Elsie Mackay (actress) explained

Elsie Mackay
Birth Name:	Elsie Gertrude Mackay
Birth Date:	20 February 1893
Birth Place:	Roebourne, Western Australia
Death Date:	6 February 1963 (aged 69)
Death Place:	Melbourne, Australia
Occupation:	Actress
Spouse:	James Stanley Smith (m.1957-1963)
Father:	Samuel Peter Mackay

Elsie Gertrude Mackay (20 February 1893 – 6 February 1963) was an Australian-born actress who appeared on stage in the United States and Britain between 1914 and the early 1930s, and after 1934 performed on radio in Australia.^{[1] [2]}

Stage career

Mackay was born on 20 February 1893 in Roebourne, Western Australia,^{[1] [3]} to wealthy pastoralist Samuel Peter Mackay and Florence Gertrude Mackay of Mundabullangana Station.^[4]

Mackay's education was completed at a finishing school in Switzerland. In 1910 her father remarried and her new step-mother was actress Fanny Dango. Dango's relatives Millie Hylton and George Grossmith Jr introduced her to the London stage. On 19 April 1914 she became understudy to Mrs. Patrick Campbell.^[5]

She became a player in the Cyril Maude Company, touring the United States in 1915. In 1916, she joined Herbert Beerbohm Tree's company on its tour of the United States, consistently taking the role of leading ladies and acting under the direction of David Belasco.

Mackay's US stage career included:

• A Woman's Name,^[6]
• Grumpy at Hollis Street Theatre, Boston. 27 March 1915–16.^[7]
• Colonel Newcome 1917

On Broadway she performed in:^[8]

• Another Man's Shoes, 1918, where she replaced Alma Tell as Lionel Atwill's leading woman,^[9]
• A Well-Remembered Voice, 1919
• As You Like It, as Rosalind 1919,
• Clarence, as Violet Pinney 1919,
• Poldekin, as Maria 1920,

• Deburau, as Marie Duplessis, 1921,
• The White-Faces Fool, 1922

• The Comedian, as Jacqueline, 1923,
• The New Gallantry, 1925.

Her only film role was the female lead in the silent comedy Nothing But the Truth opposite Taylor Holmes.^{[10] [11] [12]} Motion Picture News of Jan-Feb 1920 noted it was her first film but reported that she "does not register... a screen personality. She appeared somewhat camera conscious... and did not photograph well."^[13]

In December 1933 she returned to Australia with her English-born second husband, actor Max Montesole.^{[1] [14]} Together the two gave recital tours and were in radio theatre.^{[15] [16]}

Personal life

In 1920 Mackay became the second wife of actor Lionel Atwill.^[17]

Mackay and Montesole married in 1933 at St. Germans, Cornwall, England. The couple moved to Australia in late 1933 where they worked together, often on radio. Montesole died in Perth in 1942.^[18] Elsie married James Stanley Smith in 1957. She died in Hawthorn, Victoria, Australia in 1963 as Elsie Gertrude Smith. She was buried with her father, brother Peter and her stepmother Fanny Dango.^[19]

Links

• • Nick Murphy, https://forgottenaustralianactresses.com/2020/10/13/elsie-mackay-1893-1963-the-pilbara-lionel-atwill-max/, at the Forgotten Australian Actors website, 7 April 2018

Notes and References

1. Nick Murphy, https://forgottenaustralianactresses.com/2020/10/13/elsie-mackay-1893-1963-the-pilbara-lionel-atwill-max/?amp=1, at the Forgotten Australian Actors website, Accessed 1 June 2022
2. Hal Porter (1965),Stars of Australian Stage and Screen. p 166. Rigby Limited, Adelaide. Porter gives a birth date of 1894
3. http://www.bdm.dotag.wa.gov.au/_apps/pioneersindex/default.aspx Government of Western Australia, Department of Births, Deaths and Marriages
4. News: 27 August 1945. Inherits £10,000. LXIII. 14 (CITY FINAL). The Daily News. 21,961. Western Australia. 4 April 2018. National Library of Australia.
5. News: MISS ELSIE MACKAY. . . 12,921 . Queensland, Australia . 20 April 1914 . 15 June 2022 . 6 . National Library of Australia.
6. University of Florida, Special and Area Studies Collections, George A. Smathers Libraries.https://findingaids.uflib.ufl.edu/repositories/2/archival_objects/292960
7. http://www.the-forum.com/EPHEMERA/early.htm The Forum - Ephemera, Theatre poster.
8. http://www.ibdb.com/person.asp?id=68171 Elsie Mackay at the Internet Broadway Database
9. News: Theatrical Notes. The New York Times. 30 May 1918.
10. Anon.. Elaborate interior sets used in Holmes' "Nothing But the Truth". The Moving Picture World. 24 January 1920. 560.
11. York. Cal. Plays and Players. XVII. May 1920. 6. Photoplay . 105.
12. Motion Picture News. J. S.. Dickerson. 'Nothing But the Truth'. Nothing Wonderful, but Will Entertain. 24 January 1920. 1135.
13. https://archive.org/details/motionpicturenew21moti_1 (page1135)
14. News: CHIT CHAT. . . 50 . 2,592 . Western Australia . 24 October 1935 . 4 April 2018 . 30 . National Library of Australia.
15. News: 24 May 1935. Comedy, Drama, Music and Song. 1. The Weekly Gazette . Goomalling, WA.
16. News: "Shakespeare" with Max Montesole and Elsie Mackay . The Perenjori Pioneer . 24 November 1934 . 5.
17. Web site: Condé Nast . 15 December 2013 . https://web.archive.org/web/20131216092727/http://www.condenaststore.com/-sp/Vanity-Fair-March-1921-Prints_i8485367_.htm . 16 December 2013 . dead .
18. News: OBITUARY . . 27,276 . Victoria, Australia . 19 September 1942 . 4 April 2018 . 3 . National Library of Australia.
19. Lind, Letty [real name Letitia Elizabeth Rudge] (1861–1923), actress and dancer]. 16 November 2020. 2004. en. 10.1093/ref:odnb/62723. 9780198614111.