James William Wallack (c. 1794-1864), Anglo-American actor and manager, was born in London, his parents being actors.
He made his first stage appearance at Drury Lane in 1807. After three years in Dublin he was again at Drury Lane until he went to America in 1818. He settled in New York permanently in 1852, the first Wallack's theatre being an old one renamed at the corner of Broome Street and Broadway. The second, at 13th Street and Broadway, he built himself.
Wallack was an actor of the old school. Thackeray praises his Shylock, Joseph Jefferson his Don Caesar de Bazan. He married the daughter (d. 1851) of John Henry Johnstone (1749-1828), a popular tenor and stage Irishman. Their son, John Lester Wallack was also a famous actor.
This entry was originally from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
