Anderson, Mary (Antoinette)

Anderson, Mary [Antoinette] (1859–1940), actress. Born in Sacramento, California, but raised in Louisville, she made her hometown debut at the age of sixteen as Juliet. After seasons in Louisville, St. Louis, and San Francisco, she first appeared in New York as Pauline in The Lady of Lyons in 1877. Hailed as a promising but unfinished performer, she went on to play Juliet, Lizzie in Evadne, the title part of Meg Merrilies, and Parthenia in Ingomar. When critics attacked her Julia in The Hunchback, several important playwrights, including Dion Boucicault, wrote her warm, encouraging letters. She was considered by many the most beautiful actress on the stage, and her good looks and fervor instantly won over the public, if not the critics. By 1882 she had taken on, among others, the title role in Ion and of Galatea in W. S. Gilbert's Pygmalion and Galatea. After spending several seasons in England, Anderson returned to America in 1885, a mature actress, offering Rosalind, Clarice in W. S. Gilbert's Comedy and Tragedy (a part written expressly for her), and Juliet. Later she was the first actress to double in the parts of Hermione and Perdita in The Winter's Tale. In 1889, at the height of her fame, she announced she would marry and retire from the stage. To the surprise and disappointment of her many admirers, she kept her word. She did, however, help with the successful dramatization of The Garden of Allah (1911). To convey something of her radiant good looks to its readers, the Herald described her as “Tall, willowy and young, a fresh, fair face, short and rounded, a small finely chiselled mouth, large, almond shaped eyes of dark gray or blue, hair of a light brown, a long white throat,” and on her retirement, William Winter wrote, “She filled the scene with her presence, and she filled the hearts of her audience with a refreshing sense of delightful, ennobling conviction of possible loveliness and majesty of the human soul.” Few performers were so affectionately remembered. Autobiography: A Few Memories, 1896.