Tempest, Dame Marie

Tempest, Dame Marie [ Mary Susan Etherington] (1864–1942), English actress. Trained as a singer, she was seen in operetta and musical comedy and in 1890 went to New York, later touring Canada and the USA in light opera. Returning to London in 1895 she appeared under George Edwardes at Daly's Theatre, being seen in The Geisha (1896), San Toy (1899), and other musical comedies. She then deserted the musical stage and from the time of her successful appearance as Nell Gwynn in Anthony Hope's English Nell (1900) appeared only in comedy. She was much admired in two plays by her second husband Cosmo Gordon-Lennox (1869–1921), Becky Sharp (1901), based on Thackeray's Vanity Fair, and The Marriage of Kitty (1902), which she subsequently revived many times. She toured America, Australia, and elsewhere from 1914 to 1922 with a varied repertory of light comedies. On her return she became noted for playing charming and elegant middle-aged women— Judith Bliss in Noël Coward's Hay Fever (1925), the title-role in St John Ervine's The First Mrs Fraser (1929), and Fanny Cavendish in Theatre Royal (1934) by Edna Ferber and George S. Kaufman. In 1935 she celebrated her stage jubilee with a matinée at Drury Lane, but she continued to act, being seen as Georgina Leigh in Robert Morley's Short Story (1935) with her third husband, W. Graham Browne (1870–1937), who had appeared with her in many previous productions, some of which he directed. She made her last appearance as Dora Randolph in Dear Octopus (1938).

This play, in which a matriarch presides over a reunion of her family—the ‘octopus’ of the title—was the best-known work of Dodie Smith [ Dorothy Smith] (1896–1990), the author of several other well-written escapist plays, beginning with Autumn Crocus (1931) and including Call it a Day (1935).