Ena Bertoldi
Ena Bertoldi was an English contortionist who was the subject of one of the first kinetoscope films.
Career
She was born Beatrice Mary Claxton to performer and agent Thomas Claxton Gregory, and began performing in circuses at the age of eight. In 1891, she travelled to America and performed with the Howard Athenaeum Specialty Co. In 1894, she performed at Koster & Bial's theatre and at the Union Square theatre as part of the B.F. Keith circuit.Along with many of the circus and vaudeville acts at Koster & Bial's, she went to New Jersey to make films for the Thomas Edison Kinetoscope system at the Black Maria studio. Her films, filmed in the spring of 1894 and released that year, were Bertoldi and Bertoldi. The films were shown at the Holland Brothers parlour, where patrons paid twenty-five cents to watch a twenty- to thirty-second film through a slot in a wooden box.
In 1898 – 9, she carried out a twelve-month contract for G.A. Payne for £1300, earning her the nickname 'Queen of Contortionists' by the Royal Magazine. She claimed to be able to carry out her feats 'without feeling.'