US Theatre


When Change ran out of steam in the U.S.A. and the company sailed home, Gareth stayed. He wasted no time in carving out a career for himself – working with Guy Bates Post, James O’Neill and The Irish Theatre of America. Within 18 months he became the sensation of Broadway in a brief but emotional role (right) in "Moloch", a war play, at New York's New Amsterdam Theatre.

There followed a string of roles playing opposite many of Broadway's top stars: Elsie Ferguson, Walter Hampden, Irene Fenwick, Norman Trevor and Holbrook Blinn. In 1916 he was the first professional, male actor to portray Ariel in a Shakespearean Masque, played before many thousands of New Yorkers. His co-stars were Howard Kyle and Edith Wynne Matthison (pictured with Gareth below) - with special appearances by Isadora Duncan and Herbert Beerbohm Tree, his idol.

He was hailed as "America's foremost young actor" and had the world at his feet. His status in the theatre, inevitably, led to film offers and he began his silent-film career late in 1915. The lure of the West Coast was becoming harder to resist and, in 1919, after making several films on the East Coast he moved to Hollywood.

"Gareth"

“With Elsie Ferguson in “Margaret Schiller”
“With Elsie Ferguson in “Margaret Schiller”

"Gareth with Isadora Duncan & Herbert Beerbohm Tree, in "Ariel" - 1916

 

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