Marie Ann Florance McCarthy

<The Times, May 7, 1964>

<MISS MARIE KENDALL>

Miss Marie Kendall, who died on Tuesday at her home in Clapham, was one of the most notable of the great stars of the music halls who survived into our less colourful days. She was 90.

Born in July, 1873, at Victoria Park in East London, she first appeared on the stage as Baby Chester, in the Pavilion Theatre, Mile End Road, as a child of five and during an active career of more than 60 years she worked with the great legendary artistes - Marie Lloyd, Dan Leno, Chirgwin and Lottie Collins among others - with whom she will be remembered. She worked with equal distinction in pantomime, variety and music hall, and although she was in her sixties when non-stop variety shows became a temporary West End fashion. Marie Kendall returned to the stage undisturbed by new conditions in a continuous bill; she had no fear of the strains of this new method of production. Changing fashions in music, too, seemed not to worry her for, like all great artistes, she imposed fashion upon her audiences; at least one of the songs she made popular - "Just Like the Ivy" - has achieved the ubiquitous recognition of folksong.

When the demolition of Collins's Music Hall began a few months ago and the disappearing theatre was celebrated in a television programme, Marie Kendall appeared before the cameras to reminisce with charm, great dignity and a certain wistfulness about the hall, the artistes it had known and its great days. Her death makes those days seem suddenly much more distant.

The head of a family many of whose members made a career on the stage, she was the grandmother of Kay Kendall, who died in 1959.

END.

--https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Kendall

http://collinsvariety.co.uk/creating-the-collins-five-theatre-seaso...