Shaw, Ibsen, Barrie
In 1902, Terry played Mistress Page in The Merry Wives of Windsor, with Herbert Beerbohm Tree as Falstaff and Madge Kendal as Mistress Ford. In the 1890s, Terry had struck up a friendship, and conducted a famous correspondence, with Shaw, who wished to begin a theatrical venture with her. In 1903, Terry formed a new theatrical company, taking over management of the Imperial Theatre with her son, after her business partner, Irving, ended his tenure at the Lyceum in 1902. Here she had complete artistic control and could choose the works in which she would appear, as Irving had done at the Lyceum. The new venture focused on the plays of George Bernard Shaw and Henrik Ibsen, including the latter's The Vikings in 1903, with Terry as the warlike Hiordis, a misjudged role for her. Theatre management turned out to be a financial failure for Terry, who had hoped the venture would showcase the set design and directing talents of her son and the costume designs of her daughter. She then toured England, taking engagements in Nottingham, Liverpool, and Wolverhampton, and created the title role in 1905 in J. M. Barrie's Alice-Sit-by-the-Fire at the Duke of York's Theatre. Irving died in 1905 and, upset by his death, Terry briefly left the stage.
She returned to the theatre again in April 1906, playing Lady Cecily Wayneflete to acclaim in Shaw's Captain Brassbound's Conversion at the Court Theatre and then touring successfully in that role in Britain and America. On 12 June 1906, after 50 years on the stage, a star-studded gala performance was held at the Drury Lane Theatre for Terry's benefit and to celebrate her golden jubilee, at which Enrico Caruso sang, W. S. Gilbert directed a performance of Trial by Jury, Eleanora Duse, Mrs. Patrick Campbell, Lillie Langtry, Herbert Beerbohm Tree, Nellie Melba, and more than twenty members of Terry's family performed in an act of Much Ado about Nothing with her, among other performances. The benefit raised £6,000 for Terry. She next appeared at His Majesty's Theatre as Hermione in Tree's production of The Winter's Tale. In 1907 she toured America in Captain Brassbound's Conversion under the direction of Charles Frohman. During that tour, on 22 March 1907, she married co-star, American James Carew, who had appeared with her at the Court Theatre. She was thirty years older than Carew. Terry's acting career continued strongly, but her marriage broke up after only two years.
In 1908, she was back at His Majesty's, playing Aunt Imogen in W. Graham Robertson's fairy play Pinkie and the Fairies. She played as Nance Oldfield in a A Pageant of Great Women written in 1909 by Cicely Hamilton and directed by Terry's daughter Edith Craig. In 1910 she toured in the provinces and then in the U.S. with much success, acting, giving recitations and lecturing on the Shakespeare heroines. Returning to England, she played roles such as Nell Gwynne in The First Actress by Christopher St. John (Christabel Marshall; 1911). Also in 1911, she recorded scenes from five Shakespeare roles for the Victor Talking Machine Company, the only known recordings of her voice. In 1914 to 1915, Terry toured Australasia, the U.S. and Britain, again reciting and lecturing on the Shakespeare heroines. While in the U.S., she underwent an operation for the removal of cataracts from both eyes, but the operation was only partly successful. In 1916, she played Darling in Barrie's The Admirable Crichton (1916). During World War I she performed in many war benefits.
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