Allan Aynesworth

Edward Henry Abbot-Anderson (14 April 1864, Sandhurst, Berkshire – 22 August 1959, Camberley, Surrey), known professionally as Allan Aynesworth, was an English actor and producer.

Aynesworth generally appeared in drawing room comedy and contemporary high-society dramas, usually avoiding old classics and modern plays about social problems.

The Times said of this period in his life: After returning to England, Aynesworth resolved to pursue a theatrical career, and made his stage debut in April 1887 as an uncredited extra in The Red Lamp by Outram Tristram, produced by and starring Herbert Beerbohm Tree.

[5] before rejoining the company at the St James's the following month, under the management of John Hare and William Kendal; he played General de Pontac in a revival of The Ironmaster by Arthur Pinero.

[1] Later that year the Hare and Kendal management ended, and Barrington took over as lessee of the St James's; he cast Aynesworth as Lord Ashwell in The Dean's Daughter.

[7] After appearing at the Avenue, Globe, Criterion, Daly's and Garrick Theatres, during 1883–1884, Aynesworth joined George Alexander's company at the St James's, where he played Algernon Moncrieff in the first production of The Importance of Being Earnest.

He recalled that Wilde attended only one rehearsal, and then called the cast together and told them that he had just witnessed "a play that reminded him slightly of one that he'd written", but that the similarity ended there.

Looking back in the 1940s, Aynesworth told the journalist and biographer Hesketh Pearson, "In my fifty-three years of acting, I never remember a greater triumph than [that] first night.

[11] Later in 1895 Alexander led the St James's company on tour, and in September they played a command performance of the comedy-drama Liberty Hall for Queen Victoria at Balmoral Castle.

[1] During the rest of the decade Aynesworth appeared at seven London theatres, mostly in society dramas and drawing room comedies, but venturing into Ruritanian romance in an 1896 adaptation of The Prisoner of Zenda.