Sarah Bernhardt (1845-1923)

Sarah Bernhardt (1845-1923)

Sarah Bernhardt, whose birthname was Henrietta Rosine Bernard, was born in Paris on 22nd October 1845 (some sources say 1844). Her father was Edouard Bernard, a french law student. Her mother was Judith ('Youle') van Hard, a young Dutch adventuress of jewish descent who later became a fashionable courtesan. Her mother was only sixteen at the time of Sarah's birth, and as such she was perhaps not ready for the responsibility of a child of her own and took little direct part in her upbringing. Indeed she was addicted to a life of freedom and adventure and would leave the infant Sarah in the care of a nurse at a little cottage in Brittany whilst she travelled across Europe.

Tragedy almost struck for the infant Sarah when she escaped from her high chair only to fall into the fire raging in the hearth. Her nurse's husband, who was bedridden at the time, shouted for help whereupon neighbours rushed in and plucked her from the flames and dumped her, clothes still smoking, into a large pail of milk. In the days that followed, neighbours brought all the butter they could spare to make fresh poultices for Sarah's burns, and her distraught mother rushed back from Brussels to be by her side. Luckily, Sarah's burns had not been too severe, the doctors her mother brought approved of the butter treatment and little Sarah recovered without a scar.

At the age of seven, her mother still stricken with wanderlust, Sarah was entrusted to the care of a boarding school at Auteuil and later, despite being half jewish, to the convent of Grandchamps at Versailles. In the care of the nuns, Sarah became deeply dedicated to religion and announced her intention to devote her life to God. Her mother had other ideas however, and took a distraught Sarah away from the convent to study acting at the Conservatoire, Paris, where she remained from 1859 to 1863, winning a number of prizes (including second prize for tragedy in 1861 and for comedy in 1862).

When Sarah left the Converatoire, her mother had become paramour to the Duc de Mornay, one of the most influential men in France, and his influence was prevailed upon to secure Sarah a place with the Comédie Française. She made her professional acting debut in a small part in "Iphigénie en Aulide" on the 11th of August 1862. It was not a articularly auspiscious start and she soon left that company after a quarrel. In the next few years she drifted between different theatres without much success. She also had an affair with Henri, Prince de Ligne of Belgium, and gave birth to a son Maurice, in 1864 (although like her mother she remained unmarried). Throughout her life from that time forward she doted on Maurice, lavishing upon him the attention her own mother had never shown her. But, in a chilling echo of her own early childhood the infant Maurice was almost taken from her in a fire at their home. Sarah herself, despite her terror of fire from her own childhood ordeal, rushed into the burning building to save him.

In 1867 Sarah she joined the company of the Thétre de l'Odéon in Paris and it was here that she at last began to make her mark as an actress. Here she played the classics, especially Racine, making her greatest mark as "Phèdre" - a role that she was to perform regularly throughout much of her career. Having made her name, she returned to the Comédie Française in 1872 as a societaire (a senior player engaged on a twenty year contract). Her reputation continued to grow by degrees so that soon her position as the greatest actress in France was beyond dispute. For her comfort away from the stage, she had a charming Villa built on the Avenue de Villiers, the facade of which was adorned with carvings executed by two prominent French artists. She was also an accomplished artist herself, having studied sculpture under Mathieu Meusnier and Franchesci, and frequently exhibited her work at the Paris Salon.

In 1879 she was the star of their first London visit, as she began to internationalise her reputation. After one performance at the Gaiety she was introduced to the Prince of Wales, who later visited her at the William Russell Galleries in Picadilly where she was exhibiting her artwork. The Prince purchased a piece entitled "La Dormeuse" as well as commissioning her to sculpt another, a bust of Lord Beaconsfield. Sarah at this time was learning to speak English and could already take part in simple conversation as well as reciting some scenes from memory. As her fame had grown however, she had acquired enemies jealous of her success and eager to turn any opportunity against her. Her London visit then brought matters to a head. Her detractors accused her of being a publicity seeker and of sullying the reputation of the Comédie Française, even accusing that her regular public appearances at her art exhibition were defrauding her theatre public who were paying to see her. Worse, the French press (which never forgave her jewish origins) turned wholly against her, swallowing the lies and attacking her with extreme vitriol. Sarah was so distressed that she failed to appear for a scheduled performance at the Gaiety on 13th June the French Minister of Public Instruction was son incensed that he telegraphed the company to return to France at once, only rescinding the order when it was pointed out that to do so would only sully the reputation of the company further.

This was bitter medicine for Sarah, who already felt aggrieved at the unfairness of the remuneration she was receiving. Salaries paid to the Societares at the Comédie Française were strictly regulated according to seniority, meaning that Sarah, despite being the singular attraction, earned less than comrades of inferior talent but greater duration. Worse, her earnings were only a fraction of the stipend of any comparable British or American actress. The French press confidently predicted she would receive a cool reception on her return to Paris in August, but they had underestimated the extent to which the French public adored her and she was instead received with thunderous applause. Still the attacks on her persisted, and following another argument she resigned from the Comédie Française in 1880 to establish her own theatrical troupe. As she was then only seven years into her twenty year contract with the company, the result of her action was to open herself to a heavy fine for breach of contract which would have to be paid before she could again appear anywhere in France.

On leaving the Comédie she gave a series of performances in London of "Adrienne Lecouvreur" and "Frou Frou", before embarking on tours in Denmark, America and Russia during 1880 and 1881. In London in 1882 she married Greek actor Aristides (Jacques) Damala, but separated from him after only a little over a year due to his morphine addiction. In the following years she continued to tour the world with her own company, designing her own clothes and working closely with her stage designers. In 1883 she became proprietress of the Porte St-Martin where she remained for the next ten years when not on tour. By now she was an international icon, regularly appearing in the chief European capitals as well triumphal extended tours of North and South America and Australia. Her circle of friends included some of the greatest creative practitioners of her day, men like the artists Whistler and Gustave Doré, composer Reynaldo Hahn, and poet Robert de Montesquiou to name but a few. When her son Maurice was about to be married in 1887, his father the Belgian Prince Henri de Ligne, offered to officially recognise him and endow Maurice with his name as well as a substantial fortune. Maurice however, remained true to his mother, she had raised him single-handedly and in view of the debt he owed her he preferred to remain a "Bernhardt".

Sarah took over the Théâtre de la Renaissance in Paris in 1893 as her base of operations, and for the next few years continued to visit London at least almost annually. In December 1896 the Parisian public honoured Sarah with an elaborate fête organized in her honour and which was enhanced by cordial greetings received from all parts of the world. In 1899 she took over the larger house of the Théâtre des Nations, which she renamed the Théâtre Sarah-Bernhardt, and in the same year stunned the theatre public with her bold experiment of a French Hamlet with herself in the title role (for which Max Beerbohm dubbed her "Hamlet, Princess of Denmark").

She repeated the role in London soon afterwards, along with another male role as the ill-fated son of Napoleon I in Rostand's "L'Aiglon". In 1900 she was one of number of French entertainers to make early primitive sound films for the Paris Exposition of that year, reprising the duel scene from Hamlet. Over the next two years she continued to tour in Hamlet, taking the production to Scotland, Switzerland, Austria and Hungary. In the 1905/06 season she played in an extended tour of the USA during which she frequently played under a huge tent due to and ongoing war between rival managerial organisations which barred access to many theatres. On returning to France in 1906 she made her first real film, reprising an earlier stage role in a hand coloured two-reeler of 'Tosca'. It did not come out well, Sarah herself was said to have been horrified at the result and attempted, unsuccessfully, to have all the copies destroyed. In 1911 she ventured again onto the movie stage in 'La Dame aux Camellias' (aka 'Camille'). This time she got it right, her passionate acting style adapted easily to the medium and the film earned her a staggering $30,000. It was a great critical success and helped to attract a higher class of audience to the new movie houses.

Building on this success, the following year she made 'Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth' (aka 'Queen Elizabeth'), a longer four-reeler presenting in a series of tableau (each introduced by a series of captions) episodes from the life of Queen Elizabeth I of England; focusing on her doomed love affair with Robert Devereux. The film took three months to make and was a huge hit in Europe and America, where it was the first full-length drama to be screened. Adolph Zukor, the owner of a New York nickelodeon, secured the American distribution rights and his receipts from this film set him on the road to movie empire, founding first the Famous Players Film Company and then the Paramount Pictures distribution company. Sarah, despite her declarations that she hated the medium, made a great deal of money from films. It could have been more, had she not shunned offers from other companies to stay with the French Film d'Art company. Her next film was a three-reel version of her current stage role, 'Adrienne Lecouvreur', and was another big hit. Srah by now had become fascinated with the medium and made extensive home movies of herself, Maurice and their friends, and gave elaborate screenings to show them off.

In Paris in 1913 she opened in the Tristan Bernard play 'Jeanne Dore' and was still touring in the part in early 1915 when complications from an earlier injury resulted in the necessity to have her right leg amputated. She was confined to a wheelchair for several months before learning to walk on her new wooden leg. But Sarah's strength of character brooked not defeat and during this period she made a film version of 'Jeanne Dore', having to be shot either standing or sitting as she was not yet ambulatory. Sarah had been enrolled into the National Order of the Legion of Honor in 1914, an award founded by Napoleon Bonaparte and then only awarded in peacetime for twenty years eminent service to the Republic of France. In 1917, as a contribution to the War effort, Sarah made a propaganda film, 'Meres Francaises' (Mothers of France) for the French government. In it she played a wife and mother who joined the Red Cross and became an Angel of the battlefield. Despite losing both husband and son in the war, she stoically exhorted the other mothers of France to persevere in the righteous struggle.

Now into her seventies, with failing health and only one leg, Sarah continued to work as long as she was able. In 1923 she contracted herself to the Hollywood producer Leon Abrams to film 'The Fortune Teller' (aka 'La Voyante'). It was to be her last film and it was never completed. Even before filming began she was too ill to leave the house and a makeshift studio had to be set up in her Paris home. But as soon as the cameras began to roll the gauntness left her and she performed with the same strength and vigour as always. Still, it was too much for her. As news of her illness spread, crowds began to gather outside her home eager for news of her condition. Sarah died from kidney failure in her son's arms in her Paris home on 26th March, 1923. Amidst a great outpouring of grief, thousands of Parisians followed her funeral cortege through the city.

During her long and illustrious career Sarah Bernhardt performed roles specially written for her by the greatest French playwrights of her day - Rostand, Hugo and Dumas. She was, almost without question, the greatest actress of her day - adding her own name to the list of great French heroines that she so thrilled french audiences in portraying. Little wonder she was beloved by all her audiences as "the Divine Sarah". As a young woman she was indeed possessed of a divine beauty, with perfect features and pale skin accentuated by a shock of red hair. Her diction was perfect and her voice strong and beautiful so that she delivered her lines with bell-like clarity. She was as famous a personality as she was an actress, and her fiery temper was legendary. Above all else Sarah knew how to cultivate her stardom, and worked tirelessly to that end. Despite her greatness, and the success after success that shot her to the top of her profession, somehow she never managed to bank enough money to guarantee her long-term future, and this is why she continued working to the very end of her life.

As well as her film appearances Sarah made several sound recordings of famous dialogues from various characters she portrayed. Besides being a painter and sculptor of recognised ability, she was also an accomplished writer of books and magazine articles. She even wrote and produced a number of her own plays, although none of these were especially successful.

Five years after her death Greta Garbo, herself arguably the greatest actress of her own era, fittinbgly played Sarah in the biopic "The Divine Woman". Since then numerous other films have been made of her life, including the 1976 film "The Incredible Sarah" starring Glenda Jackson. Today Sarah is remembered by a sumptuous display at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, and by a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1751 Vine Street.

Movie Credits (source www.imdb.com)
1900 - Hamlet in 'Le Duel d'Hamlet'
1909 - 'La Tosca'
1912 - Marguerite Gauthier in 'La Dame aux camélias'
1912 - Queen Elizabeth I in 'Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth'
1913 - title role in 'Adrienne Lecouvreur'
1915 - title role in 'Jeanne Doré'
1917 - Mères françaises (Mothers of France)
1923 - La Voyante (the Fortuneteller) - unfinished
As herself (biographical)
1915 - 'Ceux de Chez Nous'
1919 - 'It Happened in Paris'

Writers Credits
1878 - 'Dans les Nuages, Impressions d'une Chaise Charpentier'
1888 - 'L'Aveu, drame en un acte en prose'
1907 - 'Adrienne Lecouvreur, drame en six actes'
1907 - 'Ma Double Vie' (1908 as 'My Double Life')
1911 - 'Un Coeur d'Homme, pièce en quatre actes' (1921 as 'The Idol of Paris')
1923 - 'L'Art du Théâtre: la voix, le geste, la prononciation, etc.' (1924 as 'The art of the Theatre')