Part 15 (1/2)
”Qu'on parle bien ou mal du fameux marechal, Ma prose ni mes vers n'en diront jamais rien: Il m'a fait trop de bien pour en dire du mal; Il m'a fait de mal pour en dire du bien.”
The Marshal was dead, but his death could not undo the evil he had done.
Favart, who had loved his wife with all the strength of his nature, was generous enough to pardon a past in which circ.u.mstances had been so terribly against her. Instead of reproaching her, he preferred to forget, and in so doing acted wisely; for in Justine, as long as she lived, he found a devoted friend and a sure counsellor, on whose sympathy and advice he was always able to rely, and a companion whose irrepressible gaiety was proof against all the troubles and anxieties of both family and professional life. But his generosity went no further.
If friends.h.i.+p had survived Justine's last infidelity, love had not. ”Fly from love as from the greatest of all evils,” he wrote to his friend at Strasburg; and, incredible as it may appear, when, not long afterwards, Justine, piqued, we may presume, by her husband's indifference, formed a _liaison_ with the eccentric little Abbe de Voisenon, Favart's friend and reputed collaborator, the poet--this man whom we have seen prefer persecution, exile, and misery to dishonour--so far from endeavouring to put a stop to an affair which amounted to a serious scandal, appears to have regarded it with the utmost complacency.
The removal of their persecutor left the Favarts free to resume their respective professions, and, on May 3, 1751, Justine reappeared on the stage of the Comedie-Italienne, in a piece ent.i.tled _Les Amants inquiets_, of which her husband was the author. At the beginning of the following year, on the death of Riccoboni's wife, she was allotted a full part in the company, to which she remained a tower of strength for nearly twenty years; her talents as an actress and a singer being rivalled by those which she displayed as a dancer, ”turning the heads of the public and securing even the support of the women.” Her versatility seems to have been truly amazing. ”_Soubrettes_, heroines, country girls, simple parts, character parts, all became her,” says Favart in his _Memoires_; ”in a word, she multiplied herself indefinitely, and one was astonished to see her play the same day, in four different pieces, parts of the most opposite character.” Her powers of mimicry, too, particularly of the different dialects of France, have seldom been surpa.s.sed. Provincials whose accents she had borrowed could with difficulty be persuaded that she did not come from the same part of the country as themselves.
Possessed of exquisite taste in theatrical matters, Justine laboured strenuously for a reform in stage costume, and was ”not afraid to sacrifice the charms of her countenance to truthfulness of representation.” Before her time, actresses who played the parts of _soubrettes_ and peasant-girls wore immense _paniers_, with diamonds in their hair and long gloves reaching to the elbow. But when, in August 1753, she created the role of Bastienne in _Les Amours de Bastien et Bastienne_, a parody of Jean Jacques Rousseau's _Devin du village_, which she had composed herself in collaboration with Harny, she appeared on the stage wearing a simple woollen gown, with her hair flat on her head, a cross of gold on her neck, bare arms, and wooden shoes. The _sabots_ offended some critics in the pit, and murmurs of disapprobation were heard. The Abbe de Voisenon, however, saved the situation by a happy _mot_. ”_Messieurs_,” he cried, ”_ces sabots-la donneront des souliers aux comediens_.” The pit, appreciating the abbe's wit, broke into laughter and applause; the malcontents were silenced, and the piece had so great a vogue that the players grew tired of acting it long before the attendances showed any signs of diminis.h.i.+ng.[148]
Justine, indeed, neglected nothing to arrive at theatrical truth. In _Les Trois Sultanes_, the plot of which was derived, like several other of Favart's vaudevilles, from the _Contes moraux_ of Marmontel, she played the part of Roxelane in a dress ”made at Constantinople with the materials of the country.” This was the first occasion on which the costume of Turkish ladies had been seen upon the French stage, and though Favart himself declares that it was ”at once decent and voluptuous,” it was objected to; and when soon afterwards another play in which the action pa.s.sed in the Orient was represented before the Court, Justine's reforming zeal received an abrupt check by an order from the Gentlemen of the Chamber to confine herself to the ridiculous and fantastic costume established by custom.
_Les Trois Sultanes_, it may be mentioned, in spite of the unfavourable comments pa.s.sed upon Roxelane's attire, was extraordinarily successful; and the audience, we are a.s.sured, were transported with enthusiasm. A peasant in the pit, ”_rendu fou d'admiration_,” demanded of his neighbour the name of the author, and on being told that it was Favart, exclaimed: ”_Morbleu_! I would that I had that man here; I would embrace him until I had kissed the skin off his cheeks!”
Justine's pa.s.sion for local colour was again in evidence when the interlude called _Les Chinois_ was represented. ”She appeared, as did also the other actors, dressed exactly in the Chinese fas.h.i.+on. The dresses which she had procured had been made in China, while the designs for the scenery and properties had in like manner been made on the spot.”
Among other pieces in which Justine appeared with success may be mentioned _La Servante Maitresse_, _Ninette a la Cour_, _Annette et Lubin_, of which she herself was part author, _Les Moissonneurs_, and _La Fee Urgele_, ”in which,” says Voisenon, ”she played the part of the old woman in a manner impossible to imitate.” According to the same authority, Favart was largely indebted for the success of more than one of his productions to suggestions made by his wife, notably in _Ninette a la Cour_, in which, too, she was responsible for many of the airs.
It would perhaps have been better for Justine's professional reputation had circ.u.mstances compelled her to retire from the stage some time earlier than was the case. During her later years, the critics declared that her voice had become thin and disagreeable, and that her acting had lost the _navete_ which had been its princ.i.p.al charm. She had become, too, extremely stout, and Madame Necker, then Mlle. Churchod, writing, in 1764, to Madame de Brenles, mentions that she had seen her playing Annette, ”with a figure twelve feet broad and two high.”[149] The public were more indulgent than the critics; but on December 14, 1769, when she appeared in a vaudeville by her husband called _La Rosiere de Salency_, she was very coldly received. The poor actress, believing herself abandoned by the public whose idol she had so long been, and suffering already from the disease of which she eventually died, played from that time less frequently, and, at the end of the year 1771, ceased to appear altogether. On Twelfth-day she was compelled to take to her bed, and sent for the notaries to make her will. She lingered for four months, enduring terrible sufferings, during which she continued to occupy herself with the management of her household, while her gaiety and insouciance never failed her for a single moment. ”One day,” says Grimm, ”on recovering from a long swoon, she perceived, among those whom her danger had hurriedly a.s.sembled around her, one of her neighbours rather grotesquely attired, whereupon she began to smile and remarked that she believed she saw 'the clown of Death'; a characteristic _mot_ in the mouth of a dying girl of the theatre.”
Almost to the last Justine seems to have cherished a vague hope that she would ultimately recover, and, for a long time, refused to p.r.o.nounce the renunciation of her profession which the cure of her parish demanded, according to custom, before administering the last Sacraments. Nor was it until, through the influence of Voisenon, she had obtained a promise from the Gentlemen of the Chamber that her salary should be preserved to her, under the form of a pension, in case of retirement, that she yielded, and exclaimed, smiling: ”Oh! for the moment, I renounce it.”
She then received the Sacraments and, profiting by a short respite from pain, composed her own epitaph, which she set to music. She died on April 21, 1772, at four o'clock in the morning, in her forty-sixth year, and was buried the same day in the church of Saint-Eustache.
Favart survived his talented wife just twenty years, and died in May 1792. Towards the end of his life, he became almost blind, notwithstanding which he continued to work for the theatre, besides keeping up an active correspondence with the Italian dramatist Goldoni, who came to Paris to visit him in 1791. The most successful of his later pieces was _La Belle a.r.s.ene_, music by Monsigny, produced in 1775.
Of his children by Justine, the only one to call for notice here is his second son, Charles Nicolas Joseph Favart. Born in 1749, at the age of twenty-one he was admitted a _societaire_ of the Comedie-Francaise, where he remained for fifteen years. Though but a moderate actor, he was a successful dramatist; his best works were _Le Diable boiteux, ou la Chose impossible_ (1782); _Les Trois Folies_ (1786); _Le Mariage singulier_ (1787); and _La Vieillesse d'Annette et Lubin_ (1791), the last in collaboration with his father. His son, Antoine Pierre Charles Favart (1780-1867), entered the Diplomatic Service, where he gained some little distinction. He a.s.sisted Dumolard in editing the _Memoires_ of his grandfather, collaborated in a couple of plays, and was an amateur painter of some talent.
VI
MADEMOISELLE CLAIRON
For more than seven years after the death of Adrienne Lecouvreur, her place as a tragic actress remained unfilled. During these years, several capable _tragediennes_ appeared, notably Jeanne Gaussin, a beautiful brunette with a rich and sympathetic voice, who created the part of Zare in Voltaire's tragedy of that name (August 13, 1732), and moved the delighted poet to address her in the following verses:--
”Jeanne Gaussin, recois mon tendre hommage; Recois mes vers au theatre applaudis; Protege-les: _Zare_ est ton ouvrage; Il est a toi, puisque tu l'embellis.
Ce sont tes yeux, ces yeux, si pleins de charmes, Qui du critique ont fait tomber les armes.”[150]
But beautiful as Mlle. Gaussin undoubtedly was, and excellent as was her acting in Zare and other pathetic parts, she fell very far short of the standard to which her gifted predecessor had attained; nor was it until August 1737 that an actress worthy to a.s.sume the mantle of Adrienne arose.
This was Marie Francoise Dumesnil, who, like Adrienne, had begun her career at theatres in the East of France, and, like her, singularly enough, had received her invitation to Paris while playing at Strasburg.
Her style, which was marked by a high degree of truth to Nature, refinement, and technical skill, combined with a real enthusiasm for her art, excited general admiration, and her _debut_ was brilliantly successful. In the cla.s.sic repertoire her most celebrated roles were Cleopatre, Clytemnestre, and Phedre; while her most successful creation was Merope (February 20, 1743), when, according to Voltaire, she kept the audience in tears for three successive acts.[151]
After this triumph--the greatest of her career--it may well have been supposed that Mlle. Dumesnil was destined to maintain her supremacy for many years to come. Nevertheless, ere six months had pa.s.sed, she found her proud position challenged by a most formidable rival.
Claire Joseph Lerys--for that was the name of this rival, and of the greatest, or, at least, the most celebrated tragic actress of the eighteenth century, though she styled herself Claire _Josephe Hippolyte_ Lerys _de Latude-Clairon_, and is known to fame under the last of these names--was born at Conde, a little town of Hainaut, on January 25, 1723.
Her father was one Francois Joseph Desire Lerys, a sergeant in the Regiment de Mailly; her mother, a working-woman, Marie Claire Scanapiecq by name; and she was a natural child, a fact which she omits to mention in the French edition of her _Memoires_, though she is more candid in the German edition.[152]
The circ.u.mstances attending her birth, which she has herself recounted, were, it must be admitted, highly significant of her future career:--
”It was the custom of the little town in which I was born for all persons to a.s.semble during the carnival time at the houses of the wealthiest citizens, in order to pa.s.s the entire day in dancing and other amus.e.m.e.nts. Far from disapproving of these recreations, the cure partook of them and travestied himself with the rest. During one of the fete days, my mother, who was but seven months advanced in pregnancy, suddenly brought me into the world, between two and three o'clock in the afternoon. I was so feeble that every one imagined a few moments would terminate my career. My grandmother, a woman of eminent piety, was anxious that I should be carried out at once to the church, in order that I might there receive the rite of baptism. Not a living soul was to be discovered either at the church or at the cure's house. A neighbour having informed the party that all the town was at a carnival entertainment at the house of a certain wealthy citizen, thither was I carried with all expedition. Monsieur le Cure, attired as Arlequin, and his vicar, disguised as Gille, imagining, from my appearance, that there was not a moment to be lost, hurriedly arranged upon a sideboard everything necessary for the ceremony, stopped the fiddle for a moment, muttered over me the consecrated words, and sent me back to my mother a Christian--at least in name.”[153]