Adeline Hayden Coffin

Adeline Maria Elisabeth Hayden Coffin (née de Leuw; 20 June 1862[1] – 31 March 1939) was a German-born British actress.[2] In an advertisement for her professional availability in 1921 she described herself, or was described by her agent, as suitable for "Sympathetic Mothers, Grandes Dames, and Character Parts".[3]

Adeline Hayden Coffin
older white woman with bouffant gray hair, wearing pearls or beads.
Adeline Hayden Coffin from a 1922 publication.
Born20 June 1862
Gräfrath
Died31 March 1939
Kensington, London
Spouses

Life

Hayden Coffin was born in Gräfrath (Gut Grünewald, nowadays part of Solingen), North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, daughter of Friedrich-August de Leuw, a landscape painter, and Mary Francis Charrington.[4] She was the granddaughter of the oculist Friedrich-Hermann de Leuw.

Hayden Coffin was a pupil of the composer Alberto Randegger, and married him in 1884 in London.[4] She had worked as a pianist, and taught singing.[5] They were divorced in 1892.[6] Adeline had originally petitioned for a divorce on the grounds that Randegger was cruel to her and that he had been unfaithful.[6] The Solicitor general and the judge in the case found that there was no truth in this, but that in fact Adeline had left her husband and gone to live with the actor Charles Hayden Coffin, who had also been a pupil of Randegger.[6] The divorce was granted on the grounds of Adeline's adultery.[6] She married Hayden Coffin in the same year.[7] Adeline Hayden Coffin died in Kensington, London at age 76.[8]

As well as acting, she also translated a play, Lady Tetley's Divorce (later filmed in English as Lady Tetley's Decree), from English to German; it was produced at the Royalty Theatre in 1904.[9]

Critical response

The Kinematograph and Lantern Weekly wrote that in A Little Child Shall Lead Them, "Adeline Hayden-Coffin is responsible for a coldly perfect study of an ambitious mother".[10] In another article they called her "a Unique Personality" and said "Adeline Hayden-Coffin is much in demand with British film companies, owing to her unique gifts of characterisation. She is the grande dame par excellence of the British screen and in this respect occupies the same position with regard to the film that Rose Leclercq some years ago held in connection with the stage".[11] The writer said that Hayden Coffin could play both aristocratic and working-class characters.[11]

The Bioscope wrote that in Kissing Cup's Race (1920) Hayden Coffin was "excellent, as always, in the role of Constance's somewhat worldly mama".[12] In a review of the same film a couple of weeks later they said that "Adeline Hayden Coffin acts with her usual refinement and art, but has not much to act".[13] The same paper listed Hayden Coffin in 1924 as one of "several well-known players" appearing in The Flying Fifty-Five.[14]

In 1925, The Kinematograph Weekly, reviewing Afraid of Love, called her a "reliable player".[15] In 1928, the same paper, reviewing The Guns of Loos, said that "Adeline Hayden-Coffin, whose appearances on the British screen are all too infrequent, is the English mother - around whose daughter the story revolves".[16]

Activism

Hayden Coffin was on the committee of Our Dumb Friends League and promoted animal rights.[17][18]

Selected filmography

References
  1. Pastor Wiedenfeld, Dr., Johann Carl Wilhelm (1879). Church book 1861-1879. Graefrath Germany: Church of Graefrath. p. 9.
  2. "Adeline Hayden Coffin". Ftvdb.bfi.org.uk. 2 July 2015. Archived from the original on 3 September 2009. Retrieved 15 December 2015.
  3. "Professional Cards: Adeline Hayden-Coffin". The Bioscope. 21 July 1921. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  4. "Musical Notes". Liverpool Mercury. 12 June 1884. Retrieved 1 April 2021. Another distinguished composer and teacher, Mr. Alberto Randegger, has taken unto himself a wife, having been married in London on Whit Monday to Miss Adeline de Leuw, a pupil of his, and daughter of Frederick de Leuw, the painter. Musical Liverpool offers warm congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Randegger.
  5. "Social and Personal". Glasgow Evening Post. 19 January 1892. Retrieved 1 April 2021. She originally came out, we believe as a pianist, and she has also taught singing.
  6. "The Law Courts". London Evening Standard. 15 March 1892. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  7. "Answers to Correspondents". The Referee. 30 August 1908. Retrieved 1 April 2021. 1. Mr. Hayden Coffin plays under his own name. 2. He married Adeline de Leuw in 1892.
  8. "Briefly". London Daily News. 5 April 1939. Retrieved 1 April 2021. Theatre.— The death is announced of Mrs. Adeline Coffin, widow of Mr. Hayden Coffin, musical comedy star of a generation ago
  9. "Royalty Theatre". Westminster Gazette. 8 March 1904. Retrieved 1 April 2021. I have forgotten to mention that the Play is by Mr. and Mrs. W. F. Downing, and translated by Miss Adeline Hayden Coffin. No doubt we shall see it soon in English, when many things at present open to criticism may be explained and forgiven. But, yet again, they may not.
  10. "A Little Child Shall Lead Them". The Kinematograph and Lantern Weekly. 24 July 1919. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  11. "A Unique Personality". The Kinematograph and Lantern Weekly. 31 July 1919. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  12. "Kissing Cup's Race". The Bioscope. 27 January 1921. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  13. "Kissing Cup's Race". The Bioscope. 3 February 1921. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  14. "Mainly About Stars". The Bioscope. 31 July 1924. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  15. "Afraid of Love". The Kinematograph Weekly. 19 March 1925. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  16. "GUNS OF LOOS: NEXT WEEK'S SHOWING". The Kinematograph Weekly. 2 February 1928. Retrieved 1 April 2021.
  17. Hayden Coffin, Adeline (3 November 1906). "HORSE AMBULANCES". Western Daily Press. Retrieved 1 April 2021. I myself am a member of the executive committee of "Our Dumb Friends League," a society for the encouragement of kindness to animals, our head office of which is London: but we are establishing branch societies all over the country, and one of the principal ones is the horse ambulance for which a fund was first started in 1900, the object being to provide all Metropolitan boroughs and large towns with horse ambulances for the removal of injured animals from the streets.
  18. "PERFORMING ANIMALS IN COURT. CRUEL DISPLAY AT A KENSINGTON THEATRE". West London Observer. 27 August 1915. Retrieved 1 April 2021. the Court was filled with a number of interested ladies, including Mrs. Hayden Coffin, wife of the well-known singer ... Mrs. Adeline Hayden Coffin, 78, Bedford Gardens, Kensington, was also called, and stated that she witnessed the performance on August 11th at the Boudoir Theatre.
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