Clara Morris

Clara Morris (1846-9 – November 20, 1925) was a Canadian/American stage actress of the Victorian Era.

Early life

Actress Clara Morris was born in Toronto, the eldest child of a bigamous marriage. Sources disagree on the year of her birth, writing it as any of the years from 1846 – 1849, inclusive.

When she was three, her father, whose name was La Montagne, was exposed as a bigamist and her mother moved with Clara to Cleveland, where they adopted Clara's grandmother's name, Morrison. Young Clara received only scanty schooling. In circa 1860 she became a ballet girl in the resident company of the Cleveland Academy of Music, shortening her name to Morris at that time. At the Cleveland Academy of Music, Morris worked under the management of John A. Ellsler.

Stage

After nine years of training with that company she played a leading lady at Wood's Theatre in Cincinnati in 1869. She then appeared in Halifax, Nova Scotia for a summer, and with Joseph Jefferson in Louisville, before going to New York City in 1870. She made her New York debut in September in Man and Wife, directed by Augustin Daly at his Fifth Avenue Theatre. The role had come to her by chance, but she made such an impression in it that Daly starred her in a series of highly emotional roles over the next three years in such plays as No Name, Delmonico's, L'Article 47, Alixe, Jezebel, and Madeline Morel.

Mr. Daly engaged her to play in the Fifth Avenue Theatre, then located on West Twenty-fourth street; not as a leading act, but to fill whichever roles he deemed necessary. In the season of 1870–71, Man and Wife was in preparation for opening when the lead lady originally designated to play the role of Anne Silvester declined the part, and Ms. Morris stepped up to the position. On opening night, September 13, she made her debut in a major city, and ended up being recalled in an early scene in the play before the act was terminated - an unusual occurrence in the theatre at the time.