Nowadays almost anything can be said about a theatrical star and her
manager is glad. He knows that the more she is written about, the more
she is talked about, the larger will be the receipts of the theatre
at which she is playing. Even the ancient and eminently respectable
Comédie Française has been obliged to accept this point of view--though
not without some pangs, I imagine. Witness the celebrated escapade of
Mlle. Cecile Sorel, great and exquisite interpreter of Molière, who
two years ago visited a public gallery and smashed an uncomplimentary
“portrait” of her by Bib, a young cartoonist. The press of the world
was full of the incident, but, so far as is known, the actress was not
hauled over the coals by the administration of the Comédie Française.
But in the seventies and eighties a different view was taken of such
matters. An artiste was supposed to be contented with reviews of the
plays she appeared in, and the Comédie Française especially deplored
any effort on the part of an individual actress to make herself known
by any other method than the excellence of her acting.
Thus it may be imagined that Sarah was rapidly making enemies for
herself. One could not open a newspaper or a magazine without reading
some article devoted to her, without seeing an account of some escapade
of hers. Sarah herself has said in her “Memoirs” that she regretted
this publicity, without being able to suppress it, and that she never
read the newspapers. Perhaps she may be pardoned this slight lapse of
memory.
Many times I have found her in the morning, her bed covered with
marked copies of publications sent her by friends, and by writers of
paragraphs about her. She gloried in them. She did not care what people
said about her, so long as they said something. She herself, to my
certain knowledge, inspired many of the most far-fetched stories.
When she found that the cartoonists had seized upon her slender figure
and fuzzy hair as heaven-sent objects on which to exercise their
talents, she wore clothes that accentuated her slimness, and her hair
became more studiously unruly than ever. When she found that every
foolish thing she did was immediately commented upon in a score of
newspapers, hostile as well as friendly, she spent hours thinking out
new escapades, and made foolishness an art.
She was the first actress who really understood the value of publicity.
Genius can be as eccentric as it pleases, but eccentricity without
genius becomes a boomerang, to hurl fools into oblivion.
Had Sarah been a lesser woman all this publicity would have ruined
her, but she really _was_ a genius, and not only possessed a talent
for self-advertisement, but had a genuine passion for work. People who
had read dozens of idiotic stories about her would visit the theatre
prepared to scoff--but they remained to applaud her frantically.
She was bigger than all the publicity she obtained. Her art justified
all. But her manager, Perrin, and the committee of the Comédie could
not see things that way. They were horrified and disgusted at the
notoriety that had descended on the venerable House of Molière, as the
result of the follies of their star.
Perrin used to remonstrate violently with her.
“You are a disgrace to the theatre and to your art!” he said in
my hearing on one occasion. “You will ruin the Comédie with your
insanities!”
“I will resign, then!” said Sarah promptly. And Perrin immediately
became contrite, for Sarah drew more people to the box-office than any
two artists the Comédie possessed, even including Mounet-Sully and
Sophie Croizette.
Louis Giffard was then one of the lions of Paris. Giffard was a
balloonist, and balloon ascensions were the _clou_ of the 1878
Exhibition. Giffard had long been an admirer of Sarah’s, and as he
started one of his ascents he threw a wreath of flowers at her as she
stood in a little group of spectators. For this gentle act of courtesy
she invited him to dine with her.
“_Tiens_, Sarah!” said Clairin, during this festivity, “there is
something you have not done yet--you have not gone up in a balloon!”
“She has her head always in the clouds!” grumpily put in Alexandre
Dumas, junior, who had had many a lively passage of arms with his most
unruly interpreter. But Sarah took up the suggestion immediately.
Turning enthusiastically to Giffard, she asked: “It is true? Can you
take me up in your balloon?”
“It would be the crowning point of my career!” responded Giffard
gallantly.
“When can we go?” asked Sarah, all excitement.
“To-morrow morning, if you wish!”
Sarah seized Georges Clairin by the arm. “And you, Georges--will you
come into the clouds with me, too?”
“He would be a poor poet who would not follow an angel into her natural
element!” answered Clairin, kissing her.
Everyone present was sworn to strict secrecy, and the next morning, at
seven o’clock, we trooped out to the space just outside the city gates
where Giffard’s balloon was in readiness. He had been there since dawn,
making his preparations, and when we arrived everything was ready.
Sarah, as she started to climb into the balloon, turned and saw me
crying.
“What is the matter, _ma petite_ Thérèse?” she asked, putting her arms
around me. I said that I wanted to go, too.
“There is no room,” said Giffard. “You shall make an ascent with me
another time.”
“But I want to go with Sarah!” I wailed.
Everyone laughed, and Gustave Doré, the illustrator, caught me up in
his arms. “But, _ma chérie_,” he remonstrated, “suppose the balloon
falls and you are all killed?”
“I would not care, so long as I was with my Sarah!” I replied stoutly.
There was a roar of laughter, and then Sarah was hoisted into the
basket by Clairin and Giffard, both of whom mounted after her. There
was a shout of “Cast off,” and the next thing I knew the balloon was
hundreds of feet above us, the three in the basket shrilling some
indistinguishable words of farewell.
Somebody pointed out the balloon to Perrin, who was on his way to his
office.
“There goes your _pensionnaire_!” he was told.
Perrin at first did not understand.
“Sarah Bernhardt is in that balloon!”
Perrin angrily rushed to the theatre, called together a special meeting
of the committee of administration, announced the news, and said that
he had decided to fine Sarah a thousand francs.
“I have had enough of her imbecilities!” he declared.
The balloon did not fly very far and came down seventy miles from
Paris; and that evening the three aeronauts were back again, Sarah
delighted beyond words with her experience.
In the morning she was informed by Perrin that she was to be fined.
Sarah flew into a rage, went home, wrote out her resignation, and sent
it to Perrin by a messenger. As usual, the threat prevailed. The fine
was withdrawn, and so was Sarah’s resignation. But Perrin did not
forgive her for a long time.
For a year or more it was open war between Sarah Bernhardt and the
directors of the Comédie. Most of the men in the company sided against
Sarah. She often complained that her male associates of the stage
were far more jealous than the women, and that they would stoop to
greater meannesses to revenge themselves. They caused her so many petty
annoyances that she finally made up her mind to leave the Comédie.
The idea grew on her. She felt, as she expressed it, a prisoner in
a cage of lions. Not only did they want to control her life in the
theatre, but her private life was subject to their interference as well.
[Illustration: Sarah Bernhardt in _Hamlet_.
From the well-known painting by Louis Besnard.
_Photo, Henri Manuel._]
]
Time and time again she threatened to resign. Finally, to appease her,
they had to promise to make her a “full member” of the company--an
honour not usually given till after fifteen or twenty years with
the Comédie--and accordingly raise her salary. But still she was
discontented. She was making 20,000 francs a year, and spending 50,000.
She decided that space was too restricted in her flat and resolved to
build for herself a private house. Private houses in Paris, then as
now, were the property only of the wealthy. Over nine hundred out of
every thousand people live in flats.
She chose a magnificent plot on the rue Fortuny, in what is now the
exclusive residential section of the Plaine Monceau, but which then
was practically a desert. Felix Escalier, a famous architect, was
called into consultation by the actress, and together they designed a
three-story house of noble dimensions and beautiful lines. Bordering it
on two sides was to be a spacious garden.
Sarah could scarcely contain herself when the plans were finally
approved and the building begun. The work seemed to her interminable.
To hasten construction, a call was sent out for more workmen, but none
were to be had, so a band of her student friends took off their coats,
donned the white aprons of masons, and gave their services free, joyful
to be of use.
In a little under a year the house was finished, and Sarah ransacked
the shops of Paris for furniture and appointments.
Georges Clairin, madly in love with her, undertook to paint four
mural decorations, the largest of which was in the reception hall.
It represented nude figures gambolling on fleecy clouds, and made an
enormous sensation.
The sensation came from the fact that the head of the central figure
was undoubtedly that of Sarah, and there was considerable discussion as
to whether she had posed for the entire body. Clairin finally settled
the argument.
“A professional model posed for the body,” he said. “Sarah is much too
thin.”
The explanation satisfied everybody, for there was no gainsaying the
fact that Sarah _was_ abnormally thin.
But the gossipy weeklies seized on the affair with avidity, and Sarah’s
attachment to Georges Clairin soon became public property. Of course,
both were tremendously criticised. Their denials were not listened to.
Sarah was dumbfounded at the venom of some of the attacks.
“These _canaille_!” she said, contemptously referring to her critics.
“They say that I am selfish--well, what woman is not? They say that I
am greedy--but did you ever know me to have a spare franc I could call
my own? They say I am cold and haughty, but that is because I will not
suffer the presence of fools! They say that I am indiscreet--it is they
who are indiscreet! They say that I have never really loved, that I am
cruel and ambitious, that I pull men down and climb over their bodies
on my ascent to fame--it is not true! I am ambitious; yes, and I am
jealous of a success won by hard work; but I am haughty only to those
whom I despise, and I am cruel--never! It is they who are cruel to me!”
“They delight in sticking knives into me!” she declared on another
occasion.
“I hate them!” she said again, passionately. “I hate them! They tear
down gods! All Paris is my enemy and all Paris is at my feet.”
On other occasions she was merely scornful.
“Let them talk, these little people!” she would say. “They think they
are throwing stones at me, but every stone goes to help in building the
structure of my success!”
And it was true. The more people ranted against Sarah, the greater she
became. She was by now the greatest feminine personality--I say it in
all seriousness--that France had known since Joan of Arc.
Her romance with Georges Clairin was a beautiful thing. She was, I am
convinced, genuinely in love with the great painter.
She spent all her afternoons for weeks in Clairin’s studio. Sometimes
they would work silently for hours, side by side, scarcely exchanging a
word. At others they would abandon work and sit and talk to each other,
oblivious of their surroundings. Sarah inspired many of Clairin’s
paintings, and was the model for several.
Once I accompanied her to Clairin’s studio. It was a great room, bare
of ornament except for easels and pictures that were scattered about.
Over a huge sofa hung a white bear skin, similar to the one Clairin had
given to Sarah.
Clairin was not there when we arrived, and Sarah astonished me by
crossing to the sofa and proceeding to take off her shoes and stockings.
“Whatever are you doing?” I demanded.
“He is going to paint my feet,” she answered, and indicated a large
unfinished canvas, representing Sarah as a Gypsy boy, in rags, wielding
a mouth organ. A tame bear danced to the music, and a greasy Bohemian,
presumably the boy’s father, turned the handle of a street piano.
Where this canvas went I never knew. It was not exhibited, as far as I
am aware. Some said that Sarah destroyed it in a fit of rage, when she
quarrelled with Clairin. Her romances invariably had their climax in
these terrific disputes.
When the artist entered, clad in a green velvet jacket, Sarah ran to
him crying: “_Mon petit Geogotte! Mon petit Geogotte!_”
She fondled him, kissing his face and long hair, scolding him for spots
of paint on his black tie, and using little endearing adjectives that
were a fresh revelation to me of Sarah, the lover.
Clairin showed her a painting in water-colours which he had done while
visiting at Fontainebleau. Taking a crayon, he wrote on the back: “To
the Perfect Woman,” and handed it to her.
The next day she chose a little statue she had herself modelled, and
sent it to him, with the inscription: “To my perfect man, from Sara,”
spelling her name without the “h,” as she sometimes did.
Clairin presented her with fifteen different paintings, all of which
she kept until the end of her life. Five were of herself.
These paintings were: “A Portrait of Alexandre Dumas fils,” signed by
both Clairin and Dumas; “Sarah Bernhardt, Lecturer”--this was done as
recently as 1914; “Sarah Bernhardt as Théodora”; “Portrait of Charles
Gounod”; “View of Beg-Meil”; “The Toilet of Cupid”; “The Fool and the
Skull”; “The Attack on the Fort by the Blues”; “Sarah Bernhardt as
Cleopatra”; “Sarah Bernhardt between Comedy and Tragedy”; “Repose on
a Rock”; “The Stairway in the Cliff”; “The Virgin of Avila”; “Sarah
Bernhardt as Théroigne de Méricourt”; “Characters of Comedy.” The last
was a sketch in black-and-white.
These pictures, all of which were signed and dedicated to Sarah by
Clairin, fetched unexpectedly low prices at the Paris sale of her
effects two months after her death. One was sold for as low as 160
francs--then about two guineas--while the highest price, fifteen
hundred francs, was paid for the portrait of Sarah as Théodora, which
was conceded to be one of Clairin’s greatest achievements.
Their romance lasted for several months. Then came the inevitable
rupture, the cause of which nobody knew, and Sarah left for a tour in
America, while Clairin went to a hermit-like seclusion in his home in
the _Midi_.
When both returned to Paris they were no longer lovers, but they
remained very good friends, and Clairin, until he died shortly after
the Armistice, was one of the most devoted of the little court
surrounding Sarah.
He was frequently a visitor at her house, and in his old age spent a
few weeks of every year at her property at Belle Isle, off the coast of
Brittany.
Clairin was a year older than Sarah Bernhardt. He possessed a nature
very similar to hers.