Our Family’s Love of Broadway and Live Theatre Has Deep Roots

 

We had heard for years that my wife’s family member, Elliott Stewart—the son of her grandmother’s sister—had appeared on Broadway in a number of shows. Specifically, he had appeared in The Student Prince in Heidelberg, which was one of Broadway's biggest shows of the 1920s. Also, he appeared in Madame Pompadour and the out of town production of New Moon.

An interesting story, but one I had never been able to verify.

When it came to review of the original cast of The Student Prince, Elliott didn’t originate the role, and 100-year-old playbills aren’t exactly the easiest things to find.

And yet, I happened to search on eBay the other day, and there it was: an original Broadway playbill for The Student Prince.

And, lo and behold, the actor listed next to one of lead roles Detleff was her relative, Elliott Stewart.

After all those years of hearing the family stories, I finally had the proof.

The Student Prince Playbill

And then I noticed another name in the playbill.

Sydney Greenstreet.

If you're a fan of old movies, you probably know him as Kasper Gutman, “The Fat Man,” from the 1941 classic The Maltese Falcon, starring Humphrey Bogart. 

Also, he appeared as Signor Ferrari in an movie you might of heard of -- Casablanca!

Greenstreet didn't even make his first movie until he was 61 years old. Before that, he had spent decades as a stage actor, including appearing in The Student Prince. His performance as Kasper Gutman in The Maltese Falcon earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. 

So, sitting there on a 100-year-old Broadway playbill, I was looking at the names of Elliott Stewart and the future “Fat Man” from The Maltese Falcon—actors who were performing in the same Broadway production.

That was a pretty cool genealogy discovery.

A lot has changed in 100 years, and it is fascinating to see how a playbill from that age reflected styles and interests of the day. I have included a few pictures from the playbill, and there are some great little glimpses into the world of 1926—a fascinating cigarette advertisement featuring Charlie Chaplin, articles about the “well-dressed man,” and all sorts of other things that make you realize just how different the world was.

But the most interesting thing to me was seeing Elliott's name sitting there in the cast.

And then realizing who else was performing on the same stage 8 shows a week. 

A family story had suddenly become a family artifact—and it came with a pretty famous co-star.

The Cast

Broadway in 1926

Today, we tend to think of Broadway as a place where only a few actors become well-known. Actors from television and movies—and now even social media—are often far more recognizable to the general public.

But Broadway 100 years ago was the big time.

Movies were still in their infancy, and some of the most famous celebrities of the day were stage actors.

John Wilkes Booth is probably the most dramatic example. Before he assassinated Abraham Lincoln, Booth was a highly successful and nationally famous actor. His involvement in the assassination made the crime even more shocking to the public because a well-known celebrity of the day was suddenly at the center of one of the nation's greatest tragedies.

So, for an actor like Elliott Stewart, appearing on Broadway in the 1920s was an enormous accomplishment.

And The Student Prince was about as good a show to land as you could have hoped for if you wanted to make a name for yourself on Broadway.

The operetta, with music by Sigmund Romberg and book and lyrics by Dorothy Donnelly, opened on Broadway on December 2, 1924. It was originally staged at the Jolson's 59th Street Theatre, at Seventh Avenue and West 58th Street. The production eventually ran for 608 performances, making it one of the biggest Broadway successes of the 1920s.

By 1926, the show had already become a Broadway institution. The original production featured a company of about 150 people.

A Student Prince, a German Beer Hall—and Prohibition

The Student Prince was set in Heidelberg in 1830 and tells the story of Prince Karl Franz, who falls in love with Kathie, a barmaid, while attending the University of Heidelberg.

But perhaps the most interesting part of the show for an American audience in 1926 was the drinking.

One of the show's most famous songs was “Drinking Song,” with its rousing chorus of “Drink! Drink! Drink!”

There was just one little problem.

America was in the middle of Prohibition.

Charlie Chaplin Murad Ad

So while the characters on stage were enthusiastically celebrating German student life with beer, many of the people watching them couldn't legally buy a beer of their own.

The irony apparently didn't hurt the show's popularity. Quite the opposite. The Student Prince became one of the longest-running Broadway musicals of the 1920s.

There must have been something that spoke to a Prohibition-era audience about that: Americans sitting in a theater watching actors sing about drinking beer while the real stuff was illegal outside.

Short-Lived Broadway Career

Today, except for the most famous Broadway actors, many have short careers. Broadway is incredibly competitive and only a small number of shows open each season. 

This was true in the 1920's and after a few years Elliott Stewart returned to Utica, NY. 

Elliott Steward Continued Performing 

After returned to Utica, he joined a quartette when he performed around the state and even won several awards. Eventually took a leadership role at a local radio station.

But Elliott didn't entirely leave singing and his love of performing behind.

He eventually sang at my wife's parents' wedding.

I love that part of the story.

At one point, Elliott Stewart was performing on a Broadway stage in New York. A few years later, he was back home in Utica. And eventually, he was singing at a family wedding.

Our Family Loves Broadway

Maybe that's why finding this particular piece of family history was especially meaningful to me.

While we had attended some touring shows in Boston and Fort Lauderdale, we saw our first Broadway shows as a family in 2016, when we saw Mamma Mia! and Aladdin, which had just opened on Broadway.

That began our love of Broadway, and I've lost count of how many shows we have seen since then, including Hamilton, Dear Evan Hansen, Wicked, Hadestown, Mean Girls, Beetlejuice, and more than a dozen others.

So discovering that Broadway was already part of my wife's family history almost 100 years before we started seeing shows together was pretty special.

Apparently, the love of live theater goes back a little further in the family than we realized.