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Elsie Mackay (actress)

For the English aviator and actress known as Poppy Wyndham, see Elsie Mackay.

Elsie Mackay
The Stage Yearbook 1917
Born
Elsie Gertrude Mackay

20 February 1893
Roebourne, Western Australia
Died6 February 1963 (aged 69)
Melbourne, Australia
OccupationActress
Spouses
​
​
(m. 1920; div. 1928)​
Max Montesole
​
​
(m. 1933; died 1942)​
James Stanley Smith (m.1957-1963)
FatherSamuel Peter Mackay

Elsie Gertrude Mackay (20 February 1893 – 6 February 1963) was an Australian-born actress who appeared on stage in the United States and Britain between 1914 and the early 1930s, and after 1934 performed on radio in Australia.[1][2]

Stage career

Mackay was born on 20 February 1893 in Roebourne, Western Australia,[1][3] to wealthy pastoralist Samuel Peter Mackay and Florence Gertrude Mackay of Mundabullangana Station.[4][2]

Mackay's education was completed at a finishing school in Switzerland. In 1910 her father remarried and her new step-mother was actress Fanny Dango.[5] Dango's relatives Millie Hylton and George Grossmith Jr introduced her to the London stage. On 19 April 1914 she became understudy to Mrs. Patrick Campbell.[6]

She became a player in the Cyril Maude Company, touring the United States in 1915. In 1916, she joined Herbert Beerbohm Tree's company on its tour of the United States, consistently taking the role of leading ladies and acting under the direction of David Belasco.[2]

Mackay's US stage career included:

On Broadway she performed in:[9]

  • Another Man's Shoes, 1918, where she replaced Alma Tell as Lionel Atwill's leading woman,[10]
  • A Well-Remembered Voice, 1919
  • As You Like It, as Rosalind 1919,
  • Clarence, as Violet Pinney 1919,
  • Poldekin, as Maria 1920,
The Wireless Weekly, (20 November 1936)
  • Deburau, as Marie Duplessis, 1921,
  • The White-Faces Fool, 1922
Mackay and Atwill, promoting The White-Faced Fool, 1922
  • The Comedian, as Jacqueline, 1923,
  • The New Gallantry, 1925.

Her only film role was the female lead in the silent comedy Nothing But the Truth opposite Taylor Holmes.[11][12][13] Motion Picture News of Jan-Feb 1920 noted it was her first film but reported that she "does not register... a screen personality. She appeared somewhat camera conscious... and did not photograph well."[14]

In December 1933 she returned to Australia with her English-born second husband, actor Max Montesole.[1][15] Together the two gave recital tours and were in radio theatre.[16][17]

Personal life

In 1920 Mackay became the second wife of actor Lionel Atwill.[18]

Mackay and Montesole married in 1933 at St. Germans, Cornwall, England. The couple moved to Australia in late 1933 where they worked together, often on radio. Montesole died in Perth in 1942.[19] Elsie married James Stanley Smith in 1957. She died in Hawthorn, Victoria, Australia in 1963 as Elsie Gertrude Smith. She was buried with her father, brother Peter and her stepmother Fanny Dango.[5]

References

  1. ^ a b c Nick Murphy, [1], at the Forgotten Australian Actors website, Accessed 1 June 2022
  2. ^ a b c Hal Porter (1965),Stars of Australian Stage and Screen. p 166. Rigby Limited, Adelaide. Porter gives a birth date of 1894
  3. ^ Government of Western Australia, Department of Births, Deaths and Marriages, Accessed 4 April 2018
  4. ^ "Inherits £10,000". The Daily News. Vol. LXIII, no. 21, 961. Western Australia. 27 August 1945. p. 14 (CITY FINAL). Retrieved 4 April 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
  5. ^ a b "Lind, Letty [real name Letitia Elizabeth Rudge] (1861–1923), actress and dancer". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. 2004. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/62723. ISBN 9780198614111. Retrieved 16 November 2020. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  6. ^ "MISS ELSIE MACKAY". The Telegraph. No. 12, 921. Queensland, Australia. 20 April 1914. p. 6. Retrieved 15 June 2022 – via National Library of Australia.
  7. ^ University of Florida, Special and Area Studies Collections, George A. Smathers Libraries.[2]
  8. ^ The Forum - Ephemera, Theatre poster. Archived 13 September 2012 at archive.today
  9. ^ Elsie Mackay at the Internet Broadway Database
  10. ^ "Theatrical Notes" (PDF). The New York Times. 30 May 1918.
  11. ^ Anon. (24 January 1920). "Elaborate interior sets used in Holmes' "Nothing But the Truth"". The Moving Picture World. p. 560.
  12. ^ York, Cal (May 1920). "Plays and Players". Photoplay. Vol. XVII, no. 6. p. 105.
  13. ^ Dickerson, J. S. (24 January 1920). "'Nothing But the Truth'. Nothing Wonderful, but Will Entertain". Motion Picture News. p. 1135.
  14. ^ https://archive.org/details/motionpicturenew21moti_1 (page1135)
  15. ^ "CHIT CHAT". Western Mail. Vol. 50, no. 2, 592. Western Australia. 24 October 1935. p. 30. Retrieved 4 April 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
  16. ^ "Comedy, Drama, Music and Song". The Weekly Gazette. Goomalling, WA. 24 May 1935. p. 1.
  17. ^ ""Shakespeare" with Max Montesole and Elsie Mackay". The Perenjori Pioneer. 24 November 1934. p. 5.
  18. ^ "Condé Nast". Archived from the original on 16 December 2013. Retrieved 15 December 2013.
  19. ^ "OBITUARY". The Age. No. 27, 276. Victoria, Australia. 19 September 1942. p. 3. Retrieved 4 April 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
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