Maud Jeffries (1869-1946)

Maud Jeffries (1869-1946)

Maud Jeffries was born in Coahoma County, Mississippi, USA on 14th December 1869 - the daughter of a wealthy cotton planter. She was raised and educated in Columbia, Tennesee, but by the time of her coming of age her fathers fortunes were in decline and the family were deeply in debt. It was this, rather than any great fondness for the theatre, that first set Maud on the road to acting success as she chose that route to try to revive her family's fortunes.

As a nineteen-year-old she obtained an engagement to join Augustin Daly's company in New York and made her professional debut in his self-named theatre there in 1889. After a year playing small roles in Shakespearean productions with Daly, she was spotted by the English actor/manager Wilson Barrett, who was at the time on tour in the USA. Joining Barret's company, she came to England in 1890 and made her debut on the London stage at the New Olympic Theatre on 4th December 1890, as 'Lydia' in "The Peoples Idol".

Barrett was clearly impressed with her talents, for after only a short time playing minor roles in his reportory works he invited her to become his leading lady. At first she lacked the confidence to take up the offer but eventually she found the courage to accept - thereupon meeting with considerable success. Barret excelled in the role of the melodramatic hero. He was strikingly handsome and powerfully developed and in Maud he found a perfect foil. She was very beautiful, charmingly feminine, and possessed a delicate and appealing quality of voice, all of which made her the perfect Barret heroine.

Amongst her early leading roles were 'Desdemona' in "Othello" and 'Nellie Denver' in "The Silver King", a revival of one of Barrett's greatest successes. Remaining with Barrett in the following years she appeared in a succession of other leading roles, both in England and accompanying him on tours back to the USA where she never forewent the opportunity to spend time back on her family plantation. In 1895 she became the original 'Mercia' in the first production of "The Sign of the Cross" which opened in the USA in St Louis on 28th March. That play was about a Roman patrician (Barrett) who was converted to Christianity by a beautiful Christian girl (Maud) with whom he goes into the arena to meet their deaths from the lions. It was a huge success and made Barrett a fortune and Maud a superstar. Barrett brought the production to England later that year where it opened at the Leeds Grand (which Barrett had built himself) and moved to the Lyric in London the following year. It was as big a sensation in England as it had been in the USA, clergymen preached sermons about it and it regularly played to packed houses.

Now an established star, she continued on as Barrett's leading lady over the next few years. Among the many parts she played in that period were 'Elna' in "The Daughters of Babylon", 'Virginia' in "Virginius" and her former role of Desdemona in Othello. In the Autumn of 1897, she accompanied Barrett on an extended tour of Australia and did not grace the English stage again until October 1899, when she played 'Jane Humphries' in "Man and His Makers" at the Lyric. She next appeared on stage in Edinburgh as 'Lygia' in "Quo Vadis?", Barrett's own dramatic interpretation of Sienkiewicz's novel.

In October 1900, she left Barrett to join Beerbohm Tree's company at His Majesty's and appeared as 'Marianne' in "Herod" and 'Olivia' in "Twelth Night". During 1903/04 she toured as 'Donna Roma' in "The Eternal City", then returned to Australia with the prominent Scottish actor Julius Knight. She remained touring Australia and New Zealand for the next two years starring in, among other plays, "Resurrection", "The Eternal City", "Monsieur Beaucaire", "If I Were King", "The Sign of the Cross" and "The Silver King".

In 1904, at the beginning of that tour, Maud met and married James Nott Osbourne, a wealthy Australian settler. The ceremony taking place in Christchurch, New Zealand. When Knight returned to England in September 1906, Maud retired from the stage to settle with her husband in New South Wales. She made only one further stage appearance, returning for a benefit in August 1910 as 'Galatea' in "Pygmalion and Galatea". She died in Australia forty years later, on 29th September, 1946.

Although she never professed any great love for her chosen vocation, seeing the theatre only as a means of making her way in the World, Maud nevertheless at the height of her all too short stage career rose to be recognised as a great actress, ideally suited to the role of the gentle unassuming heroine. As the drama critic Boyle Lawrence wrote of her at the time:

Her simple, unaffected style, her quiet and natural use of voice and gesture, give one a sense of repose calmness which not even poignant pathos can disturb. Even in the acute sentiment of Kirrie, the heroine of the "Manxman," this effect is gained, and one is impressed that Miss Jeffries is acting without effort or exertion of any kind".

Had Maud continued her career she could have no doubt risen to even greater heights. But above all she loved the simple pleasures of a rural life, and it was this that lured her away from the stage.