Edwin Arden Explained

Birth Name:Edwin Hunter Pendleton Arden
Birth Date:4 February 1864
Birth Place:St. Louis, Missouri
Death Place:New York City
Occupation:Stage actor, manager and playwright

Edwin Hunter Pendleton Arden (February 4, 1864 – October 2, 1918) was an American actor, theatre manager, and playwright.

Biography

Arden was born in St. Louis, Missouri, to Mary Berkley Hunter and Arden Richard Smith.[1] [2] After a common-school education he travelled west and worked in a number of different jobs, including as a mine-helper, cowboy, railroad brakeman, clerk, reporter, and theatre manager. In 1882, he made his debut as an actor with Thomas W. Keene's Shakespeare company. The next year, he married Keene's daughter Agnes Eagleson Keene.[3] Their only child, daughter Mildred Arden, also became an actor.[4] [5] Around this time, he wrote several plays, including The Eagle's Nest, Raglan's Way, Barred Out, and Zorah.

He worked with a number of theatrical companies over the next thirty years, performing in such works as Edmond Rostand's L'Aiglon, Victorien Sardou's Fédora, and in an all-star production of Romeo and Juliet at the Knickerbocker Theatre in New York. In his later years, he had his own stock theatre company in Washington, D.C.[6] He starred in silent films such as The Beloved Vagabond (1915).

Partial filmography

References

Notes
  • Bibliography
  • Notes and References

    1. News: Arden Richard Smith . 8 August 2018 . New York Times . 23 October 1897.
    2. https://www.flickr.com/photos/sidpickle/30064627868/in/dateposted-public/ Arden Richard Smith obituary
    3. News: Mrs Agnes Arden . 9 August 2018 . Brooklyn Life . 6 January 1906.
    4. News: Mildred Arden, Daughter of the Late Edwin Arden . 8 August 2018 . New York Herald, 05 Sep 1920, Sun, Page 39 . 5 September 1920.
    5. News: Descendants of Stage Stars much in the Limelight Today . 8 August 2018 . New York Herald . 5 September 1920.
    6. "Edwin Arden Drops Dead." New York Times, Oct 3, 1918, p. 13