Henry Hinchliffe Ainley (21 August 1879 – 31 October 1945) was an English actor.
Life and career
Early years
Ainley was born in Morley, near Leeds, on 21 August 1879, the only son and eldest child of Richard Ainley (1851–1919), a textile worker, and his wife, Ada née Hinchliffe (1850–1928). After education at the church school of St Peter's, Morley, Ainley became a bank clerk in Sheffield, where he took part in amateur dramatics.[1] When the actor-manager George Alexander was on tour in 1899 in H. A. Jones's play The Masqueraders, Ainley obtained his permission to "walk on" (i.e. appear as a non-speaking extra). He made his professional stage début in F. R. Benson's company as a messenger in Macbeth.[2] He remained with Benson for two years, making his London début at the Lyceum Theatre as the Duke of Gloster to Benson's king in Henry V, in a cast that also featured Constance Benson, Leslie Faber, Harcourt Williams, Charles Doran and Oscar Asche.[3][4]
John Gielgud held Ainley in high regard and fulfilled a longstanding ambition to perform with him when Gielgud played Iago opposite Ainley's Othello in a 1932 BBC Radio broadcast.[7] But he described Ainley's Prospero as "disastrous",[8] writing in the Sunday Times in 1996.
In 1932, Ainley was part of the effort to save the debt-laden Sadler's Wells theatre. According to a report in The Times dated 15 March 1932, Ainley considered Sadler's Wells stalwart Samuel Phelps the "greatest actor of all" and Sir Johnston Forbes-Robertson "the greatest of Hamlets".[11]
Personal life
He was married three times – to Susanne Sheldon, Elaine Fearon and the novelist Bettina Riddle, who was known as the Baroness von Hutten zum Stolzenberg.[12] He had several children (although the published obituaries in The Times and The Stage disagree as to the precise numbers) which include the actors Henry T. Ainley, Richard Ainley, Anthony Ainley and Patsy Ainley. He was also the father of Henrietta Riddle who was briefly engaged to Alistair Cooke in 1932.
Fifteen letters in the possession of Laurence Olivier's widow Joan Plowright suggest that Ainley may have had a sexual relationship with the younger actor in the late 1930s. The letters – said by Olivier's biographer Terry Coleman to be explicitly homosexual in content – suggest that Ainley was infatuated with Olivier, even if, as some members of Olivier's family insist, notably the actor's son Tarquin Olivier, the feeling was not reciprocated.[13]
Recordings
Henry Ainley made recordings for the Gramophone Company by the acoustic method, and also later for the same company (as HMV) by electric recordings. The early acoustics were as follows:
1456 The Day (Chappell) (Ho1100/B393) 10"
1457 The Kaiser and God (Pain). 1915. 10"
B393 The Charge of the Light Brigade (Tennyson). 10"
C490 Why Britain is at War. (coupled with GILBERT, John Bull's budget song)
D177 Carillon 'Chantez, Belges, chantez!' (Sing, Belgians, sing!) poem by Emile Cammaerts, declamation with orchestral music composed by Edward Elgar. (two sides) 12". 1915.