Barrymore and Bristol
To our artist community:
Thank you for considering an entry to our “Barrymore and Bristol” art exhibit. As you know, our theme is meant to represent a vision of Ethel Barrymore and her daughter Ethel Barrymore Colt Miglietta’s connection to our town, its history, and its places.
The Call for Art is posted here. This information is meant to serve as a starting point of inspiration. We’ve placed some photos below for you to view – and there is a wonderful 5 minute video on YouTube that is a treasure trove of photos of Ms. Barrymore over the years
Here are some vignettes to think about.
1910: Ms. Barrymore (Mrs. Russell Colt) stayed at Linden Place and enjoyed our 4th of July parade that year, and the 100th Anniversary celebration of the construction of Linden Place. Can you envision what those events might have looked like? How would one capture the civic pride, the excitement, the historic significance of these events?
1911: Ms. Barrymore – Mrs. Colt – attended a celebratory bridal luncheon to honor Miss Primrose Colt, daughter of Senator Lebaron Colt. Brother of Samuel Pomeroy Colt, he served for many years as a judge and then as the United States Senator for Rhode Island. What would that event at Linden Place looked like? The decorations were pink roses and lily of the valley. The dresses? The table setting? The elegance? The exhibit will also highlight the movement from the Gilded Age to the Progressive Era of our American history in two ways, exemplified by Mrs. Edith (JouJou) Colt, a leading suffragette of the day promoting women’s equality; and Ethel Barrymore Colt backing worker’s rights with her support of stage actors during the Actors Equity Strike in NYC in 1919.
1916: Bristol's Pastime Theatre was exuberant in its promotion of Ms. Barrymore and her leading role in the silent film “The Awakening of Helena Richie.” Residents turned out in droves to see the movie. How would you envision that excitement? The Pastime was an iconic landmark in Bristol, now gone. What does that loss, that nostalgia, feel like?
1919: Ms. Barrymore attended a clambake for 100 people at Samuel Pomeroy Colt’s gentleman’s farm, now Colt State Park. Guests were entertained with a live band on the sweeping lawn overlooking the bay. How would that party have looked? The fashion? The glamor? The children on the lawn playing games? Samuel Pomeroy Colt as the iconic host?
1929: Ms. Barrymore spent a week at Linden Place in need of full rest and relaxation between movies. Her son Sam Jr. came up to visit from Brown University, where he was a student. Can you capture that mother-son reunion – perhaps in the gardens of Linden Place?
1940: Ms. Barrymore made her last visit to Bristol – to attend the funeral of Colonel Merton Cheesman at St. Michaels Church. Divorced from her husband for almost 20 years at this point, she still came back to pay her respects to Colonel Colt’s longtime personal secretary. Was she also thinking back on the ‘death’ of her marriage in 1921, the death of Samuel Pomeroy Colt earlier that same year, her own mortality?
1930 - 1977: Ethel Barrymore Colt Miglietta, born in 1912, became the 9th generation in the Barrymore acting family. Over her career, she sang in over 100 concerts in the United States Canada and South America and appeared in both Broadway and television productions. In the early 1930s she spent five years not only as an actor with the Jitney Players, but also as their business manager. Her operatic debut came in 1941 as Micaela in "Carmen." From the 1950s into the 1970s she produced one-woman shows in which she acted and sang. In an interview in 1975 she talked about her "lifelong love affair with the stage." As an activist and patron of the arts, she helped organize and establish the Bristol Arts Museum in Bristol in the 1960s. Married in 1944, her family was the last to live in Linden Place. She died in 1977, and her funeral Mass was at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church in Bristol. She is buried in the Juniper Hill Cemetery. The grand piano in the Linden Place parlor belonged to Ethel, and represents her passions - both as a singer and a teacher.
Inspiration Images
