The Fabulous Barrymores

Part I

 

Maurice Barrymore

But the story didn’t begin with the Fab 3! Some think it started with a boy born in Amritsar, Punjab, India who became the middleweight boxing champion of England, studied law at Oxford and then had to change his name and leave town. Or maybe, as others believe, it started much earlier in America with the stage debut of a 7 year-old girl who had begun a career that spanned 70 years.

The boy, Herbert Arthur Chamberlayne Blyth, was born on September 21 st, 1849 . The son of a British army officer, he was raised in England and educated at Harrow and Oxford . But when he chose to abandon his law career to be an actor , his scandalized family asked him to change his name. So Herbert adopted the name of an early 19 th century English actor, William Barrymore , added the French-sounding “Maurice” and hopped a slow boat to Boston .

Louisa Lane Drew	John Drew

On the other side of the Atlantic , that little girl had become an established actress. Louisa Lane was best known for her comedic roles and it was probably that side of her nature that drew her to John Drew. John was born in Dublin and carried that Irish flair on to the American stage. Together the two

Georgiana Drew Barrymore

managed the Arch Street Theater in Philadelphia and raised their three children there. John, Jr. (Jack), Sidney and Georgiana Drew all followed in their parents’ path and became well-known on the American stage. When Maurice met Georgiana during his stage debut in the Broadway production of “Pique” in 1875, the circle was completed.

Maurice and Georgiana were married in 1876 and settled down in Philadelphia near her parents. When Georgiana became pregnant with their first child in the late summer of 1877, Maurice went on tour without her. On March 22, 1898 Jack Drew, Maurice and Ben Porter were stopping at the Station Hotel in Marshall, Texas on their way to Fort Worth. They were in the café eating breakfast when a drunk from the adjoining bar made a vulgar remark to one of the actresses in their troupe. Maurice objected and the drunk, a Texas and Pacific engineer named Jim Currie, opened fire with a pistol. Ben Porter was killed and it took doctors hours to remove the bullet embedded deep in Maurice’s left shoulder. It took only 10 minutes for a Texas jury to acquit Currie. Barrymore swore never to set foot in Texas again.

Georgiana and the children

The first of the Barrymore progeny, Lionel Herbert Blyth, was born just one month later on April 28 th, 1878. He was followed by Ethel Mae in 1879 and John Sidney in 1882. Since both parents were actors they were away from home much of the time and the children stayed with their grandmother. But Maurice made a better actor than he did a father. When he was home, he indulged the children shamelessly but when he was away, his little family was out of sight, out of mind and his romantic indiscretions were fodder for the press.

 

Maurice and Georgiana on stage

In 1890, Georgiana had one of her most successful roles in “The Senator” but in December, 1891 she had to leave the cast because of illness. She took Ethel and traveled west to California to take the cure for what was diagnosed as consumption (tuberculosis) and died in Santa Barbara, California on July 2, 1893. Maurice remarried a year later but the children remained with their grandmother.

Lionel Barrymore, novice actor

When Louisa Lane Drew died on August 31 st, 1897. her grandchildren were already pursuing acting careers. Maurice Barrymore died in Bellevue Hospital on March 26 th, 1905 where he had been taken by his son John, raving and violent in the last throes of syphilis. He was buried in Mt. Vernon Cemetery in Philadelphia.

 

 

 

But the dynasty carried on….

 

Next issue…..Part II…. Ethel. Lionel and John, the Fab 3!