Tag: Jennie Brenan

Isabel Mahon (1916-1993) – the “Mary Pickford” from Fitzroy

Above: 18 year old Isabel Mahon as she appears in Beaumont Smith’s final film Splendid Fellows, in 1934. This is a screen grab from the NFSA’s website Australian Screen, which contains several short clips from the film. (Click to follow the link).
The Five Second Version
Isabel Mahon (1916-1993) was not the only Australian actress to be dubbed “Australia’s Mary Pickford.” The term was regularly applied to other Australian women, including Josie Melville, Jean Duncan, Mary Maguire and Lucille Lisle. As an adult Isabel stood only about 1.5 metres (5 feet) tall,[1]She appears to have exaggerated her shortness but on stage was a vibrant and attractive performer. Born in inner city Fitzroy, she first appeared on stage at the very young age of about 8 years. By the early 1930s she had her first JC Williamson’s contract, and in 1934 she appeared in Beaumont Smith’s film Splendid Fellows. She married visiting vaudevillian Ward Gray in late 1936 and departed with him for the US to try her luck. She spent five years on the US stage, usually as a dancer. She returned to Australia with her second husband Earl Woodbury in April 1959, and spent three and a half years living there as an ordinary citizen. She died in Florida in 1993.
Isabel Woodbury nee Mahon on her Australian visa for a return visit home in April 1959. [2]Copyright National Archives of Australia – Isabel Irene Woodbury visa 1959

As historian Andrée Wright has noted, between the wars there came to be a popular narrative regarding Australia’s young actresses. These women were usually presented as sporty, good looking, capable, and more than competent on stage and screen – in fact – able to achieve anything – just by nature of being Australian. In the 1930s, newspapers delighted in listing their successes and made pious predictions about future successes overseas. “At the time, [these film success] stories convinced readers that ‘with very few exceptions, every Australian who ha[d] ever gone to America ha[d] succeeded beyond expectations.‘”[3]Andrée Wright (1986) Pps18-19. The inserted quote is from Picture Show, 2 August 1919 One such actress, briefly, was Isabel Mahon.

Isabel at the height of her Australian fame and now daubed “the Mary Pickford of the Australian stage” in 1934.[4]Sunday Times (WA) 22 Apr 1934 P11

Growing up in Fitzroy

Isabel Mahon was born in a small terrace house in Fitzroy, an inner suburb of Melbourne, in December 1916.[5]Victoria Birth Certificate, 29538/1916, Isabel Irene Mahon, born 6 December 1916 Her father Edward was former coal miner, listed in later records as a horse dealer or a labourer, her mother was Ethel nee Dennison, a Fitzroy girl who had experienced a severely disadvantaged upbringing in the suburb. Isabel was the youngest of a large family, and from a early age she showed talent and interest in performing. Like some other children of the working class inner city suburbs – notably those who joined the Pollards Lilliputian Opera company in the early 1900s – a life on stage was an exciting alternative to an apprenticeship or learning a trade.

The earliest public photo of Isabel appears in The Bulletin in 1931, while she was dancing in the panto The House that Jack Built.[6]The Bulletin 14 Jan 1931, P36,

For most of her childhood, Isabel[7]also spelled Isabelle and Isobel lived at Number 48 Little Gore Street, a laneway that appears to have originally serviced stables and provided rear access to the larger homes of Gore Street. At the time of her birth in 1916, Fitzroy, one of the city’s oldest suburbs, was developing a unenviable reputation as a “slum” suburb. Its narrow terrace housing and the proximity of factories made it undesirable to the city’s aspirational families. Accounts of working class suburbs increasingly emphasized the “rough and ready” life the citizens lived – and tended to amplify crime and coarseness. A Truth newspaper account from 1914 reported a case where Ethel Mahon had thrown a brick at a passing deliveryman whose horse and cart had just run over her cat in Little Gore St. The “lurid language” used at the time was alluded to, but the paper left spaces for titillated readers to imagine the words actually used in Fitzroy’s back streets.[8]Truth (Melb) 8 August 1914, P3

Left: 46 and 48 Little Gore Street Fitzroy, looking north towards Webb St. The dark terrace was Isabel’s home and is still a residence. The 1st floor walkways between warehouses are unusual and probably date from the 1920s, when Isabel’s mother had moved to Abbotsford. Right: Little Gore Street, looking south. Old stables and the end of the street are in the distance..

Isabel’s first professional appearances on stage, “as a clever child artist,” seems to have been when she was aged only 8, in February 1924, performing as part of a variety lineup called The Midnight Frolics.[9]Clay Djubal dates her earliest performance as the 1924 panto Cinderella

In early 1924, at age 8, Isabel was on stage in Melbourne.[10]The Prahran Telegraph (Vic) 22 Feb 1924, P3

Little actress lost

Over much of the next two years Isabel performed with O’Donnell and Ray’s Panto company on tour around Australia. We know this because, rather spectacularly, in late 1925, Ethel reported her daughter as missing to Police. After nine months away she had started to worry about Isabel but had been unable to contact the troupe – as they were moving rapidly from town to town and were often remote. Isabel and the company were finally found and in October 1926 she returned to her mother.[11]The Herald (Melb) 12 Oct 1926 P5 She had performed all over Australia, and in Java and Singapore.[12]Even today, tracking the company’s movements and performances is difficult

Report on Isabel in October 1926 [13]The Herald (Melb)12 Oct 1926 P5

Less than twenty years earlier, working class parents in this part of Melbourne had signed their children to perform on extended performance tours through Asia and North America with the Pollard Lilliputian Opera Company. They were away for up to two years. A few – Alf Goulding, Daphne Pollard, Snub Pollard and Ted McNamara, went on to make names for themselves. The parents contracted their children via a type of indenture and were paid through a trust. We must assume a similar scheme was applied to Isabel’s employment, although by the 1920s this arrangement was unusual. This is because the Victorian Education Act of 1872 required her to be at school, while the Australian Emigration Act of 1910 [14]written after the disastrous Pollards tour of India in 1909 prohibited any child being taken out of Australia to perform “theatrical, operatic or other work.”[15]How seriously these laws were applied is not clear. In 1985, performer Irene Goulding recalled her favourite teacher’s severe disapproval of her decision to leave on a performance tour with the … Continue reading

In spite of these laws, Isabel may have returned to touring,[16]the O’Donnell and Ray Panto Company still had a player called “Little Isobel” in 1927 – see for example a review of Babes in the Wood in the Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bay … Continue reading however in the later 1920s, she also came under the tutelage of Melbourne’s well known dance teacher Jennie Brennan (1877-1964). Brennan had a close association with JC Williamson, the theatrical company so dominant in Australasia it was called “the firm.” It is not surprising that Isabel then appeared in a small role in When London Sleeps, at Melbourne’s King’s Theatre in August 1928.[17]The Herald (Melb) 13 Aug 1928, P19

A beaming Isabel in the pages of the national magazine The Australian Women’s Weekly, in 1934.[18]Australian Women’s Weekly, 4 Aug 1934, P20

Leading roles

Her big break-through came in January 1934, when JC Williamson’s promoted her to a leading role in Gay Divorce, after Dulcie Davenport(1913-2011) departed to pursue a career in England. Isabel was still 18 and her mother signed the JC Williamson’s contract.[19]She was still keen to exaggerate her youth – she told the Melbourne Herald she was 15. See 25 Jan 1934, P35 Immediately after that, she went into a run of The Girlfriend, followed by an Australian tour of Gay Divorce. Her contract still survives in the Australian Performing Arts Collection in Melbourne, and it reveals a continuous run of performances, back to back, in pantos and musicals for JC Williamson.[20]The contract file suggests a degree of tension over her employment and payments made And then came another exciting break-though – during the later part of 1934, pioneer director Beaumont Smith (1885-1950) cast her for his film Splendid Fellows (1934).

With her role in an Australian film confirmed, Isabel Mahon’s story of acting success was celebrated in the manner now so familiar in newspapers:
“Seventeen years old… Miss Mahon has won her name on the stage at such an early age. Small parts in J. C. Williamson have grown until she is now playing the lead in “Gay Divorce,” at Sydney Theatre Royal... Isabel Mahon was out to win through early. She appeared in pantomime at eight, and in nine juvenile years she has capped her kicking big boots in “Cinderella” by feminine leads on stage . . . and now on the screen. And so they come forward, confirming the opinion of London papers that there is plenty of acting ability in Australia.“[21]Author’s emphasis. Examiner (Tas) 10 Aug 1934, P9

Even more grandly, in one of many articles headlined “Australia’s Mary Pickford,” one Australian paper predicted “Isabel…. is made in Australia. Soon the world will know her.” [22]Author’s emphasis. Groper (WA) 5 May 1934, P1

Frank Leighton, Leo Franklyn and Isabel in Splendid Fellows.[23]Everyone’s 5 Sept 1934, P40.

Pike and Cooper [24]Pike and Cooper(1980) P223 note that Splendid Fellows was made on the very modest budget of £5000. It featured Eric Colman (the non-acting brother of Hollywood’s Ronald Colman) and included a cameo by aviator Charles Kingsford Smith. The theme of an air race made it topical, but ultimately the film was not a success and it was to be Smith’s last. NFSA curator Paul Byrnes has noted that Smith “had a tendency to require his actors to shout as if they were working to the back stalls of a noisy theatre. His staging was similarly minimal…” Clips from the film can be seen here at the NFSA site.

Beyond the excited puff-pieces about newcomer Isabel, at least one contemporary review acknowledged the problem with her voice, so obvious to the modern listener. “Isabelle Mahon, delightful in action, but —Good [heavens] —when she talks!  On the stage her voice may have quite a different timbre; but through recording and reproduction equipment it comes with the harsh metallic ring that characterised the speech of the Hollywood girls when talkies first arrived. The Americans overcame their troubles, and if Miss Mahon can do the same she should be able to pick up some nice money in productions of the near future.“[25]Everyone’s 21 Nov 1934, P29 Almost certainly, what we hear in the film was Isabel’s attempt to mitigate her working class accent and an education limited by touring from a young age.[26]Some Australian actors pursed elocution to make their voices acceptable for a stage or screen career

Isabel Mahon as Eileen McBride and Frank Bradley as her father Jim McBride in Splendid Fellows.[27]New Zealand Herald, 1 Dec 1934, P12

Off to the US with Ward Gray

Following what would be her one and only film and perhaps coinciding with disagreements with JC Williamson over pay, Isabel signed up to appear in variety on the Tivoli circuit. In their pantos – like Cinderella and revues such as Let’s Go Gay, Flying High and The Spice of Paris, she usually took featured or leading roles and was noted in reviews for singing sweetly and “dancing divinely.”[28]Table Talk (Melb)14 Nov 1935, P19 With exposure to the Tivoli’s numerous local and visiting artists, perhaps Isabel’s appetite for greener pastures had been whetted.

During her 1936 run at the Sydney Tivoli, Isabel met Canadian born vaudevillian Ward (Worden) Gray, one part of the visiting “comedy acrobatic dancing trio” Ward, Pinkie and Terry. The trio had arrived in July, performing for the Tivoli and then at breakneck speed through Australian venues. Despite a 12 year age difference, Isabel and Ward married in Sydney on November 3, 1936, and a week later they were on the SS Monterey, bound for San Francisco.[29]NSW Births Deaths & Marriages Marriage Certificate 17015/1936

Isabel and Ward in the lineup at the Tivoli in October 1936. [30]Sydney Morning Herald 15 Oct 1936, P2

Ward’s act performed on tour across the US in 1937, with Isabel being introduced to US audiences as an “Australian movie comedienne.” Australians who launched onto the variety circuits of the US found the work hard and the movement continual. Today, their professional footprints are faint and the advance publicity that found its way into the press rarely provided considered reviews and sometimes did not list performers.[31]See Leon Errol’s comments on being a touring player in vaudeville Troupes also continually broke up and regrouped – for example, after about 12 months, Ward and Isabel joined another touring troupe – the Kit Kat Club Revue, Isabel being billed as a “comedy dancer.” By late 1939 Ward and Isabel’s act had ended its run, and apparently, so had their marriage.

Isabel, made up in the best Hollywood style for the Kit Kat Club Revue in Birmingham, Alabama in March 1938.[32]The Birmingham Post 31 March 1938, P6

Touring and marriage to Earl Woodbury

Isabel’s movements from 1940 are even more difficult to verify. However, reports from later in her life state she headlined a Vaudeville road show called The Gems of 1941.[33]Pensacola News Journal (Florida) 7 Jan 1977, P35-6 The troupe included Earl ‘Woody’ Woodbury, one of the “Rhythm Ramblers”, a screwball comedy group of musicians in the style of the Ritz Brothers, whose act was dubbed “screwball swing.”[34]The Sunday Star News, Wilmington (NC) Oct 13, 1940, P15 Isabel married Earl while the troupe was in St Louis, Missouri in July 1941.

An advertisement for Gems of 1941. The author contends the photo shows Yvette Geray, who was likely Isabel. [35]Ledger-Star (Virginia) 9 Oct 1940, P12

Unfortunately, the surviving contemporary accounts of the troupe make no mention of an Isabel Mahon or Gray or Woodbury, suggesting she was probably using a stage name at the time. Yvette Geray, the troupe’s leading dancer noted for her “daring, alluring” performance, bears a similarity to Isabel in the few surviving, grainy photos.[36]Yvette Geray, supposedly from France, does not appear in records of US performances before or after The Gems of 1941, or any other records, which also suggests it was a stage name But equally, Isabel might have been one part of Rover & Mahan, a “diminutive pair of funsters,” who also had an act in the show.[37]Richmond Times-Dispatch (Virginia) 4 Oct 1940, P25

Whatever the exact nature of her performances, it had all come to an end by mid 1941, when war loomed for the US and Earl Woodbury joined the Navy.[38]Pensacola News Journal (Florida) 7 Jan 1977, P35-6

Post-war, the couple settled in Milton, Florida. However, for the three and a half years 1959-1962 they returned to Australia to live in Melbourne – making Isabel unusual amongst expat Australian performers of her era. In Australia, Earl worked for advertising agency Berry Curry.[39]Pensacola News Journal (Florida) 7 Apr 1963, P52

Isabel and Earl Woodbury on their Australian visas in April 1959. [40]Copyright National Archives of Australia – Isabel Irene & Earl Woodbury visa 1959

In late 1962, Isabel returned to Florida with Earl. Earl seems to have turned his hand to numerous jobs – in time he became a realtor and property developer. Isabel, or “Issie,” sometimes performed in local amateur theatre in Florida, but it seems her professional career had come to an end.

It is intriguing that although she saw her family in Australia, Isabel sought no publicity at all during her time in Melbourne, and Australians seemed unaware she was home. She had become a US citizen in the 1950s and lived in Florida until her death in 1993.

Nick Murphy
November 2023

References

Text

  • Andrew Pike & Ross Cooper (1980) Australian Film 1900-1977. Oxford University Press/AFI
  • Andrée Wright (1986) Brilliant Careers, Women in Australian Cinema. Pan Australia
  • Frank Van Straten (2003) Tivoli Thomas C Lothian

Australian Performing Arts Collection, Arts Centre, Melbourne

  • JC Williamson’s Collection – Contracts for Isabel Mahon

National Film and Sound Archive (NFSA)

Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University

Australian Variety Theatre Archive

State Library of Victoria, blog

Primary Sources

  • National Archives of Australia
  • National Library of Australia, Trove
  • National Library of New Zealand, Paperspast
  • State Library of Victoria
  • Ancestry.com
  • Victoria, Births Deaths & Marriages
  • New South Wales, Births Deaths & Marriages
  • Newspapers.com
  • Lantern Digital Media Library@ the Internet Archive
This site has been selected for archiving and preservation in the National Library of Australia’s Pandora archive

Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 She appears to have exaggerated her shortness
↑2 Copyright National Archives of Australia – Isabel Irene Woodbury visa 1959
↑3 Andrée Wright (1986) Pps18-19. The inserted quote is from Picture Show, 2 August 1919
↑4 Sunday Times (WA) 22 Apr 1934 P11
↑5 Victoria Birth Certificate, 29538/1916, Isabel Irene Mahon, born 6 December 1916
↑6 The Bulletin 14 Jan 1931, P36,
↑7 also spelled Isabelle and Isobel
↑8 Truth (Melb) 8 August 1914, P3
↑9 Clay Djubal dates her earliest performance as the 1924 panto Cinderella
↑10 The Prahran Telegraph (Vic) 22 Feb 1924, P3
↑11 The Herald (Melb) 12 Oct 1926 P5
↑12 Even today, tracking the company’s movements and performances is difficult
↑13 The Herald (Melb)12 Oct 1926 P5
↑14 written after the disastrous Pollards tour of India in 1909
↑15 How seriously these laws were applied is not clear. In 1985, performer Irene Goulding recalled her favourite teacher’s severe disapproval of her decision to leave on a performance tour with the Pollards. Irene did it anyway
↑16 the O’Donnell and Ray Panto Company still had a player called “Little Isobel” in 1927 – see for example a review of Babes in the Wood in the Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bay and Burnett Advertiser (Qld) 8 Apr 1927, P4
↑17 The Herald (Melb) 13 Aug 1928, P19
↑18 Australian Women’s Weekly, 4 Aug 1934, P20
↑19 She was still keen to exaggerate her youth – she told the Melbourne Herald she was 15. See 25 Jan 1934, P35
↑20 The contract file suggests a degree of tension over her employment and payments made
↑21 Author’s emphasis. Examiner (Tas) 10 Aug 1934, P9
↑22 Author’s emphasis. Groper (WA) 5 May 1934, P1
↑23 Everyone’s 5 Sept 1934, P40.
↑24 Pike and Cooper(1980) P223
↑25 Everyone’s 21 Nov 1934, P29
↑26 Some Australian actors pursed elocution to make their voices acceptable for a stage or screen career
↑27 New Zealand Herald, 1 Dec 1934, P12
↑28 Table Talk (Melb)14 Nov 1935, P19
↑29 NSW Births Deaths & Marriages Marriage Certificate 17015/1936
↑30 Sydney Morning Herald 15 Oct 1936, P2
↑31 See Leon Errol’s comments on being a touring player in vaudeville
↑32 The Birmingham Post 31 March 1938, P6
↑33, ↑38 Pensacola News Journal (Florida) 7 Jan 1977, P35-6
↑34 The Sunday Star News, Wilmington (NC) Oct 13, 1940, P15
↑35 Ledger-Star (Virginia) 9 Oct 1940, P12
↑36 Yvette Geray, supposedly from France, does not appear in records of US performances before or after The Gems of 1941, or any other records, which also suggests it was a stage name
↑37 Richmond Times-Dispatch (Virginia) 4 Oct 1940, P25
↑39 Pensacola News Journal (Florida) 7 Apr 1963, P52
↑40 Copyright National Archives of Australia – Isabel Irene & Earl Woodbury visa 1959

Reita Nugent (1905-1986) – “the girl with the smile in her voice”

Above: A very glamorous looking Reita Nugent – now with blonded hair and using the stage name Janet Lind – in London in 1936 and under the management of “Madame Cecilia Arcana”. Spotlight Directory 1936, Author’s collection

The five second version
Reita (actually Margaurite) Nugent,[1]while this spelling is unusual, it is what appears on her birth and death certificates born 1905, began her career on the Australian stage in 1916, aged just 11. She gained a reputation for impressive “acrobatic dancing” in Australia, Europe and Britain, in variety and musical comedy. After an unsuccessful attempt to establish herself on the US stage in the early 1930s, she rebooted her British career in 1935 as singer, using the stage name “Janet Lind,” performing and recording with Louis Levy (1894-1957) and on a few occasions with Webster Booth (1902-1984). She became a regular singer on BBC radio and also appeared in early television. Short and vivacious, she had a stage charm that delighted audiences and although she was not given leading roles she became a close friend and associate of other actors – like Australian Cyril Ritchard (1898-1977). In 1940 she returned to Australia with her husband, and after wartime work for ABC radio, she disappeared from the public eye. She became an interior decorator and later in life ran a second hand shop in Fitzroy, where famously, she occasionally sold some of her records to collectors. She died in Fitzroy, Melbourne in July 1986.
24 year old Reita Nugent at her glamorous best – singing and dancing in Mr Cinders at the Adelphi Theatre in London in 1929. [2]Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, 16 March, 1929. Copyright held by the Illustrated London News Group. Via British Library Newspaper Archives

When 75 year old “Janet Lind” was interviewed as a guest on a Melbourne nostalgia radio programme in 1978, the audience must have wondered what all the fuss was about. While Alex Kenworthy’s programme played plenty of her music, she said little that informed listeners about her achievements, and Kenworthy was poorly prepared – even to the point of not being aware she was Australian born. One must conclude she had either forgotten these achievements, or really didn’t want to discuss her working life.[3]Thanks to Stephen Langley the 1978 interview has been preserved and uploaded to Youtube and can be heard here

15 year old Reita, in a large spread on Yes Uncle! [4]The Theatre Magazine 1 Sept 1920, via State Library of Victoria

This is surprising, because her reputation as a dancer on the Australian stage was an impressive one – even before she was an adult. In 1920 the Sydney Referee reported 15 year old Reita as “One of the pleasant surprises awaiting the visitor to [the play] Yes Uncle!, at Her Majesty’s… [Her] terpsichorean abilities not possessed by many of her profession.”[5]Referee (Syd) 29 Sep 1920 P7, via National Library of Australia’s Trove

19 year old Reita (standing centre and at her full height of 5 foot or 150 cms tall) with Albert Frith and Cecil Kellaway in an Australian production of Cabaret Girl, 1924. [6]Photo by Monte Luke, Lady Viola Tait Collection, via National Library of Australia‘s Trove

Reita’s Australian career 1909-1926

Born Margaurite Olive Nugent in South Melbourne, Australia in 1905,[7]Victoria Birth Certificate, Margaurite Olive Nugent, 24 February 1905,12141/1905 “Reita” or “Rita” was the fifth child of Margaret nee O’Shea and Michael Joseph Nugent, a Victorian Railways employee. The two oldest children of the family – Ella (born 1894) and Patrick (born 1896) both performed in the ill-fated Pollards Opera Company tour of India in 1909-1910. Despite the experience, both continued performing for some time. Brothers Len (born 1902) and Ray (born 1900) also became performers.[8]Len also became a recording artist in the 1920s and 30s, by this time calling himself Terrance Nugent – hear one of his songs here, thanks to Stephen Langley

Reita’s earliest appearances on stage began when she was only five years old – she was noted as being in the chorus of Sweet County Kerry at Melbourne’s Bijou Theatre, in July 1909.[9]Table Talk,15 Jul 1909, P24, via National Library of Australia’s Trove This suggests that the Nugent family, by now living in Gore Street in the inner Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy,[10]Australian Electoral Roll, Division of Batman, 1909 had made a conscious decision that all their children should pursue careers on the stage. As this writer has noted elsewhere, this was not simply a matter of obliging an early interest by a child. It was a pathway to opportunity and wealth that was otherwise not possible for working class families. In the case of Ella and Patrick,[11]aged 15 and 13 years respectively the Nugent parents were party to an agreement with Arthur Pollard, who was taking the children on an overseas performance tour with other juveniles – and intending to be away for a year or more. The Nugents were paid via a trust fund.[12]For an example of a similar contract see Peter Downes (2002) The Pollards, P212, Steele Roberts

Reita and her regular Australian dance partner Jack Hooker. c1924[13]Enlarged from Sheet music, The Cabaret Girl, author’s collection

In later life, Reita was inclined to suggest that she was self-taught as a dancer and singer, and in her 1978 radio interview she made no reference to tutors or mentors.[14]Also see her March 1941 interview in The Wireless Weekly: the hundred per cent Australian radio journal Vol. 36 No. 12 (March 22, 1941) P3, Via National Library of Australia’s Trove However, contemporary newspaper reports confirm that she was a student of Melbourne dance teacher Jennie Brenan for most of the ten years 1916-1926.[15]The Herald (Melb) 30 Oct 1926, P22, Via National Library of Australia’s Trove

The Ausstage Live Performance Database lists at least twenty-five Australian performances for her – the names Reita and Rita were used interchangeably.[16]As they were in life – Theatre programmes also spelled her first name both ways The lists also indicate that she began a serious stage career at the age of 11 or 12, and then worked almost continually – for JC Williamsons’ troupes – as a featured dancer, often in partnership with Jack Hooker. Interviewed in 1923, she stated a wish to become a singer and move into roles in musical comedy.[17]The Herald (Melb) 2 June 1923, P13 Via National Library of Australia’s Trove She did so – at the end of 1924 she had her first major speaking part in Betty, while a few months later she was dancing AND singing in Primrose, “with charm.”[18]The World’s News (Syd) 3 Oct 1925, P6, REITA NUGENT’S RISE, via National Library of Australia’s Trove One newspaper reviewer asked “Why, why doesn’t some enterprising producer make a star of Reita? She is a magnificent dancer, and can sing and speak pleasingly. The dancing was superb.”[19]The Australian Jewish Herald (Melb) 24 Sep 1925, P22, via National Library of Australia’s Trove

Reita in Europe and Britain 1926+

Reita in the Empire Theatre lineup, Paris, April 1927. Programme in author’s collection

Clearly ambitious, when a chance to perform overseas arose in 1926, Reita took it. She left Australia in June 1926 with a contract to perform in a touring variety show in Berlin, Vienna and Paris, alongside Australian dance partner Charlie Brooks – although this was, again, in specialist dance numbers and part of a larger show.[20]The Argus (Melb) 22 Jun 1926, P12, via National Library of Australia’s Trove Reita’s footsteps across Europe in 1926-1927 are faint, but the variety tour she joined, likely began in Berlin. When the show reached Paris in March 1927, Paris-Midi provided a rare critical review of her performance which may also have highlighted a challenge she was experiencing: “Reita Nugent has at least as much talent as [Brooks] and she dances just as well. [But] it seems quite inaccurate to consider their complicated exercises as a dance. A dance has a rhythm… Certainly, Charlie Brooks and Reita Nugent are excellent acrobats, but… without rhythm… Moreover, they seem to forget that comedy is born of observation and simplicity. The complexity of the act… evokes the idea of ​​a terribly concerted effort. I don’t think effort, toil and application have ever provoked laughter.“[21]Paris-Midi, 14 April 1927. Via Gallica, Bibliothèque Nationale de France. Translation is the responsibility of this author The reader can view Reita’s unique and acrobatic style of dancing here, in the short British Pathe newsreel entitled “India Rubber Muscles,” filmed in 1928. Perhaps, while popular with some audiences, a career in acrobatic dancing[22]or “eccentric dancing” as it was sometimes called was hard work, plus – as a niche area of performance, not likely to lead to anything else.

Madge and Cyril, 1928, So this is Love[23]Theatre programme – Author’s collection

Back in London her ability as a dancer and singer saw her in the supporting role of Peggy in the new George and Ira Gershwin musical about bootlegging, Oh Kay! in late 1927. While The Times felt the plot was “incomprehensible” and the music “commonplace,”[24]See J. P. Wearing (2014) The London Stage 1920-1929: A Calendar of Productions, Performers, and Personnel. P539, Rowman and Littlefield it was a success with audiences, running for over 200 performances at Her Majesty’s Theatre. In April 1928, she appeared in a long run of Stanley Lupino’s So this is Love with old colleagues from the Australian stage, Cyril Ritchard and Madge Elliott. Ritchard and Elliott were good enough friends to attend Reita’s wedding to English businessman William Fairbairn Hall in August 1931.[25]In fact, Ritchard gave Reita away at the wedding. See Table Talk, 27 August 1931, P1. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove

Sylvia Leslie, the petite Reita, Cyril Ritchard and Madge Elliott in So this is Love, in 1928.[26]Theatre programme – author’s collection

Then, following a long run at the Hippodrome in Mr Cinders, Reita went to Berlin with a German version of the play. Years later her young Australian dance partner Renee Murphy recalled that performing this gender-reversed version of the Cinderella story, in German, was “heavy weather” because of cultural differences in humour.[27]ABC Weekly May 5 1945, P38, via National Library of Australia’s Trove However, German reviews of Reita’s “extraordinary dancing” were enthusiastic.[28]Sport Im Bild Issue 21, 1930. Via Österreichische Nationalbibliothek

Reita was well enough known in Britain to be advertising Lux soap at the time of Mr Cinders.[29]The Nottingham Evening Post, 27 Mar 1930, P6 via British Library Newspaper Archive

Reita tries the US 1931-2

Reita and her husband travelled to the US soon after her wedding, and she did not return to London until December 1932. On her return to Australia ten years later, she gave some accounts of what she had done in the US. She said she had appeared in a 1931 tour of the play Gay Divorce[30]When made into a film by RKO it became The Gay Divorcee with Fred Astaire and Clare Luce. She also claimed she used the names Judy Kent, Janet Lorraine and Janet Faye, because of problems with Actors Equity.[31]The ABC Weekly, 22 March 1941, P9. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove Perhaps. However, there is no evidence of a person going by any of these names in the touring cast, or when it opened on Broadway on November 29 1932. In her 1941 Australian accounts, Reita also claimed that she had trained in dance while in the US, which is plausible. She also mentioned performing in unspecified “variety,” but what this work entailed seems impossible to verify.[32]The Home, an Australian Quarterly, Vol 22, No 6, 2 June 1941. P60-61 Via National Library of Australia’s Trove

Becoming Janet Lind 1935 +

On her return to London Reita appeared in another musical, the spectacular Ball at the Savoy, at the Drury Lane. However, at the same time she was increasingly involved with BBC radio, and appeared as a singer and dancer in some of the very early televised programmes,[33]See for example, News Chronicle, March 23, 1934, P13. Via British Library newspaper Archive. Also see BBC Programme index available only to the handful of people with television receivers at the time, and unfortunately lost to us today.

Sometime in September 1935 Reita signed up with agent Cecilia Arcana, or Madame Arcana as she liked to be called. A former singer and now also a voice coach (see Note 1 below), Madame’s management coincided with the start of Reita’s serious singing career and possibly it was she who helped Reita find a new stage name and made connections.[34]Reita herself said she took the new stage name from a Bond Street store In October 1935 Madame announced Janet Lind as her new “find,” performing in a radio version of the comic opera Veronique.[35]Evening Standard (London) 8 Oct 1935, P18 via Newspapers.com The name Reita Nugent disappeared overnight. But it was not until August 1936, five months later, that there was public acknowledgement Janet Lind really was the well known Reita Nugent.[36]See for example Birmingham Gazette, 4 August 1936, P4. “Janet Lind, radio’s mystery vocalist…is a mystery no longer” via British Library Newspaper Archive and The … Continue reading

It is difficult to be certain how much influence Madame had on Reita, particularly as neither made reference to the other in later years. However, it is the case that the glamorous studio photos (see top of article and below) date from this time, as does Reita’s first appearance, now as Janet Lind, performing in the BBC programme Music from the Movies with conductor Louis Levy and the Gaumont British Orchestra.[37]The first performance by Janet Lind with Levy and the house orchestra for Gaumont British Studios is mentioned in British newspapers in March 1936. Levy was also music director for the studio In various interviews, Reita suggested she auditioned several times as a singer before she was successful. Given that Reita’s singing voice had already been heard and remarked upon in 1924, it appears that she was indeed, naturally very talented. However, it would be unusual for an Australian who had finished formal education at age 12 to have developed the singing voice we hear in her surviving recordings without some training.[38]The refined Australian accent we hear in her 1978 radio interview might have evolved in her 14 years in Britain and Europe, but is unlikely to have survived the 46 years 1940-86 in Australia without … Continue reading

As Janet Lind, Reita performed for the BBC almost continuously between 1936 and 1940. In addition to singing (most famously music from films), she appeared in radio versions of musical comedies, varieties and apparently also dramas. By 1939 she was also compering radio programmes for the armed forces.[39]See BBC Programme Index The slogan “The girl with the smile in her voice” also dates from this busy pre-war period.[40]Daily News(London) 17 July, 1936, P14. Via British Library’s Newspaper Archive

A very glamorous Janet Lind photo accompanying a very inaccurate 1941 article in The Home. The photo, probably taken in Britain, is a reminder of the skills of studio photographers at the time. [41]The Home, an Australian Quarterly, Vol 22, No 6, 2 June 1941. P60-61 Via National Library of Australia’s Trove

Surviving recordings of her performances with Louis Levy in the late 1930s are easily found – a number are listed at the end of this article. Also existing (click here) is one of her performances with Webster Booth (1902-1984), which collectors Stephen Langley and Jean Collen suggest showcases her singing at its best.

Janet Lind returns to Australia 1940

In August 1940, Reita and her husband decided to leave Britain for Australia, via the USA.[42]Jean Collen has reminded me that this move was quite dramatic and remains unexplained. Why would she leave a successful career in Britain? They departed Liverpool, bound for New York on the SS Samaria. In the US, Reita sang several times for radio stations, but the couple were in Sydney by early October. A performer newly returned to Australia from the London scene, and of Reita’s prowess, was a novelty in 1940 and there were numerous newspaper reports.[43]not all of which seem to match what is otherwise known of her activities – but some might be, such as her story of her luggage being on a different, torpedoed ship

Janet Lind, looking different again, on the cover of an Australian magazine in 1941. [44]The ABC Weekly Vol 3, No 12, 22 March 1941, Page 1 Cover. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove

In April 1941, Reita joined ABC radio’s Out of the Bag, a light entertainment style programme featuring Australian comedian Dick Bentley,[45]Daily Advertiser (Wagga Wagga), 11 June 1941, P4. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove who had also recently arrived home from London. It had been devised by another recent returnee – Harry Pringle (1903-1985), whom Reita had known in London, ten years before.[46]National Film and Sound Archive, Title No: 793604, collection photo of Reita with Pringle in London in 1930-not digitised

As for so many people, the Second World War seems to have changed Reita’s fortunes. Her husband joined the Army,[47]it was brief, presumably due to health issues while she continued performing on Australian radio, however there were fewer live performances – the last possibly being a US forces musical in 1944.[48]The Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 11 Nov 1944, P4, via National Library of Australia’s Trove By 1948, it seems she had drifted into an entirely new career, as Australian newspapers reported that she was now an interior designer,[49]The Mercury (Hobart) 27 Sept 1948, P3. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove and now used the name Jane Hall.[50]The Argus(Melb) 25 Jan 1950, P6, via National Library of Australia’s Trove

Although she lived in the Melbourne suburb of Toorak in the late 1960s and 1970s, she appears to have moved above the second hand shop she ran in Fitzroy soon after her husband’s death in 1984. Her death certificate clearly states her place of residence was 345 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, and that she also went by the name Jane Hall. While Australian newspapers appear to have missed her passing, British newspapers did not. The London Daily Telegraph ran an obituary reminding British readers of her past success as a singer, with her “light, well-articulated voice of refreshing clarity”, and stating that she had taken up singing under the guidance of Madame Arcana.[51]The Daily Telegraph, 5 Aug 1986, P10, via Newspapers.com

345 Brunswick Street Fitzroy in 2022. The vegan shoe shop was once Reita’s shop. At the time of her death in 1986, she lived upstairs. Author’s collection.

Note 1

Madame Cecilia Arcana (Olive or Mary Clifton c1887-1969) had a career on the English stage as a singer before becoming a teacher of voice and elocution. She ran her own agency in London from about 1930 until 1940 when she moved to the US and attempted to reestablish herself. In the early 1950s she settled in Kings Cross, Sydney, where she again took up teaching voice and elocution. She died in Sydney in May 1969.[52]NSW Births, Deaths & Marriages, Madame Cecilia Arcana, Death Certificate 23075/1969 To the end of her days she remained proud of the performers she had mentored and convinced of her almost mystic ability to predict success – although she did not mention Janet Lind again after the initial announcement noted above. In 1967 she predicted “Mark my words! Don Lane will become an international film star of the first water”[53]The Sydney Morning Herald, 11 Jan 1967, P6, via Newspapers.com US born Don Lane (1933-2009) did become a popular Australian TV presenter but not a film star. She was inclined to speak about herself in a most grandiloquent way, as this advertisement in The Era illustrates.

Madame Arcana advertising her skills in 1934. [54]The Era 28 March, 1934, P2. Via the British Library Newspaper Archive.
Madame Arcana still at work, ABC weekly, 1956
[55] ABC Weekly Vol. 18 No. 25, 23 June 1956 via National Library of Australia’s Trove
 

Special thanks

to Stephen Langley for assistance with this account.

Further Reading

  • Text
    • Peter Downes (2002) The Pollards, Steele Roberts
    • Kurt Ganzl (2001) The Encyclopedia of the Musical Theatre. Schirmer Books
    • J. P. Wearing (2014) The London Stage 1930-1939: A Calendar of Productions, Performers, and Personnel. Rowman and Littlefield
    • J. P. Wearing (2014) The London Stage 1920-1929: A Calendar of Productions, Performers, and Personnel. Rowman and Littlefield
  • Newspaper & Magazine Sources
    • National Library of Australia’s Trove
    • State Library of Victoria
    • Newspapers.com
    • British Library Newspaper Archive
    • Österreichische Nationalbibliothek-Austrian National Library, digitised newspapers
    • Bibliothèque Nationale de France -National library of France, digitized newspapers
  • Primary Sources
    • Familysearch.com
    • Ancestry.com
    • Victoria, Births, Deaths and Marriages
    • General Register Office, HM Passport Office.

This site has been selected for preservation in the National Library of Australia’s Pandora archive



Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 while this spelling is unusual, it is what appears on her birth and death certificates
↑2 Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, 16 March, 1929. Copyright held by the Illustrated London News Group. Via British Library Newspaper Archives
↑3 Thanks to Stephen Langley the 1978 interview has been preserved and uploaded to Youtube and can be heard here
↑4 The Theatre Magazine 1 Sept 1920, via State Library of Victoria
↑5 Referee (Syd) 29 Sep 1920 P7, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑6 Photo by Monte Luke, Lady Viola Tait Collection, via National Library of Australia‘s Trove
↑7 Victoria Birth Certificate, Margaurite Olive Nugent, 24 February 1905,12141/1905
↑8 Len also became a recording artist in the 1920s and 30s, by this time calling himself Terrance Nugent – hear one of his songs here, thanks to Stephen Langley
↑9 Table Talk,15 Jul 1909, P24, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑10 Australian Electoral Roll, Division of Batman, 1909
↑11 aged 15 and 13 years respectively
↑12 For an example of a similar contract see Peter Downes (2002) The Pollards, P212, Steele Roberts
↑13 Enlarged from Sheet music, The Cabaret Girl, author’s collection
↑14 Also see her March 1941 interview in The Wireless Weekly: the hundred per cent Australian radio journal Vol. 36 No. 12 (March 22, 1941) P3, Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑15 The Herald (Melb) 30 Oct 1926, P22, Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑16 As they were in life – Theatre programmes also spelled her first name both ways
↑17 The Herald (Melb) 2 June 1923, P13 Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑18 The World’s News (Syd) 3 Oct 1925, P6, REITA NUGENT’S RISE, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑19 The Australian Jewish Herald (Melb) 24 Sep 1925, P22, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑20 The Argus (Melb) 22 Jun 1926, P12, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑21 Paris-Midi, 14 April 1927. Via Gallica, Bibliothèque Nationale de France. Translation is the responsibility of this author
↑22 or “eccentric dancing” as it was sometimes called
↑23 Theatre programme – Author’s collection
↑24 See J. P. Wearing (2014) The London Stage 1920-1929: A Calendar of Productions, Performers, and Personnel. P539, Rowman and Littlefield
↑25 In fact, Ritchard gave Reita away at the wedding. See Table Talk, 27 August 1931, P1. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑26 Theatre programme – author’s collection
↑27 ABC Weekly May 5 1945, P38, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑28 Sport Im Bild Issue 21, 1930. Via Österreichische Nationalbibliothek
↑29 The Nottingham Evening Post, 27 Mar 1930, P6 via British Library Newspaper Archive
↑30 When made into a film by RKO it became The Gay Divorcee
↑31 The ABC Weekly, 22 March 1941, P9. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑32, ↑41 The Home, an Australian Quarterly, Vol 22, No 6, 2 June 1941. P60-61 Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑33 See for example, News Chronicle, March 23, 1934, P13. Via British Library newspaper Archive. Also see BBC Programme index
↑34 Reita herself said she took the new stage name from a Bond Street store
↑35 Evening Standard (London) 8 Oct 1935, P18 via Newspapers.com
↑36 See for example Birmingham Gazette, 4 August 1936, P4. “Janet Lind, radio’s mystery vocalist…is a mystery no longer” via British Library Newspaper Archive and The Queenslander, 6 August 1936, P11 via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑37 The first performance by Janet Lind with Levy and the house orchestra for Gaumont British Studios is mentioned in British newspapers in March 1936. Levy was also music director for the studio
↑38 The refined Australian accent we hear in her 1978 radio interview might have evolved in her 14 years in Britain and Europe, but is unlikely to have survived the 46 years 1940-86 in Australia without conscious effort
↑39 See BBC Programme Index
↑40 Daily News(London) 17 July, 1936, P14. Via British Library’s Newspaper Archive
↑42 Jean Collen has reminded me that this move was quite dramatic and remains unexplained. Why would she leave a successful career in Britain?
↑43 not all of which seem to match what is otherwise known of her activities – but some might be, such as her story of her luggage being on a different, torpedoed ship
↑44 The ABC Weekly Vol 3, No 12, 22 March 1941, Page 1 Cover. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑45 Daily Advertiser (Wagga Wagga), 11 June 1941, P4. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑46 National Film and Sound Archive, Title No: 793604, collection photo of Reita with Pringle in London in 1930-not digitised
↑47 it was brief, presumably due to health issues
↑48 The Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 11 Nov 1944, P4, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑49 The Mercury (Hobart) 27 Sept 1948, P3. Via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑50 The Argus(Melb) 25 Jan 1950, P6, via National Library of Australia’s Trove
↑51 The Daily Telegraph, 5 Aug 1986, P10, via Newspapers.com
↑52 NSW Births, Deaths & Marriages, Madame Cecilia Arcana, Death Certificate 23075/1969
↑53 The Sydney Morning Herald, 11 Jan 1967, P6, via Newspapers.com
↑54 The Era 28 March, 1934, P2. Via the British Library Newspaper Archive.
↑55 ABC Weekly Vol. 18 No. 25, 23 June 1956 via National Library of Australia’s Trove