Maude Adams

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This article is about Maude Adams, the stage actress. For the Swedish actress, see Maud Adams.

Maude Adams (1902)

Maude Adams (born November 11, 1872; died July 17, 1953) was an American stage actress, most noted for her signature role, Peter Pan.^[1]^[2]

1 Personal life
2 Professional career
3 Appearances on Broadway
4 External link
5 References

[edit] Personal life

She was born Maude Ewing Adams Kiskadden in Salt Lake City, Utah. The daughter of an actor, she spent her early years in provincial theatres, sometimes appearing on plays when she was carried onstage in her mother’s arms. At the age of five, she starred in a San Francisco theatre as Little Schneider in Fritz, Our German Cousin. Her quiet, resolved, confident nature made her popular both in public and behind the scenes. She gave the impression of being refined and dignified at all times, and was openly helpful to young actors and actresses.

[edit] Professional career

Maude Adams as Peter in an early stage production

After touring in Boston and California, she made her New York City debut at age 16 as a member of E. H. Sothern's theatre company. She became a member of Charles H. Hoyt's stock company. In 1889, The powerful producer Charles Frohman then took control of her career. He requested David Belasco and Henry C. de Mille to specially write the part of Dora Prescott for her in their new 1890 play Men and Women that Frohman was producing. He then paired her with John Drew, Jr. in a series of plays beginning with The Masked Ball and ending with Rosemary in 1896, at last taking ingénue roles. She spent five years as the leading lady in John Drew's company.^[3]

Maude Adams in The Little Minister, by J. M. Barrie

Her greatest triumphs came in the works of James M. Barrie, including The Little Minister, Quality Street, What Every Woman Knows, and Peter Pan, the latter being the role with which she was most closely identified, and often repeated.

Adams last appeared on the New York stage in A Kiss For Cinderella in 1916. In 1917 she donated her estates at Lake Ronkonkoma to the Sisters of St. Regis for use as a novitiate and retreat house. Following a thirteen year retirement from the stage, during which she worked with General Electric to develop improved and more powerful stage lighting, she appeared in several regional productions of Shakespeare. She headed the drama department at Stephens College in Missouri from 1937 to 1943, becoming well known as an inspiring teacher in the arts of acting.^[3]^[4]

She died, aged 80, at her summer home, Caddam Hill, in Tannersville, New York and is interred in the cemetery of Cenacle Convent, Lake Ronkonkoma, New York.

The character of "Elise McKenna" in Richard Matheson's 1975 novel Bid Time Return and its 1980 film adaptation Somewhere in Time, in which the character was played by Jane Seymour, was based upon her.^[5]^[6]^[7] In the novel, Elise is appearing in The Little Minister, which Barrie is said to have written especially for her.