TITHERADGE, GEORGE SUTTON (18481916)

was born at Portsmouth, England, on 9 December 1848. He made his first appearance on the stage at the Theatre Royal, Portsmouth, subsequently supported Charles Dillon in Shakespearian plays, and in 1873 played the junior lead at Bristol. In 1876 he was Joseph Surface in the Chippendale classical company, and in the same year played Hamlet at Calcutta. On 1 January 1877 he was the Herald at the Calcutta Durbar and proclaimed Queen Victoria Empress of India. He made his first appearance in London in October 1877, and on 8 April 1878 played Iago to the Othello of Henry Forrester. He visited India a second time and, going on to Australia, made his first appearance there in May 1879 as Lord Arthur Chilton inFalse Shame. He joined the London Comedy Company at Sydney in 1880. After a world tour including the United States, Titheradge was engaged in 1883 byWilliamsonand Garner to come to Australia and play Wilfred Denver inThe Silver King. He made a great success in this character, and in leading parts in other popular dramas of the period. He joined the Brough andBoucicault(q.v.) company in 1887, and for 10 years played lead in plays by Robertson, Grundy, Jones, Pinero and other dramatists of the period. There was one Shakespearian production,Much Ado About Nothing, in which Titheradge was an excellent Benedick to the Beatrice of Mrs Brough. He must have played something like 100 parts in Australia, not one without distinction, and many seemed almost faultless. Possibly his Aubrey Tanqueray and Village Priest returned most often to the memories of play-goers of the time. He went to London in 1898, and played with success with Mrs Patrick Campbell, including his old part of Aubrey Tanqueray, and was with her company in America in 1902, among his parts being Schwartze inMagda. In January 1903 he played Professor Rubeck at the Imperial Theatre, London, in Ibsen'sWhen We Dead Awaken, and later in the year toured America with Henry Miller and Margaret Anglin inCamille,The Devil's Disciple, and other plays.He was in the United States again late in 1905, and toured with Sothern and Julia Marlowe. In England in 1907 he was with Sir John Hare's company inCasteandA Pair of Spectacles. He returned to Australia in 1908 and in that year and in 1909 played inThe Thief,The Taming of the Shrew,The Village Priest,The Silver Kingand other plays. During the remainder of his life Titheradge made only occasional appearances, among them being inThe Village Priest, with Mrs Brough in 1912, Shylock to the Portia of Ellen Terry at her benefit at Sydney in 1914, and George II in a Lewis Waller production ofA Fair Highwayman. He died at Sydney on 22 January 1916. He married about 1879 Alma Santon who survived him with a son and six daughters, of whom Madge Titheradge, born in Melbourne, in 1887, made a reputation as an actress in London, playing many leading parts. The son, Dion Titheradge, born in Melbourne in 1889, after experience as an actor in Australia, U.S.A. and England, became well-known as a producer and author of many plays and scenarios.

Titheradge was over medium height, well-formed, and an artist to his finger tips. He was the personification of natural acting, and every gesture seemed the inevitable one. It was said of him that to play Aubrey Tanqueray he only needed to play himself, a cultured gentleman. But he would have dissented strongly from this; he had no patience with the "typing" of actors which became so prevalent in the present century. And though he believed in naturalness on the stage he considered it was being overdone and was leading to dullness, when he returned to England at the close of the century. Personally Titheradge was everywhere much respected; he was president of the Actors' Association of Australia at the time of his death. The charm of his personality is well suggested in the article in theBookfellowreferred to below. In private life he was interested in the growing of daffodils and in botany.