Baby Benson
Baby Benson (1868?-) was a celebrated child performer.
Contents
Biography
A product of the 19th interest in child actors, she was a "child phenomenon" from the USA, who made a name for herself, inter alia performing to some acclaim at the Adelphi Theatre in London in about 1877.
She was the star member of the Baby Benson Combination Troupe who toured Australia in 1876, the United Kingdom in 1877 and South Africa in 1878, along with her mother Miss Jennie Benson. In Greyvenstein, the company is named the Benson Company.
Contribution to SA theatre, film, media and/or performance
In February 1878, a production of Please Let My Little Brother Go was staged at Trafalgar Hall in Durban by the Benson Company.
Baby Benson then appeared in a production of Beauty and the Beast in The Athenaeum Theatre, Cape Town for a short season (22 April to 4 May 1878). Billed as the Baby Benson Pantomime, it was directed by Monsieur Frigerio, using a libretto in part written by St John Knight. The production was presented by the Benson Company in association with the local Dramatic Recital Society.
Sources
Dennis Denisoff (ed). 2016. The Nineteenth-Century Child and Consumer Culture, Routledge[1]
F.C.L. Bosman. 1980. Drama en Toneel in Suid-Afrika, Deel II, 1856-1916. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik: pp. 367
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/37139043
Greyvenstein, Walter 1988. The history and development of children's theatre in English in South Africa. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Johannesburg: Rand Afrikaans University.
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