FIFTH ANNUAL DINNER
Report from Alexander Bisset.

Once again it was the Savage Club, within the National Liberal Club building, just off Whitehall, that welcomed members and friends of the Irving Society for their fifth annual dinner.

            This being the third occasion on which the event has been hosted by the Savage Club, many of our company for dinner were already familiar with the Club-room - recently refurbished to give more space - and with the Liberal Club’s magnificent marble staircase and elaborately tiled dining room. For those attending for the first time it was a welcome opportunity to see one of the remaining architectural treasures of Victorian London.

The evening, relaxed and convivial, included a brief entertainment, provided by Mr. Chris Holland of the Players’ Theatre, in costume, accompanied on the pianoforte by our Chairman, Mr. Michael Kilgarriff. They gave the comic song from 1902 “I’m John James ‘Enery Irving Wilson Barrett Baggs,” with the assembled dinner party joining, in true music hall fashion, in the chorus, the words of which were provided with the evening’s programme.

            With conversation a-plenty, it was not surprising that some of this should turn to Henry Irving. Our Chairman, Vice-Chairman and the actress Tina Gray, who specialises in the delineation of Ellen Terry - members will have an opportunity next February of seeing her - discussing the writings of the talented and much-loved twentieth century actress, Athene Seyler (1889 - 1990).

            Michael recollected an interview with Miss Seyler, when she told him that her mother, née Clara Thies, was, as a child, an old neighbour of the young Henry Irving in the City of London.

            A little bit of investigation by means of the 1851 Census has now shown this to be the case. The Brodribb family, Samuel (a clerk), Mary and their thirteen year old son John H., together with a visitor were then living at No.68 Old Broad Street (not No.65, as recorded by Austin Brereton); the Thies family, John (a master baker) and Sarah, with three sons, three daughters (including six year old Clara), two lodgers and a servant were living at No.61 Old Broad Street.

            It is interesting simply to reflect that, from these neighbouring families in the modest surroundings of inner city Victorian London should come the first Knight of the British theatre and one of its Dames, a major ornament to twentieth century theatre and cinema.

            But for the random nature of after-dinner conversation, this piece of Irvingiana might never have surfaced.