Hayes [Brown], Helen (1900–93), actress. The daughter of a small‐time actress and a traveling salesman, she was born in Washington, D.C., and made her stage debut there at the age of five with a local stock company. She soon came to the attention of Lew
Fields, who cast her as Little Mimi in
Old Dutch (1909), her Broadway debut. After appearing in several more of his musicals she moved on to such teenage roles as
Pollyanna (1917), Margaret Schofield in
Penrod (1918), and Margaret in
Dear Brutus (1918). In the early 1920s Hayes won recognition and seemed for a short while type‐cast as a flapper, including the parts of Cora Wheeler in
Clarence (1919), Elsie Beebe in
To the Ladies (1922), and Catherine Westcourt in
Dancing Mothers (1924). After playing Cleopatra in
Caesar and Cleopatra (1925) she appeared for the first time in what became her favorite part: Maggie Wylie in
What Every Woman Knows. This role of a seemingly mousy, unassertive woman who bends everyone to her will succinctly caught the dichotomy that characterized much of Hayes's later acting, a curious and unique combination of apparent softness, even cuteness, with a hard, iron resolve. Following memorable portrayals of the doomed flapper Norma Besant in
Coquette (1927) and Mary Stuart in
Mary of Scotland (1933), Hayes essayed what is probably her most famous part, the title role in
Victoria Regina (1935). She portrayed the Queen from her young, innocent years into aged widowhood. Robert Garland of the
World‐Telegram hailed her performance as one of “consummate skill and comprehension.” Subsequent performances of note included Viola in
Twelfth Night (1940); the determined actress Madeleine Guest in
Candle in the Wind (1941); author Harriet Beecher Stowe in
Harriet (1943); the tipsy librarian Addie Bemis in
Happy Birthday (1946); Southern aristocrat Lucy Andree Ransdell in
The Wisteria Trees (1950); Mrs. Howard V. Larue II, whose son is spirited away by a wicked witch, in
Mrs. McThing (1952); the Duchess of Pont‐au‐Bronc in
Time Remembered (1957); and the loyal wife Nora Melody in
A Touch of the Poet (1958). For the rest of her career, playing in both America and Europe, she appeared largely in revivals. The most memorable of these was her sweetly calculating Mrs. Fisher in
The Show‐Off (1967) and the flustered Veta Louise Simmons in
Harvey (1970). In her heyday Hayes ranked with Katharine
Cornell and Lynn
Fontanne as one of the theatre's great ladies. She lived to see two Broadway theatres named after her. Autobiography:
My Life in Three Acts, 1990.
