archives.nypl.org -- Francis Wilson papers (original) (raw)

Born in Philadelphia on February 7, 1854 to Charles Edwin and Emily Von Erdon Wilson, Francis Wilson began his theatrical career as a child in minstrel shows. "It may seem a little odd that a boy of Quaker forebears should have gravitated so early toward the stage. I was not older than eight or nine when I made my first appearance. I can explain it only on the theory that it was an overdue protest against the solemn repression suffered by generations of ancestors," Wilson wrote in his 1924 autobiography, Francis Wilson's Life of Himself (Houghton Mifflin Company, p. 33). He was soon the main breadwinner of his family.

Wilson made his debut on the legitimate stage at the Chestnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia in the 1878-79 season. For thirty-five years he was one of the best known and best loved of American comedians. His greatest success was as Cadeaux in Erminie. This operetta opened at the Casino Theatre in New York City in May 1886, ran for 1256 performances, had a long run on the road and was revived in 1921 with Wilson and his co-star, De Wolf Hopper, assuming again their famous roles.

In 1889 Wilson established his own production company, Francis Wilson and Company, and ran up against the Theatrical Syndicate, a trust trying to control theater bookings. Allied with other actor-managers including Joseph Jefferson, Richard Mansfield, Minnie Maddern Fiske and David Belasco, Wilson fought the Syndicate beginning in the 1896 season, but ultimately surrendered. This experience led the founders of Actors' Equity Association to ask him to serve as the first president of the organization, a post he assumed in 1913. Frank Gillmore, one of the founders and a later president said, "No man was more responsible for the success of the Actors' Equity Association than Francis Wilson... He was a notable actor, a fiery and logical speaker, and he was a man of independent means whose livelihood could not be destroyed by his assumption of the leadership of this movement." (The New York Times, "Francis Wilson, 81, Noted Actor, Dead" Oct. 8, 1935.) In 1919, Wilson led the successful strike against the Producing Managers' Association, a strike that involved 8 cities, closed 37 plays, and prevented the opening of 16 others. Most of the casts of the leading Broadway productions walked out. Equity won recognition as the bargaining agent for actors and eventually affiliated with the American Federation of Labor. Wilson retired from the presidency in 1920, but was made president emeritus for life.

Wilson was also a writer and lecturer. He wrote books on Eugene Field, Joseph Jefferson, John Wilkes Booth and Edwin Booth as well as plays including The Bachelor's Baby and his own reminiscences. Except for roles in the Players Club productions, Wilson made his last professional appearances in the title role of Rip Van Winkle and in The Rivals, both at the opening of the new Boston Repertory Theatre in 1925. His final appearance was in the Players Club revival of The Little Father of the Wilderness in 1930.

Wilson was married twice: first to Mira Barrie from 1881 until her death in 1915, then to the actress, Edna Bruns, from 1917 until his own death in 1935. He had four children, two daughters, Frances Barrie and Adelaide Craycroft, with his first wife and a son and daughter, Craycroft Francis and Margalo Francis, with his second. He had three homes: in New York City, Lake Mahopac, N.Y. and Clearwater, Florida. In Florida he was active in the Little Theatre movement where the Francis Wilson Little Theatre was named for him. Francis Wilson died of a heart attack at his home on Gramercy Park in New York City on October 7, 1935. He was 81 years old. At his request, he was buried in the Actors' Fund Plot in Kensico, N.Y. under an epitaph he composed for himself: "Here lies the man who tried to free the actor."