In 1937 the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama celebrated its 21st birthday. By this time Miss Mawer had been married, widowed, married again, lived through a World War, worked with Sybil Thorndike and Lewis Casson in The Trojan Women, and also in Medea, published The Dance of Words, visited
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Cigarette, anyone? It came as a huge shock to me to find out that Irene Mawer probably smoked cigarettes. In our modern age, it is almost incomprehensible that an athlete (which a dancer surely is) would smoke, but of course, attitudes (and knowledge) were completely different in those
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During the dinner given to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the start of the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama, Effie Williams “made a presentation to the School and to its two Principals on behalf of the Ginner-Mawer Old Girls’ Club. The gift to the School was a most beautiful shield
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Edith Sitwell’s Influence at the 21st Birthday Party Today’s blog post is definitely one of my favourites. I have had such fun researching it. It started with me reading the report of the 21st Birthday Party for the Ginner-Mawer School (1937). I had no idea that the write-up in The
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21st Birthday of the School in 1937 In 1937, the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama celebrated its 21st birthday. It had survived the First World War, and could not yet foresee the troubles of the future. In a speech at a party given in celebration of the event, Miss
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Some time ago I published a blog post where I noted that I thought there was a link between Laurence Olivier and Irene Mawer. I am happy to say, that following a visit to NRCD, I have now found the evidence to prove what I suspected: in his youth Lord
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“…reeds don’t sway from side to side…” The five year old boy earnestly criticised his teacher, Dorothy Reavely, as she struggled to find her teaching feet in 1920s France. As a graduate of Ginner-Mawer, she had a good, solid training on which to
Continue readingWhile idly browsing through Facebook, I came upon a video which made my heart sing. So I send out a big thank you to an Italian community organisation called Balancing Act for making this video, and for including Irene Mawer. I began watching the video, totally unknowing what would be
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This flyer, and the newspaper clipping attached to it are causing me some confusion! There is no date. Written in fountain pen are the words “This may be the future G-M School”. Yet, in the newspaper clipping, there is a reference to the Civic Theatre fire – but this happened
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This programme puts me in a conundrum. There is no mention of Elsie Fogerty’s Central School, yet I think there is a connection. This performance of Prunella was given at the Swanley Horticultural College in 1916. In Marion Cole’s book about Elsie Fogerty, she states that when Irene Mawer was
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