Fanny Lily Gipsy Davenport was an American actress. There is no question of her wide popularity or of the eminence of the position she reached and maintained in her profession.
Background
Fanny Lily Gipsy Davenport was born on April 10, 1850 in London, England, in a house opposite the British Museum, while her father was in the midst of six years in the English theatre. She was the daughter of E. L. Davenport, one of America’s leading actors during the nineteenth century, and Fanny (Vining) Davenport, daughter of an English actor and manager and herself an actress all her life.
The eldest of seven brothers and sisters who all adopted the theatre as a profession.
Education
Davenport's parents brought her with them to America in 1854, and she went to school in Boston where the family made their home.
Career
Davenport made her first public appearance as the child in Metamora, with her father’s company at the Howard Athenaeum, Boston, and thereafter she accompanied her parents on tour, whenever a child was needed being chosen to play the part.
She spoke her first lines on the stage of Burton’s Theatre, in New York City, February 23, 1857. In these earlier appearances she was billed as “Miss Fanny. ”
Always rather robust than petite, she was often cast for boy parts and actually made her debut in an adult role as King Charles of Spain, in Faint Heart Never Won Fair Lady, with her parents, at Niblo’s Garden, New York City, February 14, 1862. Soon after this she left her father’s company and began an independent career, acting first in the Louisville Theatre company as Carline in The Black Crook, and later in Mrs. Drew’s company at the Arch Street Theatre, Philadelphia, where she attracted the attention of Augustin Daly, who engaged her for his old Fifth Avenue Theatre in West Twenty-fourth St. She made her first appearance there as Lady Gay Spanker, in London Assurance, and met with immediate success.
So began the second phase of her career. Here, and later at Daly’s Globe and new Fifth Avenue theatres, she acted a wide variety of leading roles in revivals of Shakespearian and other old English comedies as well as in new comedies. As she matured in this experience she developed a capacity for more emotional and dramatic roles.
Her success in W. S. Gilbert’s Charity induced Daly to write Pique, in which she created the part of Mabel Renfrew, in 1876. The play ran for 238 consecutive performances.
After this run she entered upon the third phase of her career by purchasing Pique and in it beginning a tour at the head of her own company.
Gradually she accumulated a repertoire of Shakespearian and modern French works covering a wide range, though eventually she forsook her earlier comedy roles for more emotional and tragic parts.
In 1882 she attempted to establish herself on the English stage, and chose Pique for her London debut, but met with little success. At that moment Sarah Bernhardt’s performance of Sar- dou’s Fedora had carried both actress and playwright to the zenith of their careers.
With the American rights to this play, Fanny Davenport returned to New York, where she produced it with such success that she continued to act it profitably for five consecutive seasons.
Thereafter, as long as she acted (with the exception of a brief ill-fated effort in a play on Joan of Arc), she played only Sardou’s La Tosca, Cleopatra, and Gismonda.
Achievements
Of Davenport's acting there is a variety of opinions, though all seem to agree in choosing Nancy Sykes in Oliver Twist, Fédora, and La Tosca as her best rôles.
Views
Quotations:
“I cannot remember when I did not love the theatre, ” she wrote in Lippincott’s Magasine, in October 1888; “and a passion for acting seemed born in me. When but ten years old I was constantly engaged in writing scenes (which my younger sisters would never study, much to my annoyance), arranging climaxes for acts, and planning all sorts of things to perform. ”
Connections
On July 30, 1879 Davenport married Edwin H. Price, an actor in her company. They were divorced in 1888, and on May 19, 1889, she married Melbourne MacDowell, also an actor in her company, who became her leading man. He survived her.
