Eva Elwes was an English actor and playwright who wrote over 50 plays between 1907 and 1938.
Biography
Eva Elwes was born Gertrude Emma Cannon on 1 February 1876 in Frome, Somerset, the second child of Mark and Ellen Cannon. In the 1891 British census her occupation was 'draper’s apprentice'. She married her first husband, comedian Henry Charles Gilpin, in 1898. Elwes and Gilpin were cast together in several productions between 1896 and 1899. The 1911 British census listed Elwes as Eva Eykyn, living in a boarding house in Walsall with Ernest Eykyn. Elwes’s occupation was 'actress' and Eykyn’s was 'actor'. Between 1900 and 1918 Elwes and Eykyn appeared together in a number of productions. Elwes and Eykyn lived in Walsall from about 1911 to 1921. They moved to South Shields where they married in 1925; her status on the marriage certificate was ‘widow’ and his was ‘scenic artist’. They remained in South Shields until 1940 when they retired to Mirfield, West Yorkshire. Eva Elwes died on 16 June 1950 in Cleckheaton, Yorkshire.
Acting career
Between 1896 and the late 1920s Elwes performed in a variety of plays and variety shows. She regularly performed in her own plays which were often staged by Will H. Glaze’s touring theatre company. She also acted in other touring companies playing mostly in the north of England. In 1921 Will Glaze took on the lease of the Alexandra Theatre in Wallis Street, South Shields. Eykyn became the theatre’s stage manager and artist, and Elwes performed in the Alexandra Players. Elwes became the co-lessee of the theatre with Ethel Hird from 1930–1940. When the theatre closed in 1940, due to the World War IIblackout, a newspaper article recalled "some particularly fine performances by that grand dowager of drama Eva Elwes". Elwes and Eykyn both contributed to the Actors’ Benevolent Fund from the production of one her plays The Cottage Girl.
Plays
Elwes was one of several female writers of melodramas in the early 20th century. She wrote over 50 plays, mostly melodramas but also pantomimes, in the thirty-year period 1907–1938. Forty six plays were submitted to the Lord Chamberlain for licensing, and the scripts and Readers’ Reports are held in the British Library Lord Chamberlain Plays Collection. References to other plays, not submitted for licence, can be found in newspapers of the time. Her first play was a musical drama His Sister’s Honour which was staged in Fleetwood in January 1907.
Several plays had wartime themes and settings, such as Joy, Sister of Mercy,John Raymond's Daughter and Billy's Mother. German spies and the sinking of a U-boat feature in Heaven at the Helm. A later play dramatised the story of Edith Cavell the British nurse who was shot by the Germans in 1915 after being suspected of spying.
''The Price She Paid''
In 1925 the Alexandra Theatre in South Shields submitted an application to the Lord Chamberlain for a licence for Elwes's play entitled Edith Cavell, Nurse and Martyr. The Lord Chamberlain would not grant a licence after consultation with Cavell's sisters who did not feel the play was accurate. In 1927 the Alexandra Theatre resubmitted its application. It was initially refused again but when Elwes changed the title to The Price She Paid and changed the names of the characters of Cavell and her mother a licence was granted. The Price She Paid was performed at the Alexandra Theatre in 1927.
Tyneside themes
Elwes wrote two plays on local Tyneside identities.
''Dolly Peel''
Elwes's play told the story of Dolly Peel, a South Shields fishwife and smuggler, who lived 1782 to 1857. The play was first performed in August 1923 at the Alexandra Theatre with Will Glaze and Elwes in the cast; the scenery was designed and painted by Ernest Eykyn. A handwritten script of Dolly Peel was discovered during renovations of a building in South Shields in 2004. The play was revived and performed at the Customs House in 2005 to mark the theatre's 10th anniversary.
''Fifty Fafty''
Fifty Fafty is about an old sailor of North Shields. It was performed by the Alexandra Players on their first anniversary in February 1923.
