Beatrice Lillie

At 94 years old, Beatrice Lillie has this physical status:

Beatrice Gladys Lillie (29 May 1894 – 20 January 1989), known as Bea Lillie, was a Canadian-born British actress, singer and comedic performer. She began to perform as a child with her mother and sister.

She made her West End debut in 1914 and soon gained notice in revues and light comedies, becoming known for her parodies of old-fashioned, flowery performing styles and absurd songs and sketches.

She debuted in New York in 1924 and two years later starred in her first film, continuing to perform in both the US and UK. She was associated with revues staged by André Charlot and works of Noël Coward and Cole Porter, and frequently was paired with Gertrude Lawrence, Bert Lahr and Jack Haley. During World War II, Lillie was an inveterate entertainer of the troops.

She won a Tony Award in 1953 for her revue An Evening with Beatrice Lillie.

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Early life and career

Lillie was born in Toronto to Irish-born John Lillie and his partner Lucie Ann (née Shaw). She had an elder sister, Muriel (1893-1973), who later performed the piano at silent movie houses, and then married first to Sir Brian Dean Paul, the 6th Baronet of Rodborough. At the time of Lillie's birth, her father was a cigar smoker and later served as a guard at the Toronto city jail. On his honorable discharge, he went to Toronto rather than returning to Ireland, and he had been stationed in India. Lucie Ann Lillie (who had changed her name from "Lucy Ann"), had "a modest reputation as a concert singer," and was the daughter of a Manchester clothing chain who had moved to a farm outside Toronto.

Lillie lived in Ontario as part of a family trio with her mother and older sister, Muriel, and her father, who was housekeeping the family's home in Toronto in their absence. The girls' mother eventually took them to London, England, where she made her West End debut in the 1914 film Not Likely! Lillie continued this tradition with about a dozen London shows and musical revues until 1922. Lillie created her sketches, songs, and parodies in her revues. Since her 1924 Broadway debut in André Charlot's Revue of 1924, starring Gertrude Lawrence, The New York Times gave her lauding.

In some of her best known bits, she solemnly parodied the flowery performing style of earlier decades, with songs such as "There Are Fairies in Our Garden" and "Mother Told Me So" for every double entendre. "Get Yourself a Geisha" and "Snoops the Attorney"), among other things, showcased her amazing sense of the absurd. "One Dozen Double Damask Dinner Napkins," ("in which an increasingly flummoxed matron seeks to buy said napkins), earned her the coveted sobriquet of "The World's Best Woman."

In 1926, she returned to New York City to perform. While in the United States, she appeared in Exit Smiling (1927), opposite fellow Canadian Jack Pickford, who was Mary Pickford's younger brother. She was followed by a small role in The Show of Shows (1929) and her first appearance in a sound feature film, Are You There? (1930) The Great Depression (1930). Lillie returned to Broadway in Vaudeville, Vaudeville, in 1928, after a 1927 visit to the Orpheum Circuit, and has appeared there regularly since.

Later career

Lillie has performed on both continents from the 1920s to the start of World War II. In 1928, she appeared at the London Palladium. She was long acquainted with Nol Coward's work, beginning with "This Year of Grace (1928) and giving the first public performance of "Mad Dogs and Englishmen" in Coward's The Third Little Show (1931). Cole Porter and others wrote songs for her. In 1935 she appeared in London and New York in Walk a Little Faster, and in 1936 she appeared in The Show Is On with Bert Lahr.

She performed in 1939 in Set to Music and in 1944 in Seven Lively Arts. Lillie appeared in the film On Approval the previous year. (Broadway and London) and High Spirits (1964), among other Broadway appearances, were Inside USA (1948), An Evening With Beatrice Lillie (1952) (Broadway and London). Her few other film appearances included a cameo appearance in Around the World (1956) and as Mrs. Meers (a white slaver) in Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967), her last film.

"Other generations may have their Mistinguett and Marie Lloyd," Beatrice Lillie wrote after watching "Average with Beatrice Lillie. We have Beatrice Lillie, and we've never seen such a display of exquisite talent." "Lillie's greatest strengths were the arched eyebrow, the curled lip, the fluttering eyelid, the tilted chin, and the ability to predict, even in apparently harmless content, the possibility of a double entendre," Sheridan Morley wrote in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.

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Awards and honours

• 1945: New York Drama Critics Award for Best Femme Performance in a Musical – Seven Lively Arts
• 1948: New York Drama Critics Award for Best Femme Performance in a Musical – Inside USA
• 1953: Special Tony Award – An Evening with Beatrice Lillie
• 1954: Sarah Siddons Award
• 1958: Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical – Ziegfeld Follies of 1957 (nominee)
• 1964: Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical – High Spirits (nominee)