Stars of the Early San Francisco Stage

The great California Gold Rush transformed San Francisco from a sleepy village into a vibrant metropolis in a matter of months, changing the city from cultural backwater to entertainment mecca. The 75,000 men who made their way to the raw, muddy town in 1849 were mostly young and footloose, with scant family responsibilities, few religious or social inhibitions, gold in their pockets, and a raging appetite for all forms of stimulation, intoxication, and diversion. They wanted to spend their time and their gold dust on the loftiest and the lowest amusements.

San Francisco's mix of Harvard graduates, farm boys, European miners, entrepreneurs, sophisticates, and ruffians constituted an enthusiastic audience for live entertainment. Early San Franciscans had an insatiable appetite for the stage and all of its pursuits, whether high tragedy, low comedy, grand opera, minstrelsy, burlesque, concerts, popular songs, dance, or circus.

Chinese Opera in San Francisco

During the California Gold Rush, Chinese immigrants were not allowed to attend whites-only performance houses. This prompted them to carry on their own theatrical traditions by importing touring groups. The 123-member Tung Hook Tong Company performed the first Chinese Opera in 1852 at the American Theater. Men played both the male and female roles, and featured a traditional sampling of historical music and drama. While the traditions of Chinese theater were originally criticized and ridiculed by the press, the genre expanded during the late 19th century. Popularity grew for Chinese opera by westernizing some of the techniques, such as providing translated synopses of the scores, cutting out culturally objectionable scenes, and by introducing the final bow to performing groups.

The first permanent Chinese theater, the Hing Chuen Yuen Theater (translated as "Prosperous Complete Origin"), was opened on Jackson Street in 1868. It quickly became a center for cultural life to Chinese-Americans, as well as a popular tourist attraction.

Edwin Booth (1833-1893)

Known as "The Prince of Players," Edwin Booth was the most famous Shakespearean actor of his time. He began his career in 1852 when he arrived in San Francisco with his actor father, Junius Brutus Booth, Sr. and brother, Junius Brutus, Jr. His career started with humble beginnings as a performer in vaudeville houses and minstrel shows, and he honed his acting craft in the mining camps of California's Gold Rush. Booth left San Francisco in 1856 to pursue a career in the east and returned a famous actor. Edwin Booth was the brother of John Wilkes Booth, also a notable actor, but notorious as the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln.

Lola Montez (1818-1861)

Flamboyant dancer and personality Lola Montez shocked Gold Rush San Franciscans with her famous "Spider Dance." The dance was set to the music of a tarantella, and was meant to represent a young woman being attacked by spiders and her effort to chase them off.

First appearing in San Francisco in May 1853, her liaisons with Franz Liszt and King Ludwig I of Bavaria were well known. Montez lived for a time in California's Grass Valley, where she pursued a quieter life surrounded by her animals. This is where she discovered and took under her tutelage a young neighbor named Lotta Crabtree.

Lotta Crabtree (1847-1924)

A true child of the Gold Rush, Lotta Crabtree was raised in California's gold country and performed in San Francisco's vaudeville houses. She became the most popular comedienne of her era and the highest paid performer on the Broadway stage. Lotta's Fountain, an ornate drinking fountain which miraculously survived the Great Earthquake and Fire of 1906, still stands at Market near Kearny Streets in San Francisco: her gift to the city she always loved and returned to frequently.

The Martinetti Troupe

The Martinettis were San Francisco's first premier ballet and pantomime troupe, performing dance fairy tales in the 1850s and 1860s. Their repertoire included "La Sylphide," but favored such lighthearted and acrobatic tales as "The Green Monster," "The Magic Trumpet," and "The Red Gnome." One of the first dance companies to tour the continent, they were perhaps the only one to do so by covered wagon, touring the West in nine covered wagons and carrying a 100-seat tent.

The Sells Brothers’ Circus (1872-1896)

The circus was perhaps the first genre to have broad appeal across the city's many social, economic, and age ranges. Founded in Columbus, Ohio as a wagon show catering to mid-western farms, the Sells Brothers' Circus became a nationally touring railroad show and grew to a 45-car, 4-ring circus. Many unusual acts were featured, including "Six Performing Colorado Cattle" and the famous clown Billy Burke, father of actress Billie Burke. In April of 1889, the Sells Brothers' Circus was appearing in San Francisco's Central Park, with the obligatory circus parade at noon on the 26th. In 1896 the Sells venture was renamed the Forespaugh-Sells Circus, and two of the Sells brothers, along with James A. Bailey and W.W. Cole, continued the show.

H.M.S. Pinafore

Perhaps the most popular of Gilbert & Sullivan's works, H.M.S. Pinafore was first seen in San Francisco on July 3, 1879 when it opened the new Tivoli Opera House and played to full houses for 63 consecutive nights. For the next twenty-five years, the Tivoli stock company presented opera twelve months of the year, presenting more than 4,000 performances and closing its doors only forty nights during its history - a record in American music annals.

Callendar’s Minstrels

In the 1850s San Francisco went minstrel-crazy, and fans welcomed dozens of visiting performance troupes. The first African-American minstrel company to perform in San Francisco is thought to be the New York-based Callender Company, which made its first local appearance in 1882, returning regularly for several years. They performed in several theaters here, including a successful Uncle Tom's Cabin at the Grand Opera House in 1883.

Bert Williams (1876 - 1922) and George Walker (1873 - 1909)

Bert Williams began his career in San Francisco when he met George Walker while they were working with the Martin & Selig Mastodon Minstrels in 1895. Along with Ada Overton (Walker's wife), they appeared in Bandana Land in 1907. This was the last show for the duo as Walker died soon after. Williams later appeared in eight editions of the Ziegfeld Follies starting in 1910.

A gifted singer, dancer, composer, comic, and entertainer, Williams was also a courageous pioneer. He was the first black performer to be featured in a white company, the first to become a Broadway star, and the first person to organize a professional union for black performers. His talent reigned supreme until 1922, when he collapsed on stage - one of the most gifted entertainers of his time.

Isadora Duncan (1877 - 1927)

Considered the "Mother of Modern Dance," native San Franciscan Isadora Duncan rebelled against the conventions of ballet. Duncan wished to emphasize the dancer as an individual rather than as one personifying a character, and encouraged the notion of a dancer as a solid body rather than as an intangible entity. She earned her reputation in Europe before her innovative dance style received acclaim in the United States.

Duncan was a legendary individual whose free lifestyle, scandals, and tragedies sometimes overshadowed her talent. She rebelled against the tight restrictions placed on women during the Victorian era and renounced materialism. Her tragic, bizarre death was widely publicized: a long scarf she was wearing became entangled in the wheels of the open sports car in which she was riding and strangled her.

Luisa Tetrazzini (1871 - 1940)

San Francisco's Tivoli Opera House was the site of this famed Italian soprano's American debut in 1905. After nearly fifteen years of appearances in Italy and South America, Tetrazzini was "suddenly" a major success after her San Francisco debut. During one of her triumphant appearances on Christmas Eve in 1910, an estimated 250,000 people gathered at Lotta's Fountain for a free concert where audience members joined her in a chorus of "Auld Lang Syne." She returned to San Francisco again in 1913 to inaugurate the new Tivoli Opera House, which was rebuilt after being destroyed by the 1906 earthquake.

Maude Adams (1872 - 1953)

Known for her portrayal of "Peter Pan" in the play written expressly for her by James M. Barrie (1905), Maude Adams was one of the country's most beloved actresses. For many years she was one of the theaters' greatest box office attractions. Offstage, Adams was known for her generosity, character, and desire for privacy. At age five she played her first speaking part at the old Bush Theater in San Francisco. Performing in other local theaters, her experience led her eventually to New York. For five years she played opposite John Drew before becoming a star in The Little Minister.

Sarah Bernhardt (1845 - 1923)

This world-renowned French actress, known as "The Divine Sarah," was one of the greatest dramatic actresses of the 19th century. She came to San Francisco soon after the Great Earthquake of 1906 to perform at Berkeley's Greek Theater as a benefit for the stricken city in which she had triumphed in earlier visits. A generous and kind individual, she donated 10% of her earnings to victims of the earthquake. Bernhardt was an inveterate trouper, performing anywhere and everywhere - in tents, tabernacles, skating rinks, and even making a stop at San Quentin. Mark Twain reportedly claimed that there are five kinds of actresses - "bad actresses, fair actresses, good actresses, great actresses, and Sarah Bernhardt."

Mei Lan-Fang (1894 - 1961)

An extraordinary actor, Mei Lan-Fang was acclaimed for his portrayal of female roles in Chinese Opera. In 1930 he conducted his first American tour, performing in San Francisco, where Chinese Opera was first presented in the U.S. in 1852. He offered a program of Chinese drama "Especially Prepared for American Reception," and included his most famous dance, "The Heavenly Maiden Scattering Flowers." Beloved by his fans and respected by his colleagues, he was also a noted painter and playwright.

Lew Christensen (1909 - 1984)

Considered the first great American male ballet dancer, Lew Christensen (along with his brothers Willam and Harold) was brought up performing in vaudeville, the only outlet for dance as an art form in the early 1920s. Christensen later went on to study with the great George Balanchine in New York. His performing career was cut short by service in World War II, but upon returning to civilian life, he was appointed ballet master of the newly formed New York City Ballet.

In 1952, Christensen moved to San Francisco to take over the San Francisco Ballet, the country's oldest ballet company. As a dancer, director, and choreographer, Lew Christensen was associated with the San Francisco Ballet for more than 47 years. It is undeniable that dance in the western United States would not be what is it today without the extraordinary contributions and talents of Lew and his brothers.

The exhibition is supported in part by a grant from Grants for the Arts.