Olive Blakeney

Olive Blakeney was an American actress whose work spanned stage, film, and television, beginning in regional stock theater. Born in Kentucky in 1894, she trained in Cincinnati at the School of Expression and the Schuster-Martin School and made her stage debut at the Empire Theater in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, in 1912. She later performed with the Lucille La Verne stock company and partnered with William Gaxton in vaudeville before acting in England, where she took part in introducing the play Broadway to British audiences. On Broadway she appeared in The Royal Family and in The Browning Version / Harlequinade. She entered films in England in 1932 and became known for playing Mrs. Alice Aldrich, Henry Aldrich's mother, in eight films of the Aldrich Family series. On television she took the role of housekeeper in Dr. Hudson's Secret Journal and had guest parts on Mr. Adams and Eve and Colgate Theatre.