Ira Mallory Remsen (May 11, 1876 – November 29, 1928), known locally as Rem Remsen, was an American painter, playwright and Bohemian Club member. He was the son of Dr. Ira Remsen chemist and former president of Johns Hopkins University. Remsen was the author of children's plays notably Inchling and Mr. Blunt, he produced at the Forest Theater in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California in the 1920s. His studio on Dolores Street became the permanent home for the Carmel Art Association in 1933.
Early life
Remsen was born on May 11, 1876, in Manhattan, New York City, New York. His father was Ira Remsen (1846-1927), and his mother was Elisabeth Hilleard Mallory (1854-). He was raised and educated in Baltimore, Maryland. At the age of 20, he went to Johns Hopkins University in 1895 and was in the class of Ninety-Seven.
In September 1898, he traveled to Paris, France. He studied art with Jean-Joseph Benjamin-Constant at the Académie Julian where he won an award for his paintings. He mastered portrait painting under Jacques Blanche and trained with painter Jean-Paul Laurens at the École des Beaux-Arts. He became a member of the American Art Association in Paris where he exhibited his portraits.
Professional background
In June 1900, on Remsen returned to his family home in Baltimore. He painted along the Atlantic seaboard and established an art studio at 80 Washington Square, New York City. He married Mary Hall Putnam (1878-1905), prominent in New York society, on May 24, 1902, in Manhattan, New York City. They were divorced on April 1, 1910, on the allegation of "failure to provide and willful neglect". Remsen became familiar with stagecraft by working with the Provincetown Players in New York.
While living in Greenwich Village, New York, Remsen stunted a fake marriage to Marie Centlivre, born of French parents in Indiana, on April 27, 1917. Centlivre was an actress in New York where they produced the play The Man Who Married an Ostrich.
In 1918, he left New York and resigned from the Mural Painters Association, and move to Long Beach, California, where he settled on East Seaside Avenue. Although his ill health disqualified him from active military service, he found a way to contribute to his country by being assigned to the Los Angeles shipyard. In this capacity, he employed his artistic talents to design camouflage for U.S. Government war vessels.
During his two years stay in Long Beach, he wrote The Water Lily, a poetic play in four acts on the life Hokusai, one of the master artists of Japan. He worked with M. A. Morrison editor of the Long Beach Press, in writing a series of one-act plays. He sketched and wrote at Signal Hill, located high on a hill.
In 1920, he then moved to Santa Monica to continue his art and playwright work, identifying himself as a "writer, at home." For a period, he served as the technical director at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara, bringing his artistic expertise to the world of theater.
Carmel-by-the-Sea
In 1921, Remsen moved into a campsite at the tree-bound Forest Theater in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California. In May 1922, he held sketching and exhibition studios at the nearby Carmel Highlands.
He married his second wife, Helen "Yodee" Armstrong Yoder on September 25, 1922 in Topeka, Kansas. She was a movie actress and society editor of the Topeka newspaper. She had a supporting role in the 1919 silent movie A Midnight Romance starring Anita Stewart. They moved into a cottage in downtown Carmel-by-the-Sea. She later became a sales representative for the Carmel Land Company.
Inchling
Remsen wrote a three-act children's fantasy play called Inchling, that was a story of an inch worm and its struggle for wings, which captured the fantasies of young children. It was directed by Blanche Tolmie at the Forest Theater and played from August 19 through 20, 1922. Walter Flanders played the character Inchling. Composer Thomas Vincent Cator wrote the composition operetta for the play. Remsen designed the Inchling sets, the costumes and the lights. He loved working with the children and they loved him.
Carmel's master builder M. J. Murphy's daughters Kathleen and Rosalie had parts in the play along with other Carmel children.
On August 3, 1928, Remsen's play Inchling was presented at the Forest Theater for the second time under the direction of Garnet Holm. The play was rejected by New York producers after Remsen submitted the play for a theatrical release. The rejection threw him into a depression. He talked about George Sterling's death as a "glorious finish".