Anna Pavlova at the Music Hall

When Bronislava-Nijinska saw the great Anna Pavlova dance at the famous music hall, the Palace Theatre, in London, tears came to her eyes.  She thought that appearing on the same bill as musicians, clowns and acrobats had ruined Pavlova's dancing.  (Our Albert Whelan, the 'great Australian entertainer', was sometimes on the same stage, so he might have been included in this indictment!) Some of the papers also looked down on Pavlova's appearing at a music hall.  One critic wrote that Pavlova had been 'rescued from the music-hall' when she joined Diaghilev's company again.

However, most ballet stars such as Adeline Genee did perform on the music-hall stages in the Edwardian era, and they helped ballet to become popular. It was part of Pavlova's mission to make ballet accessible to the ordinary people, so she saw nothing wrong with moving to the Palace. She would probably have been foolish to refuse the attractive salary that she was offered.  This started at 400 pounds a week, and it eventually rose to 1200 pounds - an enormous amount in the early 1900s.

Pavlova's most popular dance was probably the 'Bacchanal' from Autumn, which she performed with Michael Mordkin.  Mordkin looked like a 'Greek God', and, according to Kerensky, his strong and manly physique provided a dramatic contrast to Pavlova's ethereal fragillity and grace.  In this abandoned dance, Pavlova wore flimsy chiffon and danced wildly with her long dark hair tied in a scarlet ribbon. * ( Mordkin actually flung her onto the stage at the end of the dance.  Once he dropped her rather too hard, and she created a sensation by slapping him! (There were rumours of an affair, but Mordkin's widow didn't believe it). Perhaps he did it because he was jealous of her popularity - Pavlova performed more solos.  Once he complained that there were no dishes named after him, but some were named after her!

* Years later, some of the audience in Sydney complained that this dance was unpleasant.

(Anna Pavlova in The Dragonfly)

The Well-Dressed Music-Hall Star

Imagine having your leg amputated at 82! This happened to Albert Whelan, one of the most famous Australian music-hall entertainers. Yet he still made appearances and even did a stint on the BBC TV show, Life Begins at Eighty. One has to admire this kind of attitude!

Born in in Melbourne in 1875 as Albert Waxman, he made his start by singing for the miners in the goldfields in Western Australia. He changed his name and became part of the musical comedy team, Whelan & Wilson.

Whelan must have been extremely ambitious because he soon went to London. He made his debut as a dancer and singer at London's Empire Theatre in 1901. He was very versatile - he could play the piano and the violin, sing comic songs, and tell funny stories.

He toured the United States and appeared with Anna Pavlova at the Palace Theatre in 1912. I wonder what she thought of him! She might not have liked his singing, but she probably approved of his appearance. He always dressed immaculately for the stage. His outfit included an opera cloak, top hat and tails and white gloves.

Whelan was the first person to use a signature tune - The Jolly Brothers - which he whistled at the beginning and end of his performance.

Albert Whelan died in 1961.

Here he is singing with his son Gordon at the piano.

Albert Whelan Sings My Secret Passion

The Most Beautiful Girl In The Mid-West

Cathleen ni Houlihan, one of the symbols of Irish nationhood, is often depicted in literature as an old woman who needs the help of young men to fight for Ireland. She is not usually as beautiful as Hazel Lavery appears on the old Irish pound note.

Born Hazel Martyn in Chicago in 1880, she was the daughter of a wealthy American industrialist descended from an old Irish family. Hazel was a talented young artist and ambitious, but fate had other plans.

The ‘most beautiful girl in the Mid-West’ fell in love with the Irish artist, John Lavery, on a family holiday in Brittany, when she was quite young. The widower was thirty years older and Hazel’s family was not impressed with the match. Hazel agreed to marry Ned Trudeau, a handsome surgeon, who was her family’s choice.

Ned died of pneumonia a short time after they were married when Hazel was pregnant with Alice. Hazel wanted to return to John but her mother still opposed the idea.

After her mother died Hazel was free. She married John in 1910.

John Lavery was a very successful artist who painted Queen Victoria, the Asquiths, the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, and other famous people in society. He also painted many exquisite paintings of his wife, Hazel. He was knighted in 1921 so Hazel became Lady Lavery. (I can’t help receiving the impression that she was the type of woman who’d enjoy having a title!)

The Laverys were friendly with the Churchills. After the Dardanelles Campaign in 1915, Churchill’s wife, Clementine, thought that Winston would ‘die of grief.’ He had always wanted to paint and bought a paintbox and brushes. One day when he visited Hazel, she asked: “Why do you hesitate?” She persuaded him to finally start painting.

Hazel and John also helped Winston Churchill by becoming involved in diplomacy. Hazel became extremely interested in Irish nationalism – she even described herself as Irish and put on an Irish accent. She and John offered their house in South Kensington, London, as the site for the negotiations for the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1922 which formed the basis for the Irish Free State.

Legend has it that forty year old Hazel fell for the handsome Irish nationalist, Michael Collins, and that they had an affair. She and John apparently had a rocky marriage. Michael wrote poems about her ‘delicate sad grace.’ However, Michael Collins was engaged to a young lady and Hazel was twenty years older and dyed her hair, according to one of Churchill’s daughters. There are claims that Hazel would have been shot by the I.R.A. if they’d had an affair.

There are also stories that Hazel wanted to put on widow’s weeds after Collins was shot and even throw herself onto his grave, but this is probably an exaggeration.

It’s a pity that Hazel’s talent for painting has largely been unnoticed. Perhaps her husband was the more talented of the two. Hazel died in 1935 and is buried with John in Putney Vale Cemetery.

(I hope to write about Sir John Lavery soon. They were certainly a fascinating couple!)