Jean Aylwin

Jean Aylwin (10 October 18851964), also known as Jean Isabella Griffin Aitkin, was a Scottish actress and singer, often billed as "The Lady Harry Lauder".

Aylwin was best known for creating character roles in successful Edwardian musical comedies early in the 20th century. She turned to roles in non-musical plays by World War I, continued to act into the 1920s and was later a radio broadcaster. Her divorce in 1924 from a colonel in the Intelligence Corps involved allegations of infidelity.

Early life and career

Aylwin was born in Hawick and was educated at George Watsons College, Edinburgh.

She began her professional stage career in 1904 with a touring company playing character roles in smaller towns in the British provinces in such melodramas as ''The Red Coat'' and ''No Cross, No Crown''. She later toured with a company managed by George Dance as a shop assistant in the Edwardian musical comedy ''The Girl from Kays'', and next was engaged at the Gaiety Theatre, in the chorus. She soon became an understudy there"Miss Jean Aylwin", ''The Daily Mail'', 29 December 1906 and made her London principal debut in the same theatre, as Sylvana in the long-running musical comedy ''The Spring Chicken'' in 1906. George Grossmith, Jr. also appeared in the piece, and over the next four years, Aylwin would play in a series of successful musicals co-written by, and starring, Grossmith. Later the same year, she played Jennie, a maid in the original cast of the first of these, ''The New Aladdin''. A reviewer from ''The Daily Mail'' wrote that if she fulfilled her early promise, she "has a future before her as character actress that can best be described as a particularly bright one." In 1907, she took the role of Minna in the original run of the hit musical ''The Girls of Gottenberg''. The following year, she performed as Anita in ''Havana'', and in 1909 appeared in ''Our Miss Gibbs''. When ''Our Miss Gibbs'' transferred to the Knickerbocker Theatre, New York, in 1910, Aylwin went with it, joining a mostly American cast.

By 1912, she was back in England starring in ''A Scrape O' the Pen'', by Graham Moffat, at the Comedy Theatre. One reviewer opined, "Jean Aylwin has joined the company, and she was far more at home in the part of Jean Lowther than in a musical comedy role." The following year, she starred in ''Who's the Lady'' at the Garrick Theatre. A reviewer commented: "Jean Aylwin, who was altogether charming as Gobette, had no difficulty in showing what an accomplished actress this most outrageous of flirts was. Her delicate art, indeed, all but transmuted base metal into pure gold." The show's success was later described by another critic as "in no small degree due to the brilliant acting of Miss Jean Aylwin".

In 1913–14, she appeared in Scotland and northern England as the title character in a show with a Scottish theme, ''A Careless Lassie''. The ''Dundee Courier'' praised the story of a girl from a rigidly righteous (''unco guid'') family, who runs away to the music hall stage and then returns, but the ''Manchester Courier''s review lamented that the show's own music hall format gave limited scope to 'clever players' from the 'legitimate' theatre, such as Aylwin. In 1914 she received press coverage for inspiring a style of dress "in crepe and lace". In 1915, she starred in a second Scottish-themed show, ''All Scotch''. The show was described as a "tartan revue" and culminated in a sequence in which Aylwin appeared as Bonnie Prince Charlie. The ''Manchester Courier'' described the revue as "probably one of the best which has been to Manchester" and commended the wit and humour, observing that Aylwin "sings and dances charmingly". Later that year, she supported the comedian Dan Rolyat in his revue ''She's a Daisy'', at the Manchester Hippodrome, and performed in benefit concerts to support the war effort. In February 1916, ''All Scotch'' was revived at Her Majesty's Theatre, Dundee, where Aylwin's part was again praised as "charming" by the press.

Later years

In 1918, Aylwin appeared in the silent film '' The Greatest Wish in the World'' as the Mother Superior. In the same year, she starred in a sketch called ''Something to his Advantage'', written for her by Dion Titheradge, at the Euston Theatre and the Coventry Hippodrome. A reviewer remarked that "There may not be much of a 'plot', but there is sufficient to bring out the remarkably fine qualities of Miss Aylwin". In 1920, she appeared in ''Just Like a Woman'' at the Glasgow Empire.

In 1923 she returned to the stage in one of two competing London versions of ''Polly'' at the Chelsea Theatre, London. Her role as a Scottish maid was newly introduced for the Chelsea production and does not appear in the original. At the end of that year she announced her permanent retirement from the stage. She stated that she intended to travel to India and other parts of the East, to work with the Wesleyan Missionary Society to improve conditions in leper settlements. She subsequently returned to England, and in 1926 was an early radio broadcaster on the BBC
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