Abraham Walter de Frece

Sir Abraham Walter de Frece (7 October 1870 – 7 January 1935) was a British theatre impresario, and later Conservative Party politician, who served as a member of parliament (MP) from 1920 to 1931. His wife was the celebrated male impersonator, Vesta Tilley.

Abraham Walter de Frece was one of four sons of Henry (Harry) de Frece, of the Gaiety Music Hall in Camden Street, Liverpool. A prosperous agent in the Roscoe Arcade, prominent theatrical manager, and a pioneering actors' agent from a large theatrical family.

Henry de Frece had his sons educated well to keep them out of theatre, with Walter attending the Liverpool Institute and a school in Belgium. But by the time Walter returned home, his elder brother Jack was managing the Alhambra wooden theatre in Manchester Street, Liverpool, and Isaac managed the old Theatre Royal in Clayton Square, Liverpool. Walter's younger brother, Lauri de Frece, later became a celebrated comedian.

By 1889, Walter was apprenticed with a notable Merseyside architect, when his father's Gaiety Theatre engaged the 25-year-old Tilly Ball as principal boy in pantomime that Christmas. Known professionally as Vesta Tilley (the 'Matchless' little Tilly), as the daughter of the former chairman of the St. George's Hall in Nottingham, Harry Ball, she had been on the stage since the age of four. By 1889 she was well-known on the tour circuit as a male impersonator.

Walter fell for Tilly, and against romantic competition that included Sir Oswald Stoll, managed to take Tilly to a dance and secure a kiss. This inspired Walter to resign his apprenticeship, and leaving home secured himself a job in the office of Warner's Theatrical Agency. Walter married Tilley, at Brixton Register Office on 16 August 1890.

Noting the decline in popularity of melodrama, and the increase in music hall revenues, de Frece secured the lease on the Metropole Theatre at Camberwell. Leaving Warner's, he turned it into the Camberwell Empire, a modern music hall. After this success, he began building a tour circuit by buying out the leases of other theatres which had fallen on hard times, including: the Grand Theatre, Margate; the Grand Theatre, Colchester; the Prince of Wales, Southampton; and a theatre at Boscombe managed by his brother-in-law, Harry Ball, junior. All were refurbished and renamed "Hippodromes," with music hall productions run by his company "The South of England Hippodromes, Ltd.," where his wife Tilley was a regular performer. He later added new Hippodromes in both Portsmouth and Southend.

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