18 Facts About Ben Greet

Sir Philip Barling Greet, known professionally as Ben Greet, was a British Shakespearean actor, director, impresario and actor-manager.

Ben Greet was the youngest of five sisters and two brothers.

Ben Greet was educated at the Royal Naval School, New Cross.

Ben Greet's parents planned to for him to be a naval officer or a clergyman, but instead he became a schoolmaster at a private school at Worthing.

Ben Greet's brother, William Greet, was a theatre manager while his other brother Thomas was the only sibling to go on to have a career in the Royal Navy.

Ben Greet would visit the Greenwich and Woolwich theatres frequently to watch the exciting productions of Victorian melodrama, Shakespearean plays, farces and pantomimes.

Ben Greet was exposed to many dramas as a child, and he performed in plays at school.

Yet, Ben Greet did not perform on the professional stage until four years after his father's death in 1879.

Ben Greet performed in an Irish melodrama and within the next day, he was assigned to play over twenty Shakespearean parts for an additional season.

Ben Greet played, as 'Caius Lucius' in the show, and it was this role that claimed to be Greet's first real debut in 1883.

Later that year, Ben Greet became a member of Minnie Palmer's Company at the Grand Theatre in Islington, where he played 'Dudley Harcourt' in My Sweetheart.

From 1884 to 1897, Ben Greet played numerous roles with many different companies and theatres.

In May 1914, the "Ben Greet Players" presented two Shakespearean plays on the campus of the College of Industrial Arts, a women's college in Denton, Texas.

The "Ben Greet Players" is a traveling company that goes to the various colleges and universities of the country to play.

Ben Greet returned to England in 1903 for a short time and managed more tours before beginning another American tour in 1904.

Ben Greet was thus able to share Shakespeare's works with over a million children.

Ben Greet was knighted in 1929 by King George V for his works involving the Old Vic theatre and his overall devotion to Shakespeare.

Ben Greet is commemorated by a blue plaque on the facade of 160 Lambeth Road, London, where he lived from 1920 until his death in 1936.