Comédie-Française

“ The traditions of the Comédie Française—that is the sovereign word, and that is the charm of the place—the charm that one never ceases to feel, however often one may sit beneath the classic, dusky dome. ”

“ Clever men, distinguished men, and even men of exalted station formed a perpetual and brilliant court round the fascinating young actress of the Comédie Française, and she glided through republican, revolutionary, bloodthirsty Paris like a shining comet with a trail behind her of all that was most distinguished, most interesting, in intellectual Europe. ”

“ When the time for the performance drew near, the scene almost baffled description. All the approaches to the Comédie-Française were so blocked with people that the actors themselves could with difficulty persuade their excited patrons to make way for them. An enormous crowd surged round the theatre, forced the doors, and struggled and fought for the best places in the pit. ”

“ LET us now return to the Palais Royal, and to the theatre which adjoins it. The Comédie Française, or Théâtre Français, as it is also called, was never, as the first of these names might suggest, devoted exclusively to comedy. The word “comedy” was used in France in the early days of its stage to denote any kind of theatrical entertainment. The famous “Ballet Comique de la Reine,” produced towards the end of the 16th century, was, in fact, a dramatic entertainment with singing and dancing, strongly resembling what would now be called an opera ”

“ The handsome, delicate, aristocratic-looking gentleman who joins the group is M. Perrin, the director of the Comédie Française, the most accomplished and intelligent theatrical manager in France. There is an elderly, reserved-looking gentleman beside him who looks like a solemn savant out on a holiday. It takes more than one glance for us to recognize in him the most accomplished light comedian of our day, that embodiment of grace, vivacity, sparkling wit and unfading youth, who is known to the boards of the Comédie Française by the name of Delaunay. ”

“ I am afraid I have nothing very lively in hand; but I take what comes uppermost. I am to dine tonight at Sir Frederick Pollock's, to meet one or two of the (more genteel) members of the Comédie Française, who are here just now, playing with immense success and supplying the London world with that invaluable boon, a topic. I mean the whole Comédie is here en masse for six weeks. I have been to see them two or three times and I find their artistic perfection gives one an immense lift out of British air. ”

“ There were three tolerably distinct kinds of dramatic work—tragedy, comedy, and opera—the latter either artificial or comic, and subdividing itself into a great many classes, from the dignified opera of the Comédie Française and the Comédie Italienne, down to the vaudevilles and operettas of the so-called 'fair' theatre, Théâtre de la Foire. Towards the middle of the century there grew up a fourth class, to which the not very appropriate and still less definite name of drame is applied. This was subdivided, also somewhat arbitrarily, into tragédie bourgeoise and comédie larmoyante. ”

“ VANHOVE. This king of the Théâtre Français neither has majesty nor nobleness of manner. His countenance is mean, and his make common. His monotonous and heavy utterance is sometimes intermingled with yelping sounds. He possesses no sensibility, and substitutes noise for expression. His mediocrity caused him to be received at the old Comédie Française; for the first or principal actors of that theatre were rather fond of receiving persons of weak talents, merely that they might be set off. He doubled BRIZARD, whom nature had endowed with the happiest gifts for tragedy. ”

“ The lounge of the Comédie-Française was, apparently, a wonderful place in those days—I only saw the remains of it.
After each great representation—and every time such actors as Talma, Raucourt, Contat, Monvel or Molé played was a great occasion—all the noted people in the artistic, diplomatic or aristocratic circles went to have a few minutes' chat in the box of the hero or of the heroine of the evening; then they returned to the lounge and joined the general company there. ”

“ Dumas asked himself. The Comédie Française, a State-endowed theatre, ruled by the Government and a committee of its actors, and bound by tradition to the classic school of Corneille and Racine, would not be likely to tolerate any suspicion of vulgarity, in the shape of plays cast in the mould of Shakespeare. But this very system of national control enables young writers to obtain, by right, at least a hearing. ”

“ When a temple appears, the spectators are seized with a holy respect, and if the goddess be at all pretty, they become at once half pagan. They are not so difficult here as they are at the Comédie Francaise. There the audience cannot indue a comedian with his part: at the Opera, they cannot separate the actor from his. They revolt against a reasonable illusion, and yield to others in proportion as they are absurd and clumsy. Or, perhaps, they find it easier to form an idea of gods than of heroes. ”

“ One effect of the Revolution was to deprive the Comédie Française of the privilege it had so long and so unjustly enjoyed of incorporating in its company any actor or actress whom it might choose to detach from some other troop, not only at Paris, but in any other part of France. It at the same time also lost its monopoly. A split having taken place in the company, a second Comédie Française was started in the Palais Royal with the celebrated Talma, and with Grandmesnil, Dugazon, and Mme. Vestris among its artists. ”

“ The hours go lightly to the accompaniment of music and laughter and the clink of coin, and when, after the dinner, the diners move on to the theatres, no serious drama is likely to claim them. Glitter, gaiety, and frivolity are the keynotes of this June day from start to finish, and the staid Comédie Française is left high and dry, while all the "tingle-tangles" are packed to suffocation. ”

“ It was a world new and strange to him, attractive, and as exciting as acid to this man, still young, whose success had been achieved by unstinted labors, and who knew Paris only by what he had learned of it years ago, when a law student: the pit of the Comédie Française, the Luxembourg galleries and those of the Louvre, the Public Libraries, the Hall of Archives, the balls in the Latin Quarter, the holidays and the foyer of the Opéra once or twice on the occasion of a masked ball. ”

“ Mlle. Contat’s jealousy, indeed, caused her to be anything{252} but beloved by her fair comrades at the Comédie-Française. Like Madame Saint-Huberty at the Opera, she could not endure a rival on the stage. She absolutely refused to be doubled, and, even when illness prevented her appearing, it was only with the greatest difficulty that she could be persuaded to allow any one to replace her. ”

“ Their visit to Nantes—the announcement proceeds—is preliminary to their visit to Paris, where they intend to throw down the glove to the actors of the Comédie Française, and to show the world how superior is the art of the improviser to that of the actor who depends upon an author for what he shall say, and who consequently says always the same thing every time that he plays in the same piece. ”

“ Of course the visitor in Paris misses a great deal that the true boulevardier enjoys through not knowing or understanding all that he sees. But, on the other hand, he has an advantage in being able to imagine that he is surrounded by all the famous journalists and poets and noted duellists; and every clerk with a portfolio becomes a Deputy, and every powdered and auburn-haired woman who passes in an open fiacre is a celebrated actress of the Comédie Française. ”

“ When Mademoiselle Augustine Brohan attacked the exiled poet in the press, Dumas wrote to the Comédie Française to demand that the actress who had insulted his friend should not be allowed to play in his comedies in the future. Hugo in writing to thank his comrade for his loyalty, added, "I feel I must write to tell you that I love you more every day, not only because you are one of the wonders of the century, but because you are one of its consolations." ”

“ The middle of the eighteenth century was the golden era of the Comédie-Française. What a galaxy of talent do we find there! Mesdemoiselles Clairon, Dumesnil, Gaussin, and Dangeville; Grandval, Molé, Lekain, Préville, and Brizard! Never before and never since have so many celebrated players appeared together upon one stage. And of this brilliant band, Mlle. Clairon was the ruler; ruling not so much by force of talent, for Mlle. Dumesnil had greater natural talent, nor by beauty, for Mlle. ”

“ CHAPTER XI EUGENIE GONTIER Few salons in Paris have so imposing an air as the foyer of the dramatic artists of the Comedie Francaise, a rectangular room of fine proportions, whose walls are adorned with portraits of great actors, representing the principal illustrations of the plays that have been the glory of the house Mademoiselle Duclos, by Largilliere ”

“ There are literary and artistic and academic salons in Paris, which are the most interesting places to the foreigner, which might be copied in every university town of America, to the infinite advantage of society. A fashionable young woman of Paris never misses these, or the lectures, or her Thursday at the Comédie Française where she hears the classic plays of Molière and even Shakspeare. It makes her a very agreeable talker, although her culture may not be very deep. ”

“ The cleverness of the plot, the character of the interpreter, the brightness of the dialogue, have caused the little farce to be retained in the repertory of the Comédie Française, where it is performed many times every year, with ever-increasing popularity.
Chanoine-Malherbe and Séraphine should speak good French, or at least some approximation which shall sound fluent and easy to the audience. Amateurs are urged not to over-act: this play is one which can easily be over-accentuated. ”

“ In Italy, Mlle. Raucourt remained several years, paying, however, occasional visits to Paris, when she appeared at the Comédie-Française, generally in the parts of mothers or queens, and always with great success. Madame Vigée Lebrun tells us that she remained to the last a great tragédienne, but that, with advancing years, her voice became so harsh that, when not looking at her, people might have imagined themselves listening to a man. ”

“ You must be in Paris by the afternoon of Sunday, the 15th; there you will find, at the box-office of the Comédie Francaise, a ticket for admission taken in your name and waiting you. You are requested to sit out the whole performance in the seat provided, and that is all."
"I should certainly have preferred a week-day, replied Francis. "But, after all, once in a way——"
"And in Paris, my dear sir," added the lawyer, soothingly. "I believe I am something of a precisian myself, but upon such a consideration, and in Paris, I should not hesitate an instant." ”

“ The popularity of the national theatre was just then much weakened by the rivalry of the Opera and the unlicensed playhouses of the fairs in the neighbourhood of Paris, and they feared that by tolerating such performances as the present one their receipts would be still further diminished. They accordingly sent a deputation to d'Argenson, begging him to uphold the exclusive privileges conferred upon the Comédie-Française at its foundation, and to nip the enterprise of their youthful competitors in the bud. ”

“ A Government stopping a play for literary reasons is a strange thing, but it is not, however, without foundation. You remember—if by chance it was worth your trouble to remember it—that, in 1829, at the period when the first works called romantic appeared upon the stage, about the time when the Comédie-Française received Marion Delorme, a petition signed by seven persons was presented to King Charles X. to demand that the Théâtre-Français be closed by the king, simply to the works of what was called the New School. ”

“ We have men of every trade here, and, among the rest, we have actors enough to stock the Comédie Française. If you remain long enough among us, you will see some of the best farces of the best time played uncommonly well by our fellow détenus. ”

“ His success was confirmed at the Gymnase when he returned to Paris in 1846, and he made his début at the Comédie Française as a full-fledged sociétaire in 1854. From playing the ardent young lover, he turned to leading rôles both in modern plays and in the classical répertoire. ”

“ Some one then asked Rossi what he thought of the Comédie Frarçaise.
"The Comédie Française," said Rossi, "like every school of acting that is founded on art, and not on Nature, is falling into decadence. It is ruled by tradition, not by the realities of life and passion. One incident that I beheld at a rehearsal at that theatre in 1855 revealed the usual process by which their great performers study their art. I was then fulfilling an [pg 644] engagement in Paris with Ristori, and, though only twenty-two years of age, I was her leading man and stage-manager as well. ”

“ Amedee has been working mostly upon his drama, for the Comedie-Francaise this summer, and it is nearly done; it is a modern drama in verse, entitled L’Atelier. The action is very simple, like that of a tragedy, but he believes it is sympathetic and touching, and it ends in a popular way. ”

“ Mars—the beautiful and successful Mars—who had reigned a queen for so long, and who still retained a great deal of the grace and beauty that enchanted the France of the latter end of the preceding century, and the pale dark-faced Jewess, with the eyes of flame, who was destined to take the sceptre that was dropping from the elder woman's grasp. The result of this audience was that Rachel obtained an engagement at the Comédie Française to play children's parts at a salary of eight hundred francs a year. ”