Baby Mine (1910 play)

Baby Mine is a farce comedy play in three acts by Margaret Mayo that made its Broadway debut at Daly's Theatre (1221 Broadway) on August 23, 1910. The piece was produced by William A. Brady and remained at Daly's for nearly an entire season. Closing on April 1, 1911, Baby Mine then transferred to Brooklyn's Majestic Theatre for a three-week run which was followed by a brief stand at the Lyric Theatre in Manhattan before closing with a combined total from all three venues of two hundred and twenty-seven performances. Mayo's comedy was made into two silent films, Baby Mine (1917), Madge Kennedy's debut film, and Baby Mine (1928), starring Charlotte Greenwood, Karl Dane and George K. Arthur. Mon bébé, a July 10, 1967, episode of The French television series Au théâtre ce soir was based on Mayo's play.

Baby Mine is a farce comedy about young newlyweds, Zoie and Alfred Hardy, who have separated after months of bickering. One issue that divides the couple is children—Alfred was eager to be a parent, Zoie not so much. After several months apart pass, Zoie consults her friend Aggie on how she could lure her estranged husband back. Aggie suggests she procure an unwanted baby and tell her husband that the foundling is theirs. Jimmy Jinks, Aggie's husband, locates a desperate mother willing to give up her newborn and soon word is sent to Alfred. The ploy begins to unravel though when shortly before Alfred is due to return, overjoyed with the news, the baby's mother has a change of heart. A scramble ensues to find another child before Alfred's homecoming.

Gynecology has never figured as a popular dramatic thesis. James A. Herne once made partial use of it in "Margaret Fleming," and some critics, including W. D. Howells, put it down as one of the greatest plays ever written, while others declared it insultingly indecent. Margaret Mayo, with refreshing candor coupled with much common sense and a nice appreciation of "the limit," has dramatized a problem in obstetrics, which is making the walls of Daly's Theatre nightly resound with howls of unlimited merriment. It is in three acts, and is called "Baby Mine." It was a happy touch on the part of the author to make her central figures a very young married couple, as their ingenuous simplicity made it possible to gloss over situations that otherwise would have appeared somewhat raw.' Theatre Magazine, October, 1910'

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