Mona Limerick (born Mary Charlotte Louise Gadney; 1882-1968) was an Irish stage actress. She was the wife of actor

Ben Iden Payne Ben Iden Payne (September 5, 1881 – April 6, 1976), also known as B. Iden Payne, was an English actor, director and teacher. Active in professional theater for seventy years, he helped the first modern Repertory Theatre in the United Kingdom, was ...

Early life

Mona Limerick was born to Irish parents, possibly in South America.''Who's who in the Theatre''
(Pitman 1922): 499. In another version of her story, she mentioned being born in India and raised in Germany, as the daughter of Irish missionaries.

Career

Limerick had her acting debut in 1902, in Bristol. She was a member of the

Abbey Players The Abbey Theatre ( ga, Amharclann na Mainistreach), also known as the National Theatre of Ireland ( ga, Amharclann Náisiúnta na hÉireann), in Dublin, Ireland, is one of the country's leading cultural institutions. First opening to the pu ...

in Dublin, and a member of Annie Horniman's repertory company of the Gaiety Theatre in Manchester. In 1909 George Bernard Shaw chose Limerick for the role of Hypatia in his play '' Misalliance'', but she had to refuse the role to play Beatrice in her husband's production of '' Much Ado About Nothing'' in Manchester. Shaw wrote to her about his disappointment: "I solemnly curse Iden Payne. I curse Miss Horniman. I curse the Gaiety Theatre. I curse Manchester. I curse destiny. I lay a blight on every theatrical enterprise in England until you do your duty and come play for me." In 1910 she appeared in Shaw's '' The Dark Lady of the Sonnets'', and toured in Shaw's '' Man and Superman''. Limerick had a reputation for being "strange, haunting, puzzling" in her stage persona. Caricaturist Max Beerbohm drew a severe figure of Limerick in 1909, and described her as having "a barbaric air, and yet an air of being over-civilized."

Joseph Conrad Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, ; 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Poles in the United Kingdom#19th century, Polish-British novelist and short story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in t ...

described Limerick in a 1917 letter as having "a quality which gets home every time and if she may exasperate her audience I am certain she will never bore it or leave it indifferent." Limerick and Ben Iden Payne left the Manchester troupe in 1911, and toured the United States in 1913. She starred in Cicely Hamilton's play ''Phyl'' and

Harriet Monroe Harriet Monroe (December 23, 1860 – September 26, 1936) was an American editor, scholar, literary critic, poet, and patron of the arts. She was the founding publisher and long-time editor of ''Poetry'' magazine, first published in 1912. As a ...

's play ''The Man-Eagle'' in Chicago in 1914. She also acted in Rabindranath Tagore's '' Chitra'' in Boston in 1915, and made plans to appear in vaudeville in ''The Woman in Red''.

Personal life

Mona Limerick married fellow actor Ben Iden Payne in 1906. They had three children, Sara (1907-1993) who became a dancer, Rosalind (1911-1990) who became an actress, and son Paget. Limerick and Payne divorced in 1950. Mona Limerick died in 1968, aged 86 years.Albin Krebst, "B. Iden Payne, Shakespearean, Actor, Director, Teacher, Dies" ''New York Times'' (April 7, 1976): 39. via ProQuest

References

External links

Postcard photograph of Mona Limerick and Ian MacLaren
in ''Much Ado About Nothing'' (1909-1910), in the "Shakespeare & the Players" online exhibit from Emory University. {{DEFAULTSORT: 1882 births 1968 deaths Irish actresses