Born in England in 1875, Dorothea Forster Baird made her first stage appearance with the Oxford Union Dramatic Society (OUDS) in 1894 as Iris in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. She then married friend and former OUDS player Henry B. Irving, the son of Sir Henry, in 1896, so her career was quite naturally entwined with that of her husband. They seldom appeared separately on stage. In 1894, Baird joined Ben Greet’s company where she played many Shakespeare roles, among them Hippolyta and Helena in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hermione in The Winter’s Tale, and Rosalind in As You Like It. Her first appearance on the London stage was as Hippolyta. She got her big break when Beerbohm Tree chose Baird to play Trilby opposite his Svengali in his 1895 production of Trilby at the Haymarket Theatre. This play, and Baird’s portrayal, made it fashionable for women to smoke cigarettes in private and was the source of the Trilby hat for men.

In 1904, Baird created the role of Mrs. Darling in the first-ever production of J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan after being considered for the role of what became Captain Hook. H. B. Irving began to revive many of his father’s plays and most famous parts, so Baird had an opportunity to play in The Bells, The Lyons Mail, and numerous Shakespeare plays. Between 1895 and 1913 she played the major female roles in As You Like It, The Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Hamlet. Both Baird and H. B. Irving had long successful careers and Shakespeare was no small part of their repertory. Her last role in London was as Portia in a 1910 run of The Merchant of Venice at His Majesty’s Theatre.

In 1913, Baird retired from the stage and spent most of her time in charitable causes, primarily those that benefited infant welfare. She died in Kent in 1933 regarded as an outstanding performer, even more so than her husband who was never quite able to step from beneath the shadow of his legendary father.

Henrietta Crosman was born in Wheeling, West Virginia, in 1865 and made her first stage appearance in 1883. In 1889, she played her first role in Shakespeare as Celia in As You Like It, and in 1902, she successfully took the part of Rosalind in the same play; this Broadway production had a run of sixty performances at the Theatre Republic. She played Shakespeare again in 1916 as Mistress Page with J. K. Hackett and Viola Allen in The Merry Wives of Windsor; she was so popular in the part of Mistress Page that she played the role again with Sir Henry Beerbohm Tree in the same year, 1916. Her last appearance in Shakespeare was as Mistress Ford in The Merry Wives of Windsor in 1928.

In 1930, she began making films and spent the rest of her career in the cinema; she played in at least fourteen films until her retirement. One of them was The Royal Family of Broadway (1930), a tale loosely based on the lives of the Barrymore family—John, Lionel and Ethel. She also played in one of my favorites, Charlie Chan’s Secret (1936).

Either through choice or through talent, Sybil had a more active career than her sister Grace. Grace had much experience with Shakespeare in her early years before she moved on to lighter fare, but Sybil seems to have played in only a few Shakespeare plays: in 1898 as Oberon in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and later as Rosalind in As You Like It. But that is not to say that she was not a serious dramatic actor. When Ibsen was still a controversial playwright in London, she performed in The Pillars of Society and The Wild Duck. Over the years she acted in many plays and took a number of parts. In 1893 she and her sister Sybil played in the music halls; they billed themselves as “The Sisters Arundale.”

Elizabeth “Lily” Brayton was born in England on June 23, 1876. She made her first stage appearance in 1896 with Frank Benson’s company in Richard II (see anecdote below). She remained with the troupe for some time, so as a “Bensonian” she played many roles in the plays of Shakespeare, appearing several seasons in the Stratford Shakespeare Festival. Her last appearance on the stage was as Portia in Julius Caesar. She married fellow actor Oscar Asche in 1898 and they joined Beerbohm Tree‘s company in 1902. In 1907, she and her sister Agnes appeared in a production of The Taming of the Shrew, as Kate and Bianca, respectively, with the Oxford Union Dramatic Society. 

She and her husband entered joint-management later in life, managing the Adelphi Theatre and Her Majesty’s Theatre, both in London. While managing, they produced As You Like It, Othello, and The Taming of the Shrew before going on tour to acclaim in Australia and New Zealand. Brayton played Rosalind, Desdemona, and Katerina respectively. Asche and Brayton made history in 1916 as the former wrote a play entitled Chu-Chin-Chow in which he played the lead, Abu Hasan. The play broke all records when it ran for 2,238 performances. Brayton took the part of Zahrat-al-Kulub and performed it almost two thousand times during the run. She died in England in 1953.

Brayton herself explains her early days as an actor in a 1919 published interview with the The Advertiser (Adelaide, Australia):

Technically speaking my first appearance was as a super, for I walked on in Twelfth Night the evening of the same day I arrived in Manchester. In the repertoire of that week were also included Othello, The Taming of the Shrew, and Richard II, and I appeared in all of them. It was in the last named that I spoke my first line as one of the ladies in attendance upon the queen, whom I afterwards played both with Mr. Benson and with Sir Herbert Tree at His Majesty’s. My line was, I believe, “Madam, we will play at bowls.” Unimportant as the line was, I think I felt an importance which has never been equalled when I have been playing the most onerous leading part.

Playing first in amateur productions, Margaret Halstan became a professional actress in 1895 at the Haymarket Theatre in a walk-on part in Trilby. Her first part in Shakespeare was a small one; she was the Player Queen Hamlet with Herbert Beerbohm Tree‘s production of the play. In 1897, she played Octavia in Antony & Cleopatra and then that same year appeared as Bianca in an adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew entitled Katherine and Petruchio.

In 1900, she joined Frank Benson‘s company where she had ample opportunity to play Shakespeare; she appeared as Portia (The Merchant of Venice), Lady Anne (Richard III), Hero (Much Ado), and Volumnia (Coriolanus). After touring with George Alexander’s group, she joined Beerbohm’s Shakespearean Company in 1904, and after that played many more Shakespeare parts: Anne Page, Calpurnia (Julius Caesar), Olivia (in 1906 and 1910), Juliet, Desdemona, and Rosalind (1908 and 1916). She played in Stratford in April 1909 as Imogen and Ophelia and Juliet again in 1913. Her role as Rosalind in 1916 may have been her last Shakespeare performance. Her early training as an actress was, however, primarily in Shakespeare’s best female roles.

She played dozens of parts in popular plays during her long career, and she was busy with films as well. Between 1917 and 1957 she played in fifteen films. The most notable of her parts was one she played several times on the London stage; she played Aunt Lydia in George O’Ferrall’s 1952 film version of The Holly and the Ivy, a sentimental but poignant story of a Christmas gathering of a family.