls, with her solo act, as a male impersonator, often dressed as a "swell". Her career spanned both World Wars when she performed in the uniform of either a soldier or a sailor. In the First World War her act included, in 1916, "Songs the soldiers sing" when she sang some of the less rude of the songs invented by soldiers in the trenches.
She also played the "principal boy" in many pantomimes. She continued to entertain until the end of her life, touring with the show Thanks for the Memory.
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Famous quotes containing the word career:
“Like the old soldier of the ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty. Goodbye.”
—Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964)
“Whether lawyer, politician or executive, the American who knows what’s good for his career seeks an institutional rather than an individual identity. He becomes the man from NBC or IBM. The institutional imprint furnishes him with pension, meaning, proofs of existence. A man without a company name is a man without a country.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“I seemed intent on making it as difficult for myself as possible to pursue my “male” career goal. I not only procrastinated endlessly, submitting my medical school application at the very last minute, but continued to crave a conventional female role even as I moved ahead with my “male” pursuits.”
—Margaret S. Mahler (1897–1985)