Aggie Thorn

Aggie Thorn. From The Theatre (Sydney), 15 August 1905.Raised in an Irish/Catholic family and spending her schooldays as a border at the Presentation Convent College in Windsor, Aggie had strong religious beliefs. Religion was important to Aggie, and she would regularly practice her faith when at home and when on tour. Aggie’s faith had been noted In ‘A Woman’s Letter’ segment in the Bulletin magazine, which commented: ‘Like Miss Tittell Brune and Dolly Castles, she [Aggie] was largely raised at a Convent. They say these three forward mummers meditate in prayer before facing the lights’.¹

During the July 1905 season in Brisbane, despite the arduous fourteen night schedule, with a new Gilbert & Sullivan opera staged every second night, matinee performances and frequent rehearsals, Aggie didn’t miss Sunday mass which she and Dolly Castles attended at St. Stephen’s Cathedral. They both sang with the choir and Aggie also sang ‘Ave Maria’, her delightfully rich voice finding a most congenial building in St. Stephens’ with its excellent acoustic properties.² The following Monday several members of the Company, including Aggie, Dolly, Vinia de Loitte, Charles Kenningham and John Ralston visited the All Hallows Convent and entertained the Sisters and students in a program of songs. Aggie sang ‘Off to the Rio Grande’ (HMS Pinafore), Dolly sang ‘Poor Wandering One’ (Pirates of Penzance), Aggie, Vinia and Dolly sang ‘The Three Little Maids from School’ (The Mikado) and John Ralson gave a rendition of ‘The Silver Churn’ (Patience) and ‘He is an Englishman’ (HMS Pinafore).

Aggie’s fine singing voice and distinct enunciation often attracted favourable comment from reviewers. In the Age review of the Melbourne  production of Iolanthe in late August 1905, their critic questioned the quality of Vinia de Loitte’s voice in the title role, and pondered—‘would not Aggie Thorn’s voice have been better suited to the part of Iolanthe’.³

Following her earlier success as Yvonne in the Melbourne production of Paul Jones, Aggie was again cast in the role when the opera was revived by the Royal Comic Opera Company on Melbourne Cup eve, 1905 at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Paul Jones was chosen to celebrate the Cup and to also welcome home Florence Young, in the name part, after several months in the United States. 

To meet her commitment at Her Majesty’s, Aggie had to leave the Gilbert and Sullivan season in Western Australia and travel to Melbourne by mail steamer from Fremantle. Aggie played Yvonne for only three nights before leaving for Sydney to appear as Tessa in the revival of The Gondoliers at Sydney’s Criterion Theatre on 11 November. Of her short stint in Paul Jones the Melbourne Age wrote that Aggie’s performance as Yvonne not only showed great promise, but was a noteworthy achievement and of real genuine merit.⁴

With the increasing popularity of Gilbert and Sullivan operas with local theatregoers, Williamson extended the range of works offered by the Company and ran two of Gilbert and Sullivan’s infrequently performed, earlier works in a ‘double bill’—The Sorcerer and Trial by Jury at Sydney’s Criterion Theatre, opening on 18 November 1905. Aggie was cast to play the Plaintiff in the latter but was ill and the role was taken by Vinia de Loitte.

The ‘double bill’ was replaced by a revival of Iolanthe a week later, where Aggie played Leila, one of the three fairies. It was a minor part which reviewers thought strange after she had previously played more important roles, but she played the part with ‘the intelligent discrimination characteristic of all her work’, said  the Daily Telegraph.⁵ The tripping melody of the fairies in the opening of the first Act delighted the opening night audience.

The season at the Criterion also included a revival of Princess Ida which opened on 2 December. It had been some twelve years since the show had been performed in Australia and it was given a ‘most flattering reception’ by the Sydney audience. Other than Howard Vernon it was the first performance in the piece for the rest of the cast. Aggie made a decided hit as the vivacious Melissa (Lady Blanche’s daughter); she was ‘roguishly attractive’ wrote one reviewer. Her solo, ‘Thus our Courage all Untarnished’ and  her duets with Celia Ghiloni (as the imposing, dignified Lady Blanche), ‘Now, Would you like to Rule the Roast’, and ‘Guide to the University’ were enthusiastically received by the audience, as was the quintette Aggie sang with Lady Psyche (Vinia de Loitte), Hilarion (Walter Whyte), Florian (Arthur Crane), and Cyril (Charles Kenningham).⁶

Aggie Thorn as Melissa in Princess Ida. Photo by Talma, Sydney & Melbourne.

Elisabeth Kumm collection

Aggie Thorn & Celia Ghiloni in Princess Ida. Photo by Talma, Sydney & Melbourne.

Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections

In the concluding week of its Sydney season the Company played revivals of The Mikado, Patience, and The Pirates of Penzance. Aggie played Kate, one of Major-General Stanley’s three daughters in the ‘Pirates’, a role she had previously been cast to play in the January 1905 production, which did not precede as she was seconded to the Royal Comic Opera Co. to play Yvonne in Paul Jones. 

Throughout the Sydney season Aggie continued to impress audiences and press alike with her acting and singing, as in The Mikado when her solo as Pitti Sing, ‘For he’s gone and married Yum Yum’, addressed to Katisha in the finale of the second act ‘was so gracefully sung that the audience broke in upon the scene with their incessant applause and the melody had to be repeated’. This was an unusual compliment for this opera, wrote the Daily Telegraph critic.⁷

At the final performance of The Pirates of Penzance on 15 December, floral tributes were presented to the female principals with Aggie receiving a large floral letter ‘A’. The Company left for Melbourne the next day.

Away from the stage several of the Gilbert and Sullivan principals lent their support to a number of events. On Saturday 16 December, Aggie, Dolly Castles, Celia Ghiloni, Vinia de Loitte and other members provided a musical program at the Thirimere Fete held at the Sydney Town Hall in aid of the Queen Victoria Consumptive Home for Women. Tittell Brune and Nellie Stewart also made an appearance.

The following Thursday afternoon and evening some 16,000 people attended the Theatrical Charities Carnival and monster gala at Melbourne’s Princes Court Amusement Park. The event was organised by the J.C. Williamson management, under the direction of George Lauri and assisted by all members of the Royal Comic Opera and Gilbert and Sullivan companies. Aggie, and other principal females of the Company helped run the Gilbert and Sullivan marquee. Then on Christmas day the principals participated in a program of sacred and classical music at Melbourne’s Princess Theatre. Aggie sang Mascheroni’s ‘Ave Maria’, Celia Ghiloni sang ‘The Better Land’ and Charles Kenningham’s ‘The Requital’ was another item.

Aggie was again an ideal Midshipmite, ‘handsome, brisk and jaunty’ when HMS Pinafore opened at the Princess Theatre on 23 December 1905 as the Christmas attraction of the Repertoire Company’s Melbourne season. Because of the shortness of this opera several numbers were injected into the second act, one from Aggie which was enthusiastically received by the audience. This interpolation, wrote the Age critic, ‘enabled Miss Aggie Thorne (who would otherwise have been literally wasted on such a part as the Midshipmite) to give us a taste of her quality, which she did with gusto in the solo “Off to the Rio Grande”, a number which was doubly encored’.⁸

During the season Aggie’s performance as Tessa in The Gondoliers was said to be equal in merit to any seen in Melbourne, ‘no light thing to say when one recalls Ida Osborne and poor Violet Varley, to name but two’, wrote the Age.⁹ Ida Osborne had played Tessa in the Australian premiere at Melbourne Princess Theatre in late October 1890, some twelve months after the opera had premiered at London’s Savoy Theatre and Violet Varley was Tessa when the opera performed for the first time in Sydney at the Theatre Royal in June the following year.¹⁰

Aggie’s role as the Plaintiff in Trial by Jury also received favourable comments, with Peter Quince of Punch, for instance, acknowledging her ‘capital rendering’ of the part as the most notable feature of the production and that her ‘pleasant natural acting and arch vivacity are steadily improving her position and making her one of the leading artistes in the company.¹¹

Aggie as Princess Nekeya in Utopia Ltd. Photo by Talma, Melbourne & Sydney.

From The Gadfly (Adelaide), 14 November 1906

Frank Wilson, Vinia de Loitte, Aggie Thorn & Walter Whyte in Utopia Ltd. Photo by Talma, Melbourne & Sydney.

From The Gadfly (Adelaide), 14 March 1906

Williamson continued to be innovative with his choice of productions and closed the Melbourne season with Utopia Limited (a satire on English society and British institutions), Gilbert and Sullivan’s penultimate opera and one of their least well known (next to The Grand Dukeand Thespis). Billed as the theatrical event of the New Year the show made its Australian premiere at the Princess Theatre on 20 January 1906 before an enthusiastic  audience and in the presence of their Excellencies the Governor-General and Lady Northcote. 

In her account of Gilbert and Sullivan’s operas in Australia, Vinia de Loitte recalls how she remembered the enthusiasm of the audience on the opening night and that ‘after the first act, there were seven well applauded curtains.’ She continued, ‘I, too, shall never forget how thrilled we younger members of the company felt at the honour of being in the first Australian cast of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera.’¹²

The setting for the opera is a tropical island in the south Pacific which lent itself to colourful staging and costuming, but reviews found the production less colourful and the performances of many individuals ineffective. Charles Kenningham as Captain Fitzbattleaxe (a part he created in the original London Savoy production in 1893), however was said to be excellent, and the roles played by Aggie (Princess Nekeya) and Vinia de Loitte (Princess Kalyba), daughters of King Paramount, charmed the audience and were applauded by reviewers—they played their parts as coy, demure and coquettishly innocent young women, full of boundless fun, to perfection. Their duet ‘Although of Native Maids the Cream’, and their part in the quartet, ‘Then I may sing and play’ were hits of the show.¹³    

The demanding schedule for Aggie and other performers continued with a six week tour of Tasmania in late February, then in Bendigo for six nights (where the Mayor welcomed Dolly Castles back to her home town) and Ballarat for a week, followed with a series of one nights stands in Geelong, Albury, Wagga Wagga, Goulburn and finally a six night season in Newcastle, opening on 31 March. In a novel approach, at each venue Williamson used a public vote to determine which operas would be staged, a gesture appreciated by theatre patrons.

During the six night run at Newcastle’s Victoria Theatre, Andre Messager’s Veronique was performed on the last two nights. Veronique had been added to the Company’s repertoire  to provide an opportunity to ‘try out’ the comic opera as the show was to be staged during the forthcoming tour of New Zealand. Aggie was cast as Denise, the bride of Seraphin.

Celia Ghiloni. Photo by Talma, Melbourne & Sydney.

State Library Victoria, Melbourne

Aggie preparting for her role of Melissa in Princess Ida

Auckland Libraries Heritage Collection

At the conclusion of the Newcastle season Aggie left for the New Zealand  tour which opened at Wellington’s Opera House on 14 April 1906 with The Gondoliers and concluded at the same venue on 27 July with a ‘double bill’, The Gondoliers and Trial by Jury, completing a highly successful season for the Company and individual performers. Aggie charmed New Zealand audiences and critics alike, and she consistently won plaudits for her roles, and the skilful interpretation of the characters she played.

In The Yeomen of the Guard the Evening Post wrote: ‘The brightest gem in a fair collection of jewels was Miss Aggie Thorn in the role of Phoebe Meryll. Perhaps there was never a Phoebe Meryll, but in case there was ever one, she lived again on Saturday, an arch, man-melting girl, all alive in eye, voice and movement. This part is easily the best of Miss Thorn’s impersonations.’¹⁴

The New Zealand Times wrote of her role in Veronique: ‘Aggie Thorn is again cast as Denise, the rustic bride, and is charming—as she always is. Her solo ‘I’ll kiss my Little Hubby by and bye’ was one of the most popular of the evening.’¹⁵

As part of their review of The Gondoliers, The Otago Daily Times said:

As the two sprightly contradine, Gianetta and Tessa, Miss Dolly Castles and Miss Aggie Thorn proved entirely pleasing, and they entered into their parts with zest, and sang and acted admirably, besides looking a deal more than satisfactory. Miss Thorn’s rendering of the dainty air ‘When a merry maiden marries’, provoked demonstrative approval.¹⁶

During the tour Aggie’s engagement to Arthur Deery, a Sydney solicitor, was announced in the May.

From New Zealand the Company began a tour around Australia, starting in Brisbane with a performance of Veronique and followed with several of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. While in Brisbane,  Aggie was central to an amusing incident which occurred at the farewell performance of The Gondoliers when a live canary in a cage was handed to Aggie during her solo ‘When a merry maiden marries’. To the amusement of Aggie, fellow performers and audience the canary also burst into song.

On 1 September 1906 the Repertoire Co., opened a three week farewell season at Her Majesty’s Theatre Sydney with Utopia Limited, followed by Veronique, The Gondoliers and concluding with The Mikado on 21 September.

There was a full house on opening night to welcome the Sydney premiere of Utopia Limited, and ‘from the opening chorus to the final scene the course of the piece was marked by delightful enthusiasm on the part of the audience’. But, after the enthusiastic first night, interest from Sydney playgoers ‘fizzled out’ and after a short run was replaced by Veronique. Notwithstanding, reviews of the show generally acknowledged that the performance of the ‘dainty duo’, Aggie and Vinia de Loitte as the two younger ‘Utopian’ princesses was a highlight of  the season. As part of his plaudits for these  ‘clever ladies’, ‘The Don’ in Punch enthused: ‘what a great pity we had not a such well-matched pair when the “Two Michus” was performed here [Sydney].’¹⁷This was some compliment, considering that Florence Young and Margaret Thomas were the little Michus when Williamson’s Royal Comic Opera Company performed The Little Michus in Sydney in June 1906.

The revival of Veronique was eagerly looked forward to by Sydney playgoers, anxious to compare the current production with that previously done by the Royal Comic Opera Co., in January 1906 when Florence Young and Margaret Thomas played leading roles. The critics also had their pens poised!

The opening performance on 15 September was well received by the audience and several of the popular numbers were encored. Although appearing in less familiar roles, reviews for the Gilbert and Sullivan production were generally favourable. ‘The Don’ reported, ‘it would be over praise, however, to say that the performance under notice was on the same level as the previous show … yet at some points the Repertoire Co., got ahead of the Comics’. Aggie, as the chic and dainty Denise was splendid.¹⁸

Aggie (right) with Dolly Castles. Photo by Stump, Adelaide. From The Gadfly (Adelaide), 21 November 1906.

The season concluded with The Mikado, and on the final night floral tributes were given to Aggie, Dolly Castles and Vinia de Loitte. Henry Bracey, the stage manager made a farewell speech, noting the remarkable work of the Company and the deserved public appreciation, a comment which was soundly acknowledged by the audience.

After a hectic, full schedule over the previous year and nine months the Gilbert and Sullivan Repertoire Co., disbanded. 

The following October Williamson’s  Comic Opera Company, formerly the Repertoire Co., played in Western Australia, although due to ill health Aggie did not tour, but she did rejoin the Company for a short season at Adelaide’s Theatre Royal and appearances at Bendigo and Geelong. 

There was a crowded house at the Theatre Royal on 23 November for the performance of Princess Ida on the last night of the Adelaide season. The theatre was a buzz of excitement as many in the audience were aware it was Aggie’s last appearance, following her announcement two days earlier in an interview with the Adelaide Gadfly magazine of her decision to leave the stage as she was soon to marry. In the interview, Aggie commented that while she was sorry to leave the stage, ‘I feel sure I’m doing the right thing. I think a girl should give it up if she is marrying someone outside (the theatre).’¹⁹

The evening was an opportunity for the audience to farewell an Adelaide favourite and the performance was everything the audience wanted. Aggie’s performance as Melissa was a distinct success, most numbers were encored and the audience applause called for her duet with Celia Ghiloni (Lady Blanche) ‘Wouldn’t you like to rule the roast’ to be repeated three times. Both in singing and acting Aggie was a delightful and captivating Melissa, wrote the Adelaide Evening Journal.²⁰

At the conclusion of the opera, Dolly Castles sang ‘Poor wandering one’ from the ‘Pirates’ and Henry Bracy sang ‘Take a pair of sparking eyes’ from The Gondoliers. It had been a memorable night for the audience and Aggie. 

State Library of New South Wales, Sydney

A few weeks after her final stage appearance, Aggie married Arthur Deery on 12 December 1906 at the Church of the Immaculate Conception, in Glenferrie, Melbourne. Two years later, Aggie’s first child, Kathleen Phoebe was born on 22 November 1908 and a second daughter, Joan was born 29 August 1911.

After an absence of some five years, the appeal of the theatre was still there, and Aggie returned to the stage in early February 1911 for a charity event. Aggie together with Mrs Hugh Ward, Dorothy Brunton and Lily Titheradge were among the principals in the Pierrot Minstrels, a matinee performance at the Palace Theatre, Sydney in aid of St. Vincent’s Hospital. Hugh Ward had made the theatre available for the occasion. Aggie’s humorous songs, ‘In the Dingle, Dongle, Dell’ and ‘Marty’s Got an Aeroplane’ were great successes.

Two years later, Aggie played the role of Judith Anderson in Bernard Shaw’s The Devil’s Disciple, the initial performance of Sydney’s new Repertory Theatre. Aggie had a keen interest in the Repertory movement and gave her support by playing the exacting role of Shaw’s heroine, a role which was in sharp contrast to her previous parts in Gilbert and Sullivan’s comic operas and while her performance received mixed reviews, overall her impersonation of the character was considered noteworthy.²¹

By 1915 the relationship between Aggie and Arthur began to unravel. Arthur’s Sydney practice was in financial difficulty and in March, Arthur was struck off the Solicitors’ Roll for misconduct involving the misappropriation of trust monies. Shortly after this, he left his family and went to America, accompanied by Grace Harvey, a Sydney barmaid. Aggie petitioned for divorce in early November 1915 on the grounds of Deery’s misconduct with Harvey and other adulterous affairs.  Aggie obtained a Decree Nisi on 20 November 1916. Aggie won custody of the children.

In early June 1915, with the intention of returning to the stage, Aggie, travelling as Mrs A. Deery, sailed for San Francisco on  board the SS Ventura in the company of Fred Niblo, his wife Josephine Cohan, and fellow actors, Enid Bennett and Pirie Bush. Niblo was returning to the States, having completed a very successful three years on the Australian stage, Bennett was looking to further her acting career (which she did with considerable success).

The only information in the Australian press on Aggie’s time in America appeared in  late September, early October 1915 when several papers claimed that Aggie had secured an engagement to play a part in The Princess Pat a new comic opera by Victor Herbert and Henry Blossom.²² This did not eventuate—The Princess Pat premiered on Broadway on 29 September 1915 at the Cort Theatre, Aggie was not in the cast. Whether she had other engagements in the United States is unknown, nor is the length of her stay in America. She did travel to London at some stage as there is a record of her return to Australia from London. Aggie arrived at Fremantle on 24 December 1915 as a passenger on the RMS Osterley which had left London on 20 November.

It appears that part of her time in London was spent purchasing items for her new business venture—a partnership with a Melbourne friend in the firm of ‘Justine’, situated in Clyde House, Collins Street, which soon after moved to The Block Arcade as a new enterprise under the name ‘Justine and Agnes’, specialising in millinery, blouses, lingerie and boudoir caps.²³

However, Aggie’s business venture didn’t last and in June 1917 Aggie and her two young daughters, Kathleen and Joan sailed to America on board the SS Makura, perhaps in the hope that she and Arthur could get back together—but this did not happen and as recorded in the Thorn family history, Aggie fell on hard times in America.

Aggie died 15 October 1932, aged 51.  She is buried in the Hastings on Hudson New York Cemetery.

Aggie Thorn. Photo by G.F. Jenkinson.

Elisabeth Kumm collection

Aggie and her daughters on board the SS Makura

Courtesy of Peter Butler

Aggie Thorn was only on the stage for a short period of time, from her first performance with George Musgrove’s Comic Opera Company while on tour in New Zealand in October 1903 to her final performance with J.C. Williamson’s Comic Opera Co. in November 1906 it was a career of just three years, other than a couple of cameos after her retirement. But it was three years packed with appearances, both with the Royal Comic Opera Company and the Gilbert and Sullivan Repertoire Company where she performed alongside many of the leading female principals of the time, including Florence Young, Celia Ghiloni, Vinia de Loitte, Dolly Castles and Olive Godwin. And she held her own. Aggie performed in the full repertoire of Gilbert and Sullivan operas, sometimes in roles of little consequence, at other times in more challenging roles, and it was perhaps her performances as Tessa in The Gondoliers and Phoebe in The Yeomen of the Guard which were thought her best. At the time of her retirement Aggie was considered one of the most promising young Australians to have appeared on the comic opera stage.

In an article ‘Beginners on the Stage’, written in June 1906, Ruth Beale of the Melbourne Argus recounts an interview with J.C. Williamson where he was asked to tell something about the raw material from which actors are made. Noteworthy, in a detailed response Williamson says ‘the demand for new faces is so great that only a highly talented person can remain in constant engagement.’ Aggie was one of this group! 

He concluded his interview stating—‘On the long list of successful members of the companies these ladies will be remembered—Misses Ethel Haydon, Fanny Liddiard, Violet Varley, Celia Ghilone, Dolly Castles, Aggie Thorne, Flora Graupner, Florence Young, Hilda Spong, Lena Brasch, Roxy Barton and Carrie Moore.²⁴

Aggie to be included in this named group by Williamson speaks for itself. The view expressed in the Bulletin some two years earlier that Aggie would shine as a bright particular star had been realised.²⁵

Endnotes

1. A Women’s Letter, Bulletin (Sydney), 9 February 1905, p.14

2. Catholic Press (Sydney) 27 July 1905, p.11

3. Age (Melbourne) 21 August 1905, p.9

4. Age (Melbourne), 8 November 1905, p.9

5. Daily Telegraph (Sydney), 27 November 1905, p.7

6. Sydney Morning Herald, 4 December 1905, p.5

7. Daily Telegraph (Sydney), 11 December 1905, p.7

8. Age (Melbourne), 26 December 1905, p.9

9. Age (Melbourne), 4 January 1906, p.6

10. Violet Varley died 2 June 1895 from complications following the birth of her still-born son. She was 24. 

11. Peter Quince, Playgoer, Punch (Melbourne), 18 January 1906, 32

12. Vinia de Loitte, Gilbert and Sullivan Opera in Australia, p.38

13. Argus (Melbourne), 22 January 1906, p.6

14. Evening Post(Sydney), 23 July 1906, p.7

15. New Zealand Times, 19 July 1906, p.6

16. Otago Daily Times, Issue 13643, 12 July 1906, p.8

17. Punch(Melbourne), 6 September 1906, p.37

18. Punch(Melbourne), 20 September 1906, p.33

19. Gadfly(Adelaide), 21 November 1906, p.18. The same article noted that Dolly Castles was also to leave the Australian stage to further her study in London and Vinia de Loitte was bound for Europe.

20.  Evening Journal (Adelaide), 23 November 1906, p.3

21. Sydney Morning Herald, 2 October 1913, p.16

22. See for example, Punch (Melbourne), 4 October 1915, p.58 and Herald (Melbourne), October 1915, p.7

23. Table Talk (Melbourne), 20 January 1916, p.31

24. Argus (Melbourne), 23 June 1906, p.6

25. Bulletin (Sydney), 15 December 1904, p.16

References

Peter Butler, The life and career of Agnes Mary Gertrude Thorn: An unpublished account of the Thorn family from the perspective of their youngest daughter, Aggie, February 2021

Vinia de Loitte, Gilbert and Sullivan Opera in Australia: Being a short account of the stories of the operas and their production and revivals in Australia, 1879-1933, Ninth Edition, Whitmarks Ltd. Print, 102 Sussex Street, Sydney, 1933

The Gilbert and Sullivan Repertoire Co.—Souvenir—Direction J.C. Williamson, Syd. Day, Print, Melbourne, [1905]

Nick Murphy, Forgotten Australian Actresses—Joan Wetmore—the flashing brunette with the charming voice

Nick Murphy, Forgotten Australian Actors—Enid Bennett—the Australian who kept her accent

Papers Past New Zealand

Trove

Thanks to Elisabeth Kumm and special thanks to Peter Butler for his willingness to allow use of the Thorn family history. Peter’s maternal Great Grandmother Mabel was Aggie’s sister.