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Molly Adair

For the film character Molly Adair, see Hollywood Cavalcade.

Molly Adair
Born
Mary Marguerite Potter

24 March 1905
Brentford, West London, England
Died9 September 1990
Watford, Hertfordshire, England
Occupationactress
Years active1920-1923
SpouseArthur James Siggins
ChildrenJill Adams

Mary Marguerite Potter (24 March 1905 – 9 September 1990), known professionally as Molly Adair, was an English stage and silent screen actress.

Biography

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Adair was of Irish-American descent. She was born as Mary Marguerite Potter on 24 March 1905 in Brentford, West London, England.[1]

Adair worked as a stage and silent screen actress.[2] One of her earliest silent film roles was as the titular character in Stella (1921), directed by Edwin J. Collins and based on the 1904 novel Stella Fregelius by H. Rider Haggard.[3]

When she was 17, Adair travelled to the Union of South Africa, employed by African Film Productions Ltd., to star in two film adaptations of Henry de Vere Stacpoole works. These were The Blue Lagoon (1923) directed by Dick Cruikshanks and William Bowden, and The Reef of Stars (1923), directed by Joseph Albrecht.[4]

Adair was the mother of the actress, artist and model Jill Adams (1930–2008).[5] She met Jill's New Zealand-born father, Arthur James Siggins,[6] while she was filming The Blue Lagoon (1923) in Tanganyika, East Africa (now Tanzania).[5] After completion of The Reef of Stars, Adair abandoned her acting career to raise her family.[7] Siggins was a sergeant in the British South African Police (BSAP) in Rhodesia and later worked as an animal handler during silent film productions.[6] The family moved to Bryn-y-Maen, near Colwyn Bay in Wales during World War II.[5]

Adair died on 9 September 1990 in Watford, Hertfordshire, England, aged 85.[8]

Selected filmography

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Year Title Role Notes
1920 A Gamble in Lives Gladys Danvers
1921 Stella Stella Fregelius
The Beryl Coronet Mary Short film
The Puppet Man Jenny Rose
1922 The Exclusive Model The Girl
Sinister Street Sylvia Scarlett
Married to a Mormon
1923 The Blue Lagoon Emmeline [9]
The Reef of Stars Chaya/Princess Moya (Chaya's daughter) [4]

References

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  1. ^ "Jill Adams - The Private Life and Times of Jill Adams. Jill Adams Pictures". Glamour Girls of the Silver Screen. Retrieved 5 November 2020.
  2. ^ "Molly Adair". British Film Institute. Archived from the original on 5 September 2009. Retrieved 5 December 2016.
  3. ^ Low, Rachael (1948). The history of the British film. London : George Allen & Unwin LTD – via Internet Archive.
  4. ^ a b S.A. Pictorial: Stage and Cinema. Vol. 18. G.D. McCraw. 1924. p. 33.
  5. ^ a b c Gaughan, Gavin (10 August 2008). "Jill Adams". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 18 April 2025.
  6. ^ a b Robson, Nigel (8 April 2021). Our First Foreign War: The Impact of the South African War 1899–1902 on New Zealand. Massey University Press. ISBN 978-0-9951229-1-8.
  7. ^ Parsons, Neil (2018). Black and white bioscope: making movies in Africa, 1899 to 1925. Bristol, UK: Intellect. p. 206. ISBN 9781783209439.
  8. ^ "Silent screen actress Mollie Adair dies". The Toronto Star. 12 September 1990. p. 51.
  9. ^ "The blue lagoon (1923)". worldwideatminc.com. Retrieved 5 November 2020.
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