Mabel Brownell (December 19, 1883 — January 23, 1972) was an American stage actress and director, active on Broadway in the 1920s.
Early life Mabel Brownell was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1883 (one source gives 1888).Harry Prescott Hanaford and Dixie Hines, Who's Who in Music and Drama (1914): 54."Mabel Brownell as Ruth Jordan in 'The Great Divide'" Rock Island Argus and Daily Union (February 13, 1909): 7. via Newspapers.com She graduated from Hughes High School in 1902.Annual Report of the Public Schools of Cincinnati (1902): 152. She also studied music and elocution."Cincinnati" The Musical Courier 44(June 18, 1902): 23.
Career Mabel Brownell made her debut in 1903,"Steadily Rises as Actress" Democrat and Chronicle (November 26, 1916): 25. via Newspapers.com when she also made her first visit to the American West, in Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush by Ian Maclaren."At the Theatres" Oregon Daily Journal (December 24, 1903): 7. via Newspapers.com Brownell appeared in a lead role in a revival of Ben-Hur on Broadway in 1907."The Theaters" Los Angeles Herald (August 27, 1908): 2. She was also lead actress of the Mabel Brownell-Clifford Stork Company, a theatre company based in Newark, New Jersey."Newark Co. Reorganized" Variety 33(3)(December 19, 1913): 14. In 1909 she starred in William Vaughn Moody's The Great Divide in London."Current Stage Talk, Here and Elsewhere" Des Moines Register (March 7, 1909): 38. via Newspapers.com She acted into the 1920s, often outside of New York City."Mabel Brownell in 'Eyes of Youth' Which Opens at the Orpheum Tonight" Harrisburg Telegraph (September 25, 1918): 10. via Newspapers.com"Premiere is Success" The Cincinnati Enquirer (September 14, 1921): 15. via Newspapers.com"Mabel Brownell Enjoys Her Role" Middlesboro Daily News (September 26, 1924): 4. via Newspapers.com
She was known to do extensive research into her roles. In 1917 she spent six weeks living in a boarding house in McKeesport, Pennsylvania to play a laborer's wife in a steel town in Eugene Walter's Just a Woman."Goes to Mills to Get Atmosphere for Role" St. Louis Star and Times (January 11, 1917): 9. via Newspapers.com
In 1927, she directed Immoral Isabella; the following year, she directed two plays on Broadway: Mrs. Dane's Defense and Within the Law, both featuring a similar cast, with Violet Heming, Stanley Logan, Robert Warwick, and Julia Hoyt among the actors appearing in both. As a star of the stage version of Ben-Hur in 1907, she was invited to the premiere of the film version in 1959.Howard Thompson, "'07 Esther Glows at 'Ben-Hur' Film" New York Times (November 21, 1959): 26.
Personal life Mabel Brownell was married to businessman Louis Vincent Aronson in 1935, as his second wife."Mabel Brownell a Bride" New York Times (September 14, 1935): 8. She was widowed in 1940,"Louis V. Aronson, Inventor, 69, Dies" New York Times (November 3, 1940): 59. and she died in 1972, aged 88 years, in New York City."Mrs. Louis Aronson is Dead; Widow of Ronson's Founder" New York Times (January 24, 1972).
References
External links Mabel Brownell's listing on IBDB An undated portrait of Mabel Brownell in the Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library Digital Collections.