Viola Emily Allen was an American actress. She played leading roles in various plays, starred in two dozen Broadway productions and three silent films.
Background
Viola Emily Allen, named for the heroine of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, was born on October 27, 1867 in Huntsville, Alabama, United States. She was the elder daughter and the first of the four children of Charles Leslie Allen and Sarah Jane (Lyon) Allen, both of the stage. Her father, whose great-grandfather had emigrated from England to Braintree, Massachussets, in 1752, was a native of Boston. Her mother was born in England. When Viola was about three, the family settled in Boston, where her father became a member of the Boston Theatre stock company.
Education
Allen was educated in a local school in suburban Boston, in Wyckham Hall, a church school in Toronto, Canada, and in Miss Cornell's School for Girls in New York City.
Career
On July 4, 1882 Allen made her professional debut at the Madison Square Theatre as an ingenue, replacing Annie Russell in the title role in Esmeralda, by William Gillette (adapted from Frances Hodgson Burnett's novel). Although only fourteen and relying mainly on her father's coaching in Shakespearean roles, she was a success, and she toured in a road company of the play the following season, then briefly supported Mrs. D. P. Powers and William E. Sheridan.
In 1883-1884 she joined tragedian John McCullough on his final tour, playing Shakespearean and classical roles (Cordelia, Desdemona, Portia, Imogen, Lady Anne; Julia in The Hunchback, Julia in The Gladiator, Tarquinia in Brutus, Virginia in Virginius, and Parthenia in Ingomar). Subsequent seasons found her playing comedy and dramatic roles at various theaters; then resuming her classical repertoire, she toured as leading lady successively to Lawrence Barrett, Tomasso Salvini, and Frederic de Belleville.
During the 1888-1889 season, she played several leading parts with the Boston Museum stock company, including Mrs. Errol (Dearest) in Frances Hodgson Burnett's Little Lord Fauntleroy and Gertrude Ellingham in Bronson Howard's Civil War drama Shenandoah. She returned to New York in the latter play, but was forced to leave the company because of a prior commitment to Joseph Jefferson and W. J. Florence, with whose comedy troupe she toured, notably as Lydia Languish in The Rivals and Cicely Homespun in The Heir-at-Law.
She next appeared in New York in The Merchant (1891) and in Aristocracy (1892). Allen became leading lady at Charles Frohman's Empire Theatre in New York in 1893. She created nearly a score of roles during the next five seasons, but left Frohman in 1898 over a contract dispute: objecting to her assignment in The Conquerors, she wanted the right to refuse a part on moral grounds. She advanced to stardom under the management of George Tyler as Glory Quayle in Hall Caine's The Christian.
During 1900-1901 she starred in Lorimer Stoddard's romantic drama In the Palace of the King; and in 1902 she played Julia in the all-star revival of The Hunchback and Roma in Caine's The Eternal City. She then toured (under the management of her brother, Charles W. Allen) in a series of opulent Shakespearean revivals: as Viola in Twelfth Night, as Hermione and Perdita in The Winter's Tale, as Rosalind in As You Like It, and as Imogen in Cymbeline.
In May 1906 the actress opened in New York in Clyde Fitch's The Toast of the Town and during the ensuing decade she appeared in a succession of classical, romantic, and contemporary parts. The White Sister was her single unimpressive venture into motion pictures. Neither Macbeth nor the Shakespeare Tercentenary Merry Wives of Windsor, both in 1916, achieved popular success; and critic Brander Matthews found Lady Macbeth "little more fitted to her temperament than Juliet would be to that of Marie Dressler". Her last stage appearance was as Margaret Russell in a single benefit performance of When a Feller Needs a Friend.
Following her retirement, Allen and her husband spent much time abroad before his death in December 1944. She died on May 9, 1948, at her New York City home and was buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Tarrytown, New York.
Achievements
Allen became a well-known actress of her time. She sustained star status through a transition from classical to realistic acting style, sometimes alternating between the two in a single season. Eschewing the advancing Ibsen school, she established herself chiefly in Shakespearean and costume parts. Allen also actively supported several theatrical and charitable organizations.
Views
Quotations:
"I like to play the real--the dramatized truth clothed with some of those idealistic verities we all possess. A little romance in these days of materialism does much to lighten and leaven the whole. "
Membership
Allen was a member of the Episcopal Actors Guild.
Personality
Allen was described as a beautiful woman with large, expressive eyes and an air of refinement. Journalist Henry Tyrrell generously ranked Viola Allen with Maude Adams, Minnie Maddern Fiske, Julia Marlowe, and Ada Rehan among the "small but supreme group of our native actresses".
Interests
Allen's favorite recreations were horseback riding, motoring, and bookcollecting were her.
Connections
On August 16, 1905, in Louisville, Kentucky, Viola Allen secretly married Peter Edward Cornell Duryea, the Brooklyn-born co-owner of a stock farm near Lexington, Kentucky, where he bred and trained champion trotting horses.
