The first representation of _Antony_--The play, the actors,
the public--_Antony_ at the Palais-Royal--Alterations of the
_dénoûment_
The times were unfavourable for literature: all minds were turned
upon politics, and disturbances were flying in the air as, on hot
summer evenings, swifts fly overhead with their shrill screams, and
black-winged bats wheel round. My piece was as well put on as it could
be; but, except for the expenditure of talent which the actors were
going to make, M. Crosnier had gone to no other cost; not a single new
carpet or decoration, not even a salon was renovated. The work might
fail without regret, for it had only cost the manager the time spent
over the rehearsals.
The curtain rose, Madame Dorval, in her gauze dress and town attire, a
society woman, in fact, was a novelty at the theatre, where people had
recently seen her in _Les Deux Forçats_, and in _Le Joueur_: so her
early scenes only met with a half-hearted success; her harsh voice,
round shoulders and peculiar gestures, of which she so often made use
that, in the scenes which contained no passionate action, they became
merely vulgar, naturally did not tell in favour of the play or the
actress. Two or three admirably true inflections, however, found grace
with the audience, but did not arouse its enthusiasm sufficiently to
extract one single cheer from it. It will be recollected that Bocage
has very little to do in the first act: he is brought in fainting,
and the only chance he has for any effect is where he tears off the
bandage from his wound, uttering, as he faints away for the second
time: "And now I shall remain, shall I not?" Only after that sentence
did the audience begin to understand the piece, and to feel the
hidden dramatic possibilities of a work whose first act ended thus.
The curtain fell in the midst of applause. I had ordered the intervals
between the acts to be short. I went behind the scenes myself to
hurry the actors, managers and scene-shifters. In five minutes' time,
before the excitement had had time to cool down, the curtain went up
again. The second act fell to the share of Bocage entirely. He threw
himself vigorously into it, but not egotistically, allowing Dorval
as much part as she had a right to take; he rose to a magnificent
height in the scene of bitter misanthropy and amorous threatening, a
scene, by the bye, which--except for that of the foundlings--took up
pretty nearly the whole act. I repeat that Bocage was really sublime
in these parts: intelligence of mind, nobleness of heart, expression
of countenance,--the very type of the Antony, as I had conceived him,
was presented to the public. After the act, whilst the audience were
still clapping, I went behind to congratulate him heartily. He was
glowing with enthusiasm and encouragement, and Dorval told him, with
the frankness of genius, how delighted she was with him. Dorval had
no fears at all. She knew that the fourth and fifth acts were hers,
and quietly waited her turn. When I re-entered the theatre it was in a
state of excitement; one could feel the air charged with those emotions
which go to the making of great success. I began to believe that I was
right, and the whole world wrong, even my manager; I except Alfred de
Vigny, who had predicted success. My readers know the third act, it is
all action, brutal action; with regard to violence, it bears a certain
likeness to the third act of _Henri III._, where the Duc de Guise
crushes his wife's wrist to force her to give Saint-Mégrin a rendezvous
in her own handwriting. Happily, the third act at the Théâtre-Français
having met with success, it made a stepping-stone for that at the
Porte-Saint-Martin. Antony, in pursuit of Adèle, is the first to reach
a village inn, where he seizes all the post-horses to oblige her to
stop there, chooses the room that suits him best of the only two in the
house, arranges an entrance into Adèle's room from the balcony, and
withdraws as he hears the sound of her carriage wheels. Adèle enters
and begs to be supplied with horses. She is only a few leagues from
Strassburg, where she is on her way to join her husband; the horses
taken away by Antony are not to be found: Adèle is obliged to spend the
night in the inn. She takes every precaution for her safety, which, the
moment she is alone, becomes useless, because of the opening by the
balcony, forgotten in her nervous investigations. Madame Dorval was
adorable in her feminine simplicity and instinctive terrors. She spoke
as no one had spoken, or ever will speak them, those two extremely
simple sentences: "But this door will not shut!" and "No accident has
ever happened in your hotel, Madame?" Then, when the mistress of the
inn has withdrawn, she decides to go into her bedroom. Hardly had she
disappeared before a pane of the window falls broken to atoms, an arm
appears and unlatches the catch, the window is opened and both Antony
and Adèle appear, the one on the balcony of her window, the other on
the threshold of the room. At the sight of Antony, Adèle utters a cry.
The rest of the scene was terrifyingly realistic. To stop her from
crying out again, Antony placed a handkerchief on Adèle's mouth, drags
her into the room, and the curtain falls as they are both entering it
together. There was a moment of silence in the house. Porcher, the man
whom I have pointed out as one of our three or four pretenders to the
crown as the most capable of bringing about a restoration, was charged
with the office of producing my restoration, but hesitated to give the
signal. Mahomet's bridge was not narrower than the thread which at
that moment hung Antony suspended between success and failure. Success
carried the day, however. A great uproar succeeded the frantic rounds
of applause which burst forth in a torrent. They clapped and howled
for five minutes. When I have failures, rest assured I will not spare
myself; but, meanwhile, I ask leave to be allowed to tell the truth. On
this occasion the success belonged to the two actors; I ran behind the
theatre to embrace them. No Adèle and no Antony to be found! I thought
for a moment that, carried away by the enthusiasm of the performance,
they had resumed the play at the words, "_Antony lui jette un mouchoir
sur la bouche, et remporte dans sa chambre_," and had continued the
piece. I was mistaken: they were both changing their costumes and were
shut in their dressing-rooms. I shouted all kinds of endearing terms
through the door.
"Are you satisfied?" Bocage inquired.
"Enchanted."
"Bravo! the rest of the piece belongs to Dorval."
"You will not leave her in the lurch?"
"Oh! be easy on that score!"
I ran to Dorval's door.
"It is superb, my child--splendid! magnificent!"
"Is that you, my big bow-wow?"
"Yes."
"Come in, then!"
"But the door is fast."
"To everybody but you." She opened it; she was unstrung; and, half
undressed as she was, she flung herself into my arms.
"I think we have secured it, my dear!"
"What?"
"Why! a success, of course!"
"H'm! h'm!"
"Are you not satisfied?"
"Yes, quite."
"Hang it! You would be hard to please, if you were not."
"It seems to me, however, that we have passed out of the worst
troubles!"
"True, all has gone well so far; but ..."
"But what, come, my big bow-wow! Oh! I do love you for giving me such a
fine part!"
"Did you see the society women, eh?"
"No."
"What did they say of me?"
"But I did not see them ..."
"You will see them?"
"Oh yes."
"Then you will repeat what they say ... but frankly, mind."
"Of course."
"Look, there is my ball dress."
"Pretty swell, I fancy!"
"Oh! big dog, do you know how much you have cost me?"
"No."
"Eight hundred francs!"
"Come here." I whispered a few words in her ear.
"Really?" she exclaimed.
"Certainly!"
"You will do that?"
"Of course, since I have said so."
"Kiss me."
"No."
"Why not?"
"I never kiss people when I make them a present."
"Why?"
"I expect them to kiss me."
She threw her arms round my neck.
"Come now, good luck!" I said to her.
"And you must have it too."
"Courage? I am going to seek it."
"Where?"
"At the Bastille."
"At the Bastille?"
"Yes, I have a notion the beginning of the fourth act will not get on
so well."
"Why not?"
"Come now! the fourth act is delightful: I will answer for it."
"Yes, you will make the end go, but not the beginning."
"Ah I yes, that is a _feuilleton_ which Grailly speaks."
"Bah! it will succeed all the same: the audience is enthusiastic; we
can feel that, all of us."
"Ah I you feel that?"
"Then, too, see you, my big bow-wow; there are people in the stalls of
the house, _gentlemen_ too! who stare at me as they never have stared
before."
"I don't wonder."
"I say ..."
"What?"
"If I am going to become the rage?"
"It only depends on yourself."
"Liar!"
"I swear it only depends on yourself."
"Yes ... but ... Alfred, eh?"
"Exactly!"
"Upon my word, so much the worse! We shall see."
The voice of the stage-manager called Madame Dorval!
"Can we begin?"
"No, no, no; I am not dressed yet, I am only in my chemise! He's a
pretty fellow, that Moëssard! What would the audience say?... It is
you who have hindered me like this ... Go off with you then!"
"Put me out."
"Go! go! go!"
She kissed me three times and pushed me to the door. Poor lips, then
fresh and smiling and trembling, which I was to see closed and frozen
for ever at the touch of death!
I went outside; as I was in need of air. I met Bixio in the corridors.
"Come with me," I said.
"Where the dickens are you off to?"
"I am going for a walk."
"What! a walk?"
"Yes!"
"Just when the curtain is going to rise?"
"Exactly! I do not feel sure about the fourth act and would much rather
it began without me."
"Are you sure about the end?"
"Oh! the end is a different matter ... We will come back for that,
never fear!"
And we hurried out on to the boulevard.
"Ah!" I exclaimed, as I breathed the air.
"What is the matter with you?... Is it your piece that is upsetting
you like this?"
"Get along, hang my piece!"
I dragged Bixio in the direction of the Bastille. I do not remember
what we talked of. I only know we walked for half a league, there and
back, chattering and laughing. If anybody had said to the passers-by,
"You see that great lunatic of a man over there? He is the author
of the play being acted at this very moment at the theatre of la
Porte-Saint-Martin!" they would indeed have been amazed.
I came in again at the right moment, at the scene of the insult. The
_feuilleton_, as Dorval called it, meaning the apology for this modern
style of drama, the real preface to _Antony_, had passed over without
hindrance and had even been applauded. I had a box close to the stage
and I made a sign to Dorval that I was there; she signalled back that
she saw me. Then the scene began between Adèle and the Vicomtesse,
which is summed up in these words, "But I have done nothing to this
woman!" Next comes the scene between Adèle and Antony, where Adèle
repeatedly exclaims, "She is his mistress!"
Well! I say it after twenty-two years have passed by,--and during those
years I have composed many plays, and seen many pieces acted, and
applauded many actors,--he who never saw Dorval act those two scenes,
although he may have seen the whole repertory of modern drama, can have
no conception how far pathos can be carried.
The reader knows how this act ends; the Vicomtesse enters; Adèle,
surprised in the arms of Antony, utters a cry and disappears. Behind
the Vicomtesse, Antony's servant enters in his turn. He has ridden full
gallop from Strassburg, to announce to his master the return of Adèle's
husband. Antony dashes from the stage like a madman, or one driven
desperate, crying, "Wretch! shall I arrive in time?"
I ran behind the scenes. Dorval was already on the stage, uncurling
her hair and pulling her flowers to pieces; she had at times her
moments of transports of passion, exceeding those of the actress. The
scene-shifters were altering the scenes, whilst Dorval was acting her
part. The audience applauded frantically. "A hundred francs," I cried
to the shifters, "if the curtain be raised again before the applause
ceases!" In two minutes' time the three raps were given: the curtain
rose and the scene-shifters had won their hundred francs. The fifth act
began literally before the applause for the fourth had died down. I had
one moment of acute anguish. In the middle of the terrible scene where
the two lovers, caught in a net of sorrows, are striving to extricate
themselves, but can find no means of either living or dying together, a
second before Dorval exclaimed, "Then I am lost!" I had, in the stage
directions, arranged that Bocage should move the armchair ready to
receive Adèle, when she is overwhelmed at the news of her husband's
arrival. And Bocage forgot to turn the chair in readiness. But Dorval
was too much carried away by passion to be put out by such a trifle.
Instead of falling on the cushion, she fell on to the arm of the chair,
and uttered a cry of despair, with such a piercing grief of soul
wounded, torn, broken, that the whole audience rose to its feet. This
time the cheers were not for me at all, but for the actress and for her
alone, for her marvellous, magnificent performance! The _dénoûment_ is
known; it is utterly unexpected, and is summed up in a single phrase
of six startling words. The door is burst open by M. de Hervey just as
Adèle falls on a sofa, stabbed by Antony.
"Dead?" cries Baron de Hervey.
"Yes, dead!" coldly answers Antony. _Elle me résistait: je l'ai
assassinée!_ And he flings his dagger at the husband's feet. The
audience gave vent to such cries of terror, dismay and sorrow, that
probably a third of the audience hardly heard these words, a necessary
supplement to the piece, which, however, without them would be
nothing but an ordinary intrigue of adultery, unravelled by a simple
assassination. The effect, all the same, was tremendous. They called
for the author with frantic cries. Bocage came forward and told them.
Then they called for Antony and Adèle again, and both returned to take
their share in such an ovation as they had never had, nor ever would
have again. For they had both attained to the highest achievement in
their art! I flew from my box to go to them, without noticing that the
passages were blocked with spectators coming out of their seats. I had
not taken four steps before I was recognised; then I had my turn, as
the author of the play. A crowd of young persons of my own age (I was
twenty-eight), pale, scared, breathless, rushed at me. They pulled
me right and left and embraced me. I wore a green coat buttoned up
from top to bottom; they tore the tails of it to shreds. I entered
the green-room, as Lord Spencer entered his, in a round jacket; the
rest of my coat had gone into a state of relics. They were stupefied
behind the scenes; they had never seen a success taking such a form
before, never before had applause gone so straight from the audience
to the actors; and what an audience it was too! The fashionable
world, the exquisites who take the best boxes at theatres, those who
only applaud from habit, who, this time, made themselves hoarse with
shouting so loudly, and had split their gloves with clapping! Crosnier
was hidden. Bocage was as happy as a child. Dorval was mad! Oh, good
and brave-hearted friends, who, in the midst of their own triumphs,
seemed to enjoy my success more even than their own! who put their
own talent on one side and loudly extolled the poet and the work! I
shall never forget that night; Bocage has not forgotten it either.
Only a week ago we were talking of it as though it had happened only
yesterday; and I am certain, if such matters are remembered in the
other world, Dorval remembers it too! Now, what became of us all after
we had been congratulated? I know not. Just as there is around every
luminous body a mist, so there was one over the rest of the evening and
night, which my memory, after a lapse of twenty-two years, is unable to
penetrate. In conclusion, one of the special features of the drama of
_Antony_ was that it kept the spectators spell-bound to the final fall
of the curtain. As the _morale_ of the work was contained in those
six words, which Bocage pronounced with such perfect dignity, "_Elle
me résistait: je l'ai assassinée!_" everybody remained to hear them,
and would not leave until they had been spoken, with the following
result. Two or three years after the first production of _Antony_, it
became the piece played at all benefit performances; to such an extent
that once they asked Dorval and Bocage to act it for the Palais-Royal
Theatre. I forget, and it does not matter, for whom the benefit was to
be performed. The play met with its accustomed success, thanks to the
acting of those two great artistes; only, the manager had been told the
wrong moment at which to call the curtain down! So it fell as Antony
is stabbing Adèle, and robbed the audience of the final _dénoûment._
That was not what they wanted: it was the _dénoûment_ they meant to
have; so, instead of going they shouted loudly for _Le dénoûment! le
dénoûment!_ They clamoured to such an extent that the manager begged
the actors to let him raise the curtain again, and for the piece to be
concluded.
Dorval, ever good-natured, resumed her pose in the armchair as the
dead woman, while they ran to find Antony. But he had gone into his
dressing-room, furious because they had made him miss his final
effect, and withdrawing himself into his tent, like Achilles; like
Achilles, too, he obstinately refused to come out of it. All the time
the audience went on clapping and shouting and calling, "Bocage!
Dorval!.... Dorval! Bocage!" and threatening to break the benches. The
manager raised the curtain, hoping that Bocage, when driven to bay,
would be compelled to come upon the stage. But Bocage sent the manager
about his business. Meanwhile, Dorval waited in her chair, with her
arms hung down, and head lying back. The audience waited, too, in
profound silence; but, when they saw that Bocage was not coming back,
they began cheering and calling their hardest. Dorval felt that the
atmosphere was becoming stormy, and raised her stiff arms, lifted her
bent head, rose, walked to the footlights, and, in the midst of the
silence which had settled down miraculously, at the first movement she
had ventured to make:
"_Messieurs_" she said, "_Messieurs, je lui résistais, il m'a
assassinée!_" Then she made a graceful obeisance and left the stage,
hailed by thunders of applause. The curtain fell and the spectators
went away enchanted. They had had their _dénoûment_, with a variation,
it is true; but this variation was so clever, that one would have had
to be very ill-natured not to prefer it to the original form.