They acted together from 1878 to 1902. Their half dozen American tours
aroused the same enthusiasm and loyalty that during all that long
period was their portion at home.[82] Her retirement is so recent
that the actress’s Portia, her Beatrice, Juliet, Imogen, Ophelia (to
mention only the outstanding Shakespearean characters) are still fresh
memories.[83]
It is probably true, as Mr. Shaw maintains,[84] that despite the
opportunities given her to act Shakespeare’s most charming heroines,
Miss Terry’s association with Henry Irving really resulted in
reducing her total accomplishment. Irving sacrificed her as he did
himself and everyone and everything else, to his art. To be sure he
mounted a number of plays--notably _Olivia_, _The Lady of Lyons_,
_Faust_, _Madame Sans-Gêne_, and perhaps some of the Shakespearean
comedies--primarily for her sake. Yet she little better than wasted
much time and effort in playing secondary and unsuccessful parts in
plays selected primarily for him. And, sorrow of sorrows, Rosalind,
whom she was born to play, he never made possible for her. How
incomparable she would have been!--a Rosalind of ideal aspect, of
delicious high spirits, of consummate grace and tenderness.[85]
But it seems, after all, rather futile and ungrateful, in the face of
what has really been, to cavil about what might have been. Ellen Terry
has actually been one of those rare spirits who confer a blessing
on a gray world by their mere presence. As a woman she was lovable,
simple, whole-heartedly human, generous, high spirited; as an actress,
uniquely delightful and in many impersonations, by virtue of nature and
instinct, of compelling power, even genius. Small wonder that we must
reckon her as one of the great line of English women of the theatre,
the last indeed of that small and scattered band, who, each in turn,
were the queens of the stage; small wonder, too, that by thousands
of hearts on both sides of the ocean she has been cherished as an
idealized fellow creature.
When she had at last left Sir Henry she bade fair to enlarge the scope
of her already well-rounded career by appearing in plays of a more
modern type than any that fell within the Lyceum’s scope. “When her
son, Mr. Gordon Craig, became a father,” wrote George Bernard Shaw,
“she said that no one would ever write plays for a grandmother. I
immediately wrote _Captain Brassbound’s Conversion_ to prove the
contrary. Once before I had tried to win her when I wrote _The Man of
Destiny_ in which the heroine is simply a delineation of Ellen Terry,
imperfect, it is true, for who can describe the indescribable?”[86]
When in 1905 Miss Terry played James M. Barrie’s delightful
_Alice-Sit-By-The-Fire_, it was felt, by those minded like Mr. Shaw,
and not disturbed by seeing her appear in a play widely diverging from
the Lyceum traditions, that at last she had come into her own--that she
was doing what she should have done years before, in giving her talents
to a modern play. And the next year she appeared as Lady Cecily in the
play that Shaw had written for a grandmother, and that had waited for
her seven years, _Captain Brassbound’s Conversion_.
She had been an actress fifty years. When the anniversary approached
the English world of the theatre bestirred itself to mark the
date fittingly. The celebration took the form of an astonishing
entertainment at Drury Lane. The programme ranged from songs,
recitations, _tableaux vivants_, through _Trial by Jury_ and scenes
from _The School for Scandal_, to an act from _Much Ado_, in which Miss
Terry herself was Beatrice, supported by a cast including a score of
the Terry family. The list of those who appeared on the stage of Drury
Lane on the afternoon of June 12, 1906, is simply a roster of the pick
of the actor’s profession in England; distinguished actors, if nothing
more could be found for them to do, thought themselves honored to walk
on as supernumeraries; Genée danced; Caruso sang; Signora Duse came
all the way from Florence to pay homage; the audience, which had begun
to gather for the great occasion as early as the previous day,[87] was
overwhelming in its enthusiasm, and altogether the occasion was an
unprecedented demonstration of loyalty and affection.
Early in the following year (1907) Miss Terry made her eighth and as an
actress her last tour of the United States.[88] Three years later, and
again in 1914, she came as a lecturer reading scenes from Shakespeare
and commenting on his heroines. It was good to see and hear her again
if only on the platform, even though, as William Winter said, it is one
thing to act, another to expound. “To see her as an actress was to
see a vital creature of beauty, passion, tenderness, and eloquence, a
being, in Cleopatra’s fine phrase, all ‘fire and air.’” On the lecture
platform she was not quite all that, but she was still Ellen Terry,
imperial of figure, rich of voice, buoyant of mood.[89] As such her
public in England and America saw its last of her.[90] She is now
living quietly in one of those small country houses the “collection” of
which has been one of her hobbies. She has given in generous measure
pleasure to many, many thousands;--more than pleasure, inspiration
indeed, to countless men and women. The realization of this must be a
great reward, to make happy the twilight of her life.
GABRIELLE RÉJANE
A certain Frenchman once voiced the feeling of his fellow Parisians
concerning Réjane by calling upon all good French provincials, who
would learn the language of the Boulevards in a single lesson, and
all children of other lands curious as to the pleasures, tastes, and
manners of Paris, to harken while he gave them this advice: “Go and
see Réjane. Don’t go to the _Opéra_, where the music is German; nor
to the _Opéra-Comique_, where it is Italian; nor yet to the _Comédie
Française_, where the sublime is made ridiculous, and the heroes
and heroines of Racine take on the attitudes of bull-fighters and
cigarette-makers; nor to the _Odéon_, nor to the _Palais-Royal_, nor
here, nor there, nor elsewhere: go and see Réjane. Be she at London,
Chicago, Brussels, St. Petersburg--Réjane is Paris. She carries the
soul of Paris with her, wheresoever she listeth.”
[Illustration: GABRIELLE RÉJANE]
Madame Réjane--the Parisienne: they are interchangeable terms. And
what is a Parisienne? Let our sprightly French friend--M. Dauphin
Meunier--tell us; he does it well:[91]
“A fabulous being, in an everyday human form; a face, not beautiful,
scarcely even pretty, which looks upon the world with an air at
once ironical and sympathetic; a brow that grows broader or narrower
according to the capricious invasions of her aureole of hair; an odd
little nose, perked heavenward; two roguish eyes, now blue, now black;
the rude accents of a street-girl, suddenly changing to the well-bred
murmuring of a great lady; abrupt, abundant gestures, eloquently
finishing half-spoken sentences; a supple neck--a slender, opulent
figure--a dainty foot, that scarcely touches the earth and yet can
fly amazingly near the ceiling; lips, nervous, sensuous, trembling,
curling; a frock, simple or sumptuous, bought at a bargain or created
by a Court-dressmaker; a gay, a grave demeanor; grace, wit, sweetness,
tartness; frivolity and earnestness, tenderness and indifference: such
is Woman at Paris: such is the Parisienne.
“No need for her to learn good manners, nor bad ones: she’s born with
both. According to the time or place, she will talk to you of politics,
of art, of literature--of dress, trade, cookery--of finance, of
socialism, of luxury, of starvation--with the patness, the sure touch,
the absolute sincerity, of one who has seen all, experienced all,
understood all. She is as sentimental as a song, wily as a diplomat,
gay as folly, or serious as a novel by Zola. What has she read? Where
was she educated? Who cares? Her book of life is Paris; she knows
her Paris by heart; and whoso knows Paris can dispense with further
knowledge.”
Réjane was from the beginning a veritable child of Paris. She was born
on June 6, 1857, at 14 _Rue de la Duane_, in a business section of the
city. This street had been “one of the storm centers for almost every
great riot known to the Paris of the last century and a half.” The
little Gabrielle Charlotte Réju passed her infancy in that busy part of
Paris between _Porte Saint-Martin_ and _Place Château d’Eau_.
Her parents were poor. Her father had earlier been an actor and at one
time had directed a theatre at Arras.[92] When Gabrielle was born, and
during the years of her infancy, he was the ticket-taker and the keeper
of the buffet at the _Ambigu_. In the work of dispensing refreshments
Madame Réju, who came of a good Valenciennes family, actively assisted,
and even Gabrielle herself, when she grew old enough, was pressed into
service.[93]
With the home life virtually transferred to the lobbies of
the _Ambigu_, it was inevitable that Gabrielle, breathing the
mystery-filled atmosphere of a theatre, should at once feel its strong
influence. Like Ellen Terry and Mrs. Fiske, and unlike her compatriot
the great Sarah, Réjane was, from the beginning, of the theatre. She
was an amiably mischievous child, possessed of an immense curiosity
about life behind the scenes. She remembers vividly those early
days, in which she divided her time between her small duties, napping
in corners, and revelling in the delights that presented themselves
over the footlights. There she saw many of the stars of the day, Jane
Essler, Frédérick Lemaître, Marie Laurent, Adèle Page. On the night
of a new production, between the acts, she would go to her mother and
recount the story of the play and give childish imitations of the
various players. To imitate the fine gowns she saw on the stage, she
would make a train from the buffet napkins. One of the memories of her
childhood is the enchantment that possessed her when she saw herself,
dressed in a velvet robe and a royal diadem, reflected in Adèle Page’s
splendid cheval glass.
When Gabrielle was about five, her father died, and mother and daughter
were thrown on their own resources. Mme. Réju secured a position at
one of the other theatres, and Gabrielle went to school. She was to
some extent in the care of a friend, but she was privileged with
extraordinary liberties. Her mother gave her a franc each morning with
which to buy her evening meal, and it was with immense pride that she
would go forth alone to take her dinner at a restaurant. Often she
would save enough from her franc to buy an orange which she would
take with her into the balcony of the _Ambigu_, where she was still
privileged to go. There she would tarry to see an act of the play
before she went home.
It is clear that she was a precocious, clever child. She was already,
indeed, an actress. Her evening walk would invariably take her past her
beloved _Ambigu_. She made an event of this passage, putting on her
best attitudes and smiles for the artists who might be seated in the
terrace of the café.
This café of the _Ambigu_ was the scene of one of the oft-repeated
episodes of Réjane’s childhood. The proprietor, a relative of some
sort, was in the habit of beating his wife. One evening, Gabrielle, who
knew what to expect, happened--as was not unusual--to be in the café.
Soon the poor woman’s cries were heard as her lord and master belabored
her. A patron demanded of Gabrielle what the terrible noises meant.
“Oh, that, Monsieur,” she said. “Why, they’re rehearsing upstairs.”
Soon the mother changed her work, and took up the painting of fans.
Between sessions of the school, and all day on Thursdays, little
Gabrielle helped in this work and proved herself adept. They received
for this work about fifty cents per dozen fans. Madame Réju seems to
have been sensitive as to her new work. She and her young daughter,
too proud to have it known that they were doing work of that sort, or
perhaps for fear of offending certain rich relatives, took a neighbor
into their confidence and paid her for delivering the fans to _la
maison Meyer_.
If mother and daughter had continued to live in the immediate
neighborhood of the _Ambigu_ it is not unlikely that the already lively
ambition of the girl would have found its outlet at that theatre. We
have seen something of her enthusiasm for the _Ambigu_ and her close
relationship with its entourage. Once launched upon her career there
as an actress of popular drama, she would very likely have remained
there and missed the valuable training that she was to receive at the
_Conservatoire_. As it happened, however, when she was about ten her
mother moved from _Rue de Lancry_ to 17 _Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette_,
and in large measure the influence of the _Ambigu_ was removed.
On the same floor with Madame Réju and her daughter in their new
quarters lived a lady with whom they gradually formed a close
friendship. When the war of 1870 broke out, the new friend left Paris,
leaving her apartment in charge of Mme. Réju and Gabrielle. There the
windows, unlike those of Mme. Réju’s own suite, overlooked the street.
When the Commune brought the terrors of civil war to Paris, it was from
these windows that the child witnessed what was to her a terrible and
long-remembered sight, a street battle between the government troops
and the Communists. The bodies of slain men, carried past under those
windows, gave her her first glimpse of death.
The war past, Gabrielle, now fourteen, returned to school at the
_Pension Boulet_, _Rue Pigalle_. She applied herself diligently to her
somewhat neglected studies, and to such good purpose that the mistress
of the school, with whom Gabrielle had become a favorite, offered
her a position as an assistant with the younger pupils. She was to be
paid forty francs a month, and her luncheon. To her mother this seemed
to be the opening of an honorable career. Not so Gabrielle herself,
who cherished constantly her already fixed ambition to be an actress.
She was, however, fond of children, and to tide affairs over she took
a class of the younger pupils. She got along well enough with them
with their ordinary lessons, but her own instruction in sewing and
embroidery had been neglected, and she had to have the help of the
older of her pupils, to bridge the gap.
Occasionally, of a Sunday evening, Gabrielle was taken by her mother
to the house of a friend who gathered about herself a modest _salon_.
There came such men as Félicien David, the composer, Joseph Kelm, the
writer, and the architect, Frantz Jourdain. Gabrielle, young as she
was, with her natural gayety and spontaneity at once took her place
in the circle. She would sing for the assembly the popular songs of
the day--compositions often full of doubtful meanings that she very
imperfectly understood. Her little successes naturally strengthened
her longing to be an actress, to stir great houses as she amused this
little circle of friends.
To Gabrielle’s increasing ambition her mother set herself in
opposition. To her mind the forty francs per month was not lightly to
be sacrificed. And she said she did not care to be the mother of an
actress. She lived to own herself in the wrong.
One evening, as mother and daughter were passing the _Théâtre
Français_, they saw a crowd at the stage door. They questioned a
bystander and were told that this had been the farewell performance of
Regnier. Gabrielle insisted on waiting to see him come out. She had
never seen him, but every one knew of Regnier, great artist and lovable
personality. Soon he appeared, a little, old man, who got up into his
carriage and acknowledged the ovation with a modest and confused air.
Gabrielle never forgot her first and touching glimpse of the man to
whom she was soon to owe so much.
The struggle with her mother over her cherished plan to go on the
stage went on for another year. A Mlle. Angelo, a friend of Mme. Réju,
attempted to make peace by offering Gabrielle a _dot_ of 10,000 francs
if she would accept a plan to marry as a solution of the difficulty.
But Gabrielle refused to be bought off, and steadfastly clung to her
ambition, with the result that the mother at last gave in.
The friend from whose windows Gabrielle had seen the battling
Communists had returned to Paris and now took up the girl’s cause. She
introduced Gabrielle to Charles Simon,[94] who knew well the actor
Regnier, now an honored teacher at the _Conservatoire_. The girl was
duly introduced to Regnier, who received her affably but tried to
dissuade her from attempting the career of an actress. He was unable
to overcome the ardent resolution of Gabrielle, and finally consented
to receive her, for two months, on the condition that if at the end of
the time she failed to convince him of her calling she would promise to
give up the attempt for good and all. Sure of success, she promised.
Regnier’s first task was to cure his pupil of a thickness of diction.
For hours every day she practiced enunciation, but found her master
hard to please. Nevertheless he must have seen promise in her, for
during the summer (of 1872) he wrote to Charles Simon that when classes
assembled he would receive Gabrielle as a regularly enrolled pupil.
When the _Conservatoire_ reopened, she passed her entrance examination
by reading the rôle of Henriette in _Les Femmes Savantes_, and was
admitted. Here began, when she was fifteen, the serious work of her
career.
She was an ardent pupil. Not content with the regular course, she and
her mother squeezed their narrow means that the girl might amplify her
studies with a number of private lessons with Regnier at his house.
He gave her the lessons, but when she offered to pay, he refused to
accept. “One does not accept pay,” he said, “when he is privileged to
deal with the temperament of an artist.” And, thus, the trial months
past, Regnier, instead of sending Gabrielle packing, engaged himself to
teach her as best he could, gratis, till her period as a student should
end.
In January (1873), came the annual elimination examination. Gabrielle,
like the rest, submitted to the test that weeded out the less promising
pupils. She had a rôle--that of Agnes--not altogether suited to her,
her dress was not too well chosen, she was at the most awkward of ages,
and she was by no means the prettiest girl of the lot. Gazing at her,
Edward Thierry, director of the _Comédie Française_, said in a doubtful
tone to Regnier, “Do we keep _this_?” “Yes,” promptly replied Regnier,
“she is in my class and she stays.” At the end of the school year came
the annual competition. For her part in the preliminary examination
Regnier chose _L’Intrigue Épistolaire_. Thierry, again one of the
judges, failed to recognize her and said, “This child is charming! She
is the hope of the competition.” And, imitating his colleague’s former
doubting tone, Regnier now said, “We keep _this_, then?”
In the competition itself Gabrielle, in this same scene of _L’Intrigue
Épistolaire_, fell just short of a prize and received a _premier
accessit_, or honorable mention,--not bad for a girl just turned
sixteen and a mere beginner.[95]
In this competition Mlle. Legault won the first prize in comedy and
with it a post at the _Comédie Française_. Her departure left vacant
a scholarship of 1,200 francs. In the same competition her successor
to the scholarship was to be determined. Regnier had resolved to get
the scholarship, if possible, for Gabrielle. The professors who sat
in judgment were forbidden by a rule of the _Conservatoire_ to impart
personally any news of the outcome. Such information was to come
only from the administration. Regnier, however, conspired with his
favorite pupil to relieve her of suspense. If she were the successful
candidate for the scholarship he was to rub his nose as he left the
building. After the meeting, therefore, she stood anxiously in the
_porte-cochère_, awaiting her teacher and the behavior of his index
finger. Imagine the importance of the moment to the rather shabbily
dressed, not too well-fed, nervously anxious girl. To stay her hunger
as she waited she was eating bits from a long loaf tucked under her
arm. First came M. Legouvé, who, by a curious chance, rubbed his nose
briskly as he left the building. Then came MM. Beauplan and Ambroise
Thomas, and each, oddly enough, suddenly gave his nose a vigorous rub.
Gabrielle wondered, but could not believe that all these demonstrations
were for her. Finally, out came Regnier, smiling, and slowly rubbing
his nose with the end of his forefinger. For the moment the loaf of
bread had been forgotten. Now she waved it aloft, dancing about in an
ecstasy of joy.
The winning of the scholarship made it possible for Gabrielle to go
on with her studies in the two months’ interval that preceded the
reopening of the _Conservatoire_.
Francisque Sarcey was discerning enough to note the promise in this
sixteen year old girl. He said of her, in speaking to the playwright
Meilhac: “She has a face you would know as Parisian a mile off ... and
she is full of the devil. If this girl doesn’t make her way, I shall
be much surprised.... She is charming; she is piquant; and if I were a
manager I would engage her out of hand.”
To eke out the family income, Gabrielle had two pupils, youngster
though she was. They were young girls from Gascony, and it was her task
to cure them of their un-Parisian accent. She remembers that one day
when she was on her way to her pupils, the omnibus passed a church.
The crowd about the door, and the numerous flowers, denoted a funeral.
“They are burying Desclée,”[96] said a fellow passenger. Gabrielle had
seen Desclée in some of her notable successes:--_Froufrou_, _La Femme
de Claude_, _La Princesse Georges_--and had been stirred to renewed
ambition by her art. So now she was tempted to alight and pay her
respects to the dead actress’ memory; but she remembered her lesson,
and went on to her pupils.
Her last year (1873–4) at the _Conservatoire_ Mme. Réjane remembers not
only for its months of hard study but for an incident or two that,
trivial in themselves, had considerable importance in her youthfully
ambitious mind. One morning Regnier called on her to recite “_La Fille
d’Honneur_,” a poem she had memorized by hearing it often spoken by
a fellow pupil. She was horribly nervous. Her own two pupils were
present, as _auditrices_, and Gabrielle feared the usual frequent
interruption of Regnier, who as a rule made his pupils repeatedly go
back over imperfectly recited passages. This time, however, he allowed
her to proceed to the end, which agitated her still more, and then
he said in a solemn tone as if pronouncing a final judgment on her:
“_C’est très bien, ma petite; descends, tu seras une grande artiste_.”
Réjane says that the intense joy of that instant never was equaled
afterwards, even in the moments of her greatest triumphs.
The pupils of the _Conservatoire_ were permitted to accept engagements
to play on Sundays at the little theatre of the _Tour-d’Auvergne_.
There it was that Gabrielle made her first public appearance. The
play was _Les Deux Timides_, and in acting it she had the inexpert
assistance of Albert Carré. In the middle of the piece M. Carré was
seated at a desk, writing a letter, when his nose began to bleed. He
bolted from the stage, leaving the _débutante_ alone to face her first
audience in the midst of a staggering contretemps. Advice was hoarsely
whispered from the wings to do this or that, to walk off, to sit down,
to wait for Carré; Gabrielle coolly seated herself and took up the
writing of the letter until, a moment later, the bleeding stopped,
Carré returned.[97]