William Terriss
Encyclopedia
Edwardian Musical Comedy
Edwardian musical comedies were British musical theatre shows from the period between the early 1890s, when the Gilbert and Sullivan operas' dominance had ended, until the rise of the American musicals by Jerome Kern, Rodgers and Hart, George Gershwin and Cole Porter following World War I.Between...
star Ellaline Terriss
Ellaline Terriss
Ellaline Terriss, born Ellaline Lewin , was a popular English actress and singer, best known for her performances in Edwardian musical comedies...
.
Life and career
Terriss's real name was William Charles James Lewin. He was born in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
and educated at Bruce Castle School
Bruce Castle School
Bruce Castle School, at Bruce Castle, Tottenham, was a progressive school for boys established in 1827 as an extension of Rowland Hill's Hazelwood School at Edgbaston...
, Tottenham
Tottenham
Tottenham is an area of the London Borough of Haringey, England, situated north north east of Charing Cross.-Toponymy:Tottenham is believed to have been named after Tota, a farmer, whose hamlet was mentioned in the Domesday Book; hence Tota's hamlet became Tottenham...
, where he was a friend of J. Comyns Carr
J. Comyns Carr
Joseph William Comyns Carr was an English drama and art critic, gallery director, author, poet, playwright and theatre manager....
and Frederick Selous
Frederick Selous
Frederick Courteney Selous DSO was a British explorer, officer, hunter, and conservationist, famous for his exploits in south and east of Africa. His real-life adventures inspired Sir H. Rider Haggard to create the fictional Allan Quatermain character. Selous was also a good friend of Theodore...
. Carr later wrote of Terriss's school days that "if he gained but little learning, he at any rate acquired a perfect mastery in the art of tree-climbing". Terriss then studied at Jesus College, Oxford
Jesus College, Oxford
Jesus College is one of the colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is in the centre of the city, on a site between Turl Street, Ship Street, Cornmarket Street and Market Street...
, without taking a degree. He loved the adventurous, outdoor life. He married Amy Lewis (stage name Fellowes) in 1868 and had a daughter, Ellaline
Ellaline Terriss
Ellaline Terriss, born Ellaline Lewin , was a popular English actress and singer, best known for her performances in Edwardian musical comedies...
, who became a very well known actress in musical comedy, together with her husband, Seymour Hicks
Seymour Hicks
Sir Arthur Seymour Hicks , better known as Seymour Hicks, was a British actor, music hall performer, playwright, screenwriter, theatre manager and producer. He married the actress Ellaline Terriss in 1893...
(an actor and the proprietor of the Aldwych Theatre
Aldwych Theatre
The Aldwych Theatre is a West End theatre, located on Aldwych in the City of Westminster. The theatre was listed Grade II on 20 July 1971. Its seating capacity is 1,200.-Origins:...
and Hicks Theatre in London). He also had a son, Tom, who became a well-known film director, writer and actor.
Falkland Islands
The Falkland Islands are an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean, located about from the coast of mainland South America. The archipelago consists of East Falkland, West Falkland and 776 lesser islands. The capital, Stanley, is on East Falkland...
, and tea-planting in Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...
, he returned to England and took to the stage, adopting the stage-name William Terriss, where his handsome presence, fine voice and gallant bearing made him popular. Because of his swashbuckling style, he became famous in hero parts and was known as "Breezy Bill". His first appearance in London was as Lord Cloudrays in Tom Robertson
Thomas William Robertson
Thomas William Robertson , usually known professionally as T. W. Robertson, was an Anglo-Irish dramatist and innovative stage director best known for a series of realistic or naturalistic plays produced in London in the 1860s that broke new ground and inspired playwrights such as W.S...
's Society, in 1871, at the old Prince of Wales's Theatre
Scala Theatre
The Scala Theatre was a theatre in London, sited on Charlotte Street, off Tottenham Court Road, in the London Borough of Camden. The first theatre on the site opened in 1772, and the theatre was demolished in 1969, after being destroyed by fire...
.
In 1871, also, Terriss had a major success in Robin Hood and in Rebecca, based on Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott. Over the next few years he established himself as one of Britain's most popular actors. In 1880 he joined Henry Irving
Henry Irving
Sir Henry Irving , born John Henry Brodribb, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility for season after season at the Lyceum Theatre, establishing himself and his company as...
's company at the Lyceum Theatre, playing such parts as Cassio in Othello
Othello
The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in approximately 1603, and based on the Italian short story "Un Capitano Moro" by Cinthio, a disciple of Boccaccio, first published in 1565...
and Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written early in the career of playwright William Shakespeare about two young star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately unite their feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular archetypal stories of young, teenage lovers.Romeo and Juliet belongs to a...
, and in 1895 he acted there with Mary Anderson
Mary Anderson (stage actress)
Mary Anderson was an American stage actress.-Early life:...
, for example, as Romeo to her Juliet. Terriss and Irving became close friends. Terriss also became close with his neighbor, George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...
.
In December 1885, Terriss met 24-year-old Jessie Millward, with whom he starred in The Harbour Lights (by G. R. Sims and Henry Pettitt
Henry Pettitt
Henry Alfred Pettitt , was a British actor and dramatist.With Augustus Harris, he wrote the play Burmah, produced on Broadway in 1896. With G. R...
), and the pair established themselves as romantic leads together. They became lovers and toured Britain and America together for some years. Terriss was then engaged to take the hero parts in Adelphi melodrama
Melodrama
The term melodrama refers to a dramatic work that exaggerates plot and characters in order to appeal to the emotions. It may also refer to the genre which includes such works, or to language, behavior, or events which resemble them...
s, such as in The Bells of Haslemere (1887), and it was in this capacity that for the rest of his career he was best known, though he occasionally acted elsewhere, notably with Irving at the Lyceum Theatre. In 1895, Terris starred in a drama called One of the Best, inspired by the famous Dreyfus Trial. Terriss's son-in-law, Seymour Hicks, wrote the piece at the suggestion of the playwright W. S. Gilbert
W. S. Gilbert
Sir William Schwenck Gilbert was an English dramatist, librettist, poet and illustrator best known for his fourteen comic operas produced in collaboration with the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, of which the most famous include H.M.S...
. Terriss's last appearance was in the play Secret Service.
Murder
On 16 December 1897, as he was entering the Adelphi TheatreAdelphi Theatre
The Adelphi Theatre is a 1500-seat West End theatre, located on the Strand in the City of Westminster. The present building is the fourth on the site. The theatre has specialised in comedy and musical theatre, and today it is a receiving house for a variety of productions, including many musicals...
to prepare for the evening's performance of Secret Service, Terriss was stabbed to death by a deranged and disgruntled actor, Richard Archer Prince
Richard Archer Prince
Richard Archer Prince, also known as William Archer Flint, was an actor, often down on his luck. He became famous for murdering actor William Terriss outside the Adelphi Theatre, in London, in 1897.-Biography:...
.
Terriss had helped the struggling younger actor to find work in various productions that he had a hand in. However, Prince had, over the years, increasingly abused alcohol and become mentally unstable. During the run of The Harbour Lights, in which Prince had a minor role, Terriss took offence to something that Prince had said about him and had Prince dismissed. Terriss, however, sent small sums of money to Prince, via the Actors' Benevolent Fund, and continued to try to find him acting work. By the end of 1897, Prince was destitute and desperate for work, but he had become unemployable. On 13 December, Prince was forcibly ejected from the foyer of the Vaudeville Theatre
Vaudeville Theatre
The Vaudeville Theatre is a West End theatre on The Strand in the City of Westminster. As the name suggests, the theatre held mostly vaudeville shows and musical revues in its early days. It opened in 1870 and was rebuilt twice, although each new building retained elements of the previous...
, and he and Terriss were seen to argue the next night in Terriss's dressing room in the Adelphi Theatre. On the day of the murder, Prince asked for money at the Fund's office but was told that his request could not be considered that day. Apparently, he crossed the street and waited for Terriss at Terriss's entrance to the Adelphi.
The murder became a sensation in the London press. The trial was not satisfactory, as Prince made the most of his new notoriety. Prince was found guilty but insane and sent to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum, where he died in 1936. His relatively mild sentence was met with anger by the theatrical community, and Sir Henry Irving was later quoted as saying that "Terriss was an actor, so his murderer will not be executed."
Memorials and references in popular culture
Terriss is buried in Brompton CemeteryBrompton Cemetery
Brompton Cemetery is located near Earl's Court in South West London, England . It is managed by The Royal Parks and is one of the Magnificent Seven...
, London. A lifeboat house was built in 1898 on Eastbourne seafront in memory of Terriss. It still stands there with a memorial plaque. There is also a plaque on the wall by the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre recording the event of the murder.
A portrait of William Terriss hangs in the stairwell of Denville Hall, the home for retired Actors and Actresses in Northwood, London, England. The home is run by The Actors' Charitable Trust, founded in 1896 by Mrs. Kittie Carson (wife of the publisher of "The STAGE") and Mrs. Compton, mother of actress Fay Compton
Fay Compton
Fay Compton was an English actress from a notable acting lineage; her father was actor/manager Edward Compton; her mother, Virginia Bateman, was a distinguished member of the profession, as were her sister, the actress Viola Compton, and her uncles and aunts. Her grandfather was the 19th-century...
. Sir Henry Irving, was the first President of the organization until his death in 1905.
The murder of Terriss is dramatised in the Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
play The Star of the Adelphi broadcast in 2002.
Ghost
Legend has it that Terriss's ghost haunts the Covent Garden tube stationCovent Garden tube station
Covent Garden is a London Underground station in Covent Garden. It is on the Piccadilly Line between Leicester Square and Holborn. The station is a Grade II listed building, on the corner of Long Acre and James Street...
and the Adelphi Theatre. A 2005 Channel 5 documentary in the UK on ghosts on the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
reported that a ghost has been seen many times, at the Covent Garden tube station, identified from a photograph as Terriss. This ghost is reported to have been seen many times, though sightings have lessened over the years. A 2008 documentary, Ghosts on the Underground produced by The History Channel
The History Channel
History, formerly known as The History Channel, is an American-based international satellite and cable TV channel that broadcasts a variety of reality shows and documentary programs including those of fictional and non-fictional historical content, together with speculation about the future.-...
, mentions a recent sighting of Terriss at the Covent Garden Underground station.
External links
- Photo and information about Terriss
- Information about Archer
- New York Times report of the murder
- Final Performance, 2009 book about Terriss and his relationship with Jessie Millward
- great great granddaughter with Theatrical archive