Augustin Daly
| Augustin Daly | |
|---|---|
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| Born |
John Augustin Daly July 20, 1838 Plymouth, North Carolina, United States |
| Died | June 7, 1899 (aged 60) United States |
| Occupation | Drama critic, theatre manager, playwright, theatre director |
| Parent(s) | Denis Daly Elizabeth Duffy |
John Augustin Daly (July 20, 1838 – June 7, 1899) was one of the most influential men in American theatre during his lifetime. Drama critic, theatre manager, playwright, and adapter, he became the first recognized stage director in America. He exercised a fierce and tyrannical control over all aspects of his productions. His rules of conduct for actors and actresses imposed heavy fines for late appearances and forgotten lines and earned him the title "the autocrat of the stage." He formed a permanent company in New York and opened Daly's Theatre in New York in 1879 and a second one in London in 1893.
Augustin Daly was born in Plymouth, North Carolina of Captain Denis Daly a sea-captain and ship owner, and of Elizabeth, daughter of Lieutenant John Duffy, of the British Army. He was educated at Norfolk, Virginia, and in the public schools of New York City. His mother, early left a widow, brought her two boys to New York City, where they soon became frequent attendants at the theaters and were members of amateur groups, which under such names as the "Burton Association" or the "Murdoch Association" were the precursors of the Little Theatre Movement.
He was dramatic critic for several New York papers from 1859, and he adapted or wrote a number of plays, Under the Gaslight (1867) being his first success. In 1869 he became the manager of the Fifth Avenue Theatre on 24th St. and in 1873 the Fifth Avenue Theatre on 28th. In 1879 he built and opened Daly's Theatre at Broadway and 30th Street in New York, and, in 1893, Daly's Theatre in London.
At the first of these, he gathered a company of players, headed by Ada Rehan, which made for it a high reputation, and for them he adapted plays from foreign sources, and revived Shakespearean comedies in a manner before unknown in America. He took his entire company on tour, visiting England, Germany and France, and some of the best actors on the American stage have owed their training and first successes to him. Among these were Clara Morris, Sara Jewett, John Drew, Jr., Maurice Barrymore, Fanny Davenport, Agnes Ethel, Maude Adams, Mrs. Gilbert, Tyrone Power, Sr., Ada Dyas, Isadora Duncan, Maud Jeffries and many others. Daly's willingness to, as he put it, "stoop to the curb and bestow upon the low, untried actor a chance at greatness" earned him the nickname "Little Man Auggie" among his peers. His play Leah the Forsaken, adapted from the Deborah of Hermann Salomon Mosenthal, was a star vehicle for Margaret Mather.
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