Richard Mansfield

Richard Mansfield (1857-1907) was an American actor who was born on the May 24 1857, in Berlin. His mother being Madame Rudersdorff (1822-1882), the singer, and his father, Maurice Mansfield (d. 1861), a London wine merchant. He first appeared on the stage at St Georges Hall, London, and then drifted into light opera, playing the Major-General in The Pirates of Penzance, and the Lord High Executioner, in The Mikado, both in the English provinces and in America. In 1883 he joined AM. Palmers Union Square theatre company in New York, and made a great hit as Baron Chevrial in A Parisian Romance. He appeared successfully in several plays adapted from well-known stories, and his rendering (1887) of the doubled title-parts in R. L. Stevensons Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde created a profound impression. It was with this play that he made his London reputation during a season (1888) at the Lyceum theatre, by invitation of Henry Irving. He produced Richard III. the next year, at the Globe. Among his other chief successes were Prince Karl, Cyrano de Bergerac and Monsieur Beaucaire. He was one of the earliest to produce G. Bernard Shaws plays in America, appearing in 1894 as Bluntschli in Arms and the Man, and as Dick Dudgeon in The Devils Disciple in 1897. As a manager and producer of plays Mansfield was remnrkable for his lavish staging. He died in New London, Connecticut, of cancer on August 30 1907.

Related Topics:
Actor - May 24 - 1857 - Berlin - London - Wine merchant - Richard III - August 30 - 1907

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