in Naples. Here, for some reason, its leading actress was lost to
it, on the eve of the presentation of _Thérèse Raquin_. To Duse, in
the emergency, was assigned the part of Thérèse. The stage--that of
the old Florentine Theatre--was a famous one; Salvini and Ristori had
often trod its boards. And she was to face the most discerning public
that had yet seen her. The result was in the way of recompense to
Duse for her years of struggle and poverty. Cesare Rossi, one of the
distinguished men of the theatre in the Italy of his day, was present.
Immediately he offered to place her under his own management. Duse’s
years of apprenticeship may be said to end at this point, for from now
on her progress was steadily upward.
Her marriage, which came at this time, when she was about twenty, was
only a brief interruption. It was another touch of tragedy in Duse’s
life. With her, “it has been difficult to choose the point when the
make believe of the theatre ended and the reality of life began.” Her
husband was a Signor Checchi, an actor of mediocre ability. A daughter
was born, but the marriage was to Duse a great disappointment.
Back to the stage she went, after this time of trial, with little heart
for her work, though Rossi had given her a good contract. Then, in
1880, while she was in Turin, she saw Bernhardt in _La Princesse de
Bagdad_, one of the plays by which the younger Dumas was making inroads
on the old-fashioned classical repertoire. Duse at once announced
her intention to play in the same piece. The resulting negotiations
with Dumas served not only to introduce some of his plays--of course
translated into Italian--into the theatre in Italy, but to begin a
warm though curiously impersonal friendship between the author and the
rising young actress. She conceived the most ardent admiration for the
man and his work, and it was not long before he was urging her to try
her fortunes in Paris. Many years were to elapse before she was to make
that venture, for very good reasons, as will later appear.[110]
Dumas, it would appear, and the success with which she made his plays,
_La Princesse de Bagdad_[111] and _La Femme de Claude_, understood and
liked in Italy, had a large share in restoring her interest in life
and her work, and in increasing her fame. She was rapidly becoming
known throughout Italy. By the time of her first venture outside of
Italy--which took her to faraway South America[112]--she had achieved
success in Turin, in Rome and in Milan.
As yet there was little thought of her as other than an Italian for
the Italians. Dumas’ appeals to act in Paris had always been in vain.
If reports of her acting had been carried home by visitors from the
great capitals, she was not thought of, as yet, as a world’s actress.
To carry plays to Moscow, to Vienna, to Berlin, and act them there
effectively in a foreign tongue, an actress must needs be of great
power, must have a genius that makes itself felt above all differences
of speech. In 1892 she went to Vienna, comparatively unheralded, and
from there word went forth that a new and great actress had come
from her native Italy and blazed into a sudden glory. Francisque
Sarcey, the distinguished French critic, had followed the company
of the _Comédie Française_ to Vienna, and from there wrote to the
_Temps_ accounts of her display of versatility in playing equally well
_Antony_ and _Cleopatra_, _La Dame aux Camélias_ (“_Camille_”) and
_Divorçons_. Sworn admirer of Bernhardt that he was, he easily found
faults in Duse, but he praised her justly too: “She is not handsome,
but has an intelligent and expressive face and wonderful mobility of
features. Her voice is not particularly musical, but its occasional
metallic vibrations produce thrilling effects. Her diction, like Mme.
Bernhardt’s, is distinct and clear, each syllable coming out with
well-rounded edges.” Though Sarcey thought her, as Cleopatra, to have
“the air of a crowned grisette,” (in contrast to Sarah, who was “always
the Queen of Egypt”) he confessed that “La Duse carried the house
by storm with her alternate explosions of fury and sudden tones of
touching tenderness.” Sarcey’s early sympathy for Duse was, as we shall
see, to be of benefit to her later. During this transalpine tour Duse
acted in Russia and Germany, as well as in Austria; and now was to come
her first venture in an English-speaking country.
In 1893 Americans interested in the European stage knew that Duse had
achieved fame in her own country and had succeeded notably in Austria
and Germany. The average American theatregoer knew little of her. Even
those who had heard of her had little notion that she really was an
actress of the first rank, fully worthy of comparison with Bernhardt
and Modjeska.
On an evening of January, 1893, when a large and brilliant audience
assembled at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York to see her
in _Camille_, the prevailing atmosphere was therefore one of
curiosity.[113] Duse had not long to wait before striking fire. One
who was present said: “Her power over an audience was manifested in a
very striking manner before she had been on the stage five minutes.
The actress had scarcely made her appearance and given her careless
nod of recognition to De Varville before everybody was in an attitude
of strained attention. Already the old and hackneyed character had
been revivified by the power of genius. Signora Duse does not attempt
to make a Frenchwoman of Camille, but fills her with the fire and
passion of her own Italian temperament. But both the fire and passion,
except at very rare intervals, are kept under complete control. Their
glow is apparent in all the love scenes, and breaks into flame at
one or two critical moments, but it is by the suggestion of force
in reserve that she makes her most striking effects. Only an artist
of the highest type could create so profound an impression with so
little apparent effort or forethought, by some light and seemingly
spontaneous gesture, by a sudden change of facial expression, or
by some subtle inflection of the voice. The chief beauties of her
impersonation are to be found in its lesser and, to the inexperienced
eye, insignificant details. All her by-play, although it appears to
be due only to the impulse of the moment, is dearly the result of the
most deliberate design, and changes with every variety of mood or
condition which it is meant to illustrate. The impetuous, audacious,
bored and querulous Camille of the first act becomes quite another
creature beneath the softening influence of the love passages with
Armand--such love passages as have not been witnessed in a New York
theatre half a dozen times in this generation--and is transformed into
a type of placid and contented womanhood in the country home of Armand.
She played the whole of this act with perfect skill and profoundest
pathos, and in the scene of parting with her lover, she suggested the
heart-breaking under a smile, with a simplicity so true and so poignant
that her own suppressed sob found many an echo in the audience.”[114]
In the many accounts of Duse’s Camille there is constant reference
to a simple and telling interpolation that she made in the scene in
which Armand publicly denounces her. Where other actresses have sought
to express Marguérite’s feelings only through facial expression and
pantomime, Duse spoke at intervals during his tirade her lover’s
name--“Armand!”--at first in simple incredulity, then in fright, then
in deeply hurt pride, then in heart-breaking anguish[115]. Sarcey,
however, severely condemned her for making this emendation, which, he
thought, ruined the naturalness and effectiveness of the scene.
Duse had come unheralded, but her few weeks in New York proved a
genuine “sensation.” She followed _Camille_ with _Fédora_, in which she
again demonstrated her strange power of creating a stirring dramatic
effect by the simplest and apparently the most unstudied means.
As Clotilde in _Fernande_ she presented another type: “The change
wrought in her by the dispatch that proved her lover’s perfidy was an
extraordinary illustration of suppressed emotion, and the remorseless
deliberation of her manner while beguiling the faithless Andre into
the net which she had spread for him was intensely eloquent of a
woman scorned. Not until after the marriage had been accomplished
did she give vent to the rage which she had restrained so long; but
when the floodgates of passion were once opened, the torrent of her
wrath and hate and scorn might almost be called appalling. This one
revelation of her power would place her instantly in the front rank
of emotional actresses.”[116] Another jealous woman was revealed in
Santuzza in _Cavalleria Rusticana_. Astonishing in this part was the
complete sinking of her own personality in that of a peasant woman.
By voice, walk, subtle suggestions of gesture and pose, she achieved
a masterpiece in what the French call “getting within the skin” of a
character. When to the other impersonations she added her Mirandolina
in _La Locandiera_, a part calling for a charming archness and humor,
and as sure a touch in comedy as Santuzza in tragedy, her wide range
was astonishingly revealed.[117]
After visiting a few other American cities, Duse’s company arrived
in London, and opened an engagement there in May (1893). She was the
first Italian since Salvini to claim London’s serious attention. She
was at least as unknown there to “the general” as she had been in New
York, though of course there were many who had either seen her on the
continent or had read glowing accounts of her. But there were many, at
first, to ask: “Who is she?” When she made her presence felt, as she
promptly did, there arose a fine critical storm with her as the center.
Bernhardt was idolized in London, appeared there in the same season,
and naturally comparison was rife. As a matter of fact, comparison
between Duse and Bernhardt, both of whom were well within their prime
in the early nineties, was one of the favorite intellectual amusements
of the day, with both professional and amateur critics. Duse succeeded
in London, however, as she had succeeded elsewhere.[118]
Thus had she swung about the world, making known her great gifts, and
firmly establishing a genuine, honestly won fame. Only Paris remained
to be conquered, and before she attempted that formidable task, she
visited America again.[119]
Now, at last, came Duse’s invasion of Paris. Why was it delayed so
long? What were the circumstances of her going? And how did she fare
there? The answers to these questions form a curious chapter in her
history, and in that of a great sister artist. Duse’s few weeks in
Paris in the early summer of 1897 mark the climax of her career, and
may well be described in some detail.
It is an established tenet of Parisian faith that nothing in the
artistic world can really be said to have won the stamp of authentic
achievement until it has been seen and approved by Paris. With much
justification, surely, the French are likely to consider themselves
final arbiters, and they do not go out of their way to discover merit
in a foreigner who has not yet shown his art in “the home of art.”
Paris had heard the echoes of Duse’s achievements, then, with the
comfortable feeling that if she really amounted to anything she would
come to Paris and prove it. Until then Parisians could wait. Duse was
known to be the best Italian actress, Dumas’ interest in her had been
evidenced years before, and her success in the large European cities
and in America and England was by no means unknown. But the occasional
whisper that Duse was comparable to Bernhardt herself brought only
indulgent smiles. The lady evidently avoided the test.
That she had avoided the test was true. Duse had been really afraid to
go to Paris. Later, after she had won the day, she admitted as much. A
failure in Paris would be, she recognized, a fatal blow to her prestige
and ambitions.
When Dumas had urged her to try her fortunes in the French capital,
he assumed that she would act in French. But Duse knew how sensitive
were French ears to the niceties of the language, how dependent on
purity and beauty of speech was much of the drama to which they were
accustomed, and how, she would be placing herself under a heavy
handicap in acting in a strange medium.
It was not, then, until in Austria, Russia, England and the United
States she had been warmly received while acting in her native tongue,
that the conquest of Paris began to seem possible.
Enter now, Sarah Bernhardt. Mme. Sarah, unlike most Parisians, had seen
Duse and knew her quality. She knew the truth of the growing impression
that Duse was really a worthy rival. Therefore, if Duse was really
coming to Paris, Sarah wished to involve herself in the proceedings,
and protect her position. It was announced that where others had failed
to induce Duse to come to Paris, Bernhardt had succeeded. More, she
had offered Duse the use of her own theatre. Thus Duse was put at once
in the position of _protégée_, and the press resounded with praises of
Sarah’s magnanimity.
Duse chose _Magda_ for her first appearance. It was a part well suited
to her, and in it she had less to fear in comparison with Bernhardt,
who had never scored so heavily with it as with her other rôles.
Bernhardt forthwith called on Duse, and the announcement at once
followed that the opening performance was to be changed to _La Dame aux
Camélias_ (_Camille_). Whatever the honesty of Bernhardt’s motives,
she had succeeded in inducing Duse to appear first in a part that was
one of Sarah’s own triumphs. One can imagine the new security that
Bernhardt felt.
The house was crowded with the most brilliant audience that Paris
could muster. Word had gone forth that one was to appear who had been
mentioned in the same breath with the idolized Bernhardt. Rochefort
was there, and so was Halévy, and Got, the _doyen_ of the _Française_,
and a throng of the distinguished men and women of the Paris of the
day. For the critics, Lemaître was there, and Catulle Mendes, and, most
important, Francisque Sarcey. Sarah herself was there, holding court,
and serene and smiling in her rôle of protecting friend.
The story of that first performance is soon told. It was a
disappointment. During the first act Duse was almost painfully
nervous; in the second she showed flashes of power, and won some mild
enthusiasm; in the third she was listened to only with patience; in the
fourth the audience took more pleasure in Ando, her “leading man,” than
in Duse herself; in the fifth she played the death scene beautifully,
but it was too late. “If someone had triumphed it was not Duse.”
Already Paris thought that it had taken Duse’s measure, and now that
the alleged comparison with Bernhardt was disposed of settled back to
enjoy her, if possible, for her own sake. _Magda_ followed. The critics
were a little more impressed. Sarcey in particular--his criticism
always appeared after a few days’ interval--poured balm on Duse’s
feelings. He began to see that all had not yet been told. “Everyone,”
he wrote, “was delighted to see so much naturalness combined with such
great force of feeling.... I think I am beginning to distinguish the
characteristic traits of her peculiar talent.”
After the first performance of _Magda_, Duse had been suddenly taken
ill. Immediately after Sarcey’s encouraging article--whether or not it
was the cause,[120]--she recovered and was ready for the lists again.
Bernhardt grew apprehensive. She proposed a gala performance in aid of
the fund for a memorial to Dumas. She announced that she would give
the last two acts of _La Dame aux Camélias_, and that Duse had been
asked to give the second and third acts of the same play. Now the third
act was the point where Duse had most signally failed to please Paris
on that memorable first night. She was by now wary of Bernhardt’s
“friendship,” and said that while she was eager to appear in honor of
Dumas, she would substitute the second act of _La Femme de Claude_. And
on this substitution she insisted in spite of all Mme. Sarah could say.
The audience had anticipated a rare feast of acting and was not
disappointed. It applauded both actresses to the echo. But notice
how Sarah worked into this occasion an element that had reference
not so much to the glorification of Dumas as to the glorification of
herself: “The curtain rises to disclose the celebrated bust of Dumas,
by Carpeaux, which occupies the center of the stage. Grouped about,
at a respectful distance, are all the artists who have taken part
in the performance, while in advance of all, face to face with the
bust itself, stands Sarah Bernhardt. She still wears the costume of
Marguérite Gauthier, and is there as the accepted symbol, the unrivaled
personification of Dumas’ immortal creation. Duse is in the background
along with the others.
“A poem has been composed especially for the occasion by Edmond
Rostand, in which Bernhardt is allowed to address Dumas in a tone of
familiar grandeur, as befits one genius in the presence of another.
After one expressive pause, therefore, she changes her attitude and
begins.
“‘She recites these exquisite verses [the account in the _Gaulois_
said] with a charm of tenderness, an intensity of feeling, that arouse
new transports of enthusiasm. The whole audience is on its feet,
quivering, with arms outstretched toward the prodigious _artiste_, who
makes an effort to bow, but is overcome by the force of her emotion.
The curtain rises and falls an incalculable number of times, disclosing
the great _tragédienne_ in her gracious attitude of homage to the great
dramatist. And then, with a movement of touching spontaneity, Sarah
goes to La Duse, seizes her hand, and both incline before the bust of
the master. The spectacle is one that will never be forgotten.’”[121]
How very Gallic! And how extremely effective as an apotheosis of
Bernhardt! With Duse triumphantly subordinated by means of Bernhardt’s
apparently magnanimous demonstrations of friendship, and with the Paris
season practically at an end, Mme. Sarah left town and repaired to
England.
In spite of all, Duse went on. In rapid succession she played _La
Locandiera_, _Sogno di un Mattino di Primavera_ (a new play by
d’Annunzio), _La Femme de Claude_, and _Cavalleria Rusticana_.
A curious thing happened. Her great first-night audience Duse had not
been able to overwhelm. Now, by the slow-working influence of her
very genuine art, she gained a cumulative hold on the imagination
and affection of the Paris public. An open letter to her, signed
“Sganarelle,” appeared in _Le Temps_, appealing to her to give a
final matinée especially for her brother and sister artists to whom
“her methods had opened new horizons.” “Sganarelle” proved to be
Sarcey. His project was taken up with an enthusiasm that told how
effective, after all, had been Duse’s unobtrusive art. Lavrouniet, in
_Figaro_, speaking of Bernhardt and Duse, in a few sentences admirably
characterized the art of both. The former, he says, “from a constant
desire to be unique, supplies all the highest and rarest expressions
of art, except one--simplicity. In La Duse, we have seen on the stage
a woman’s nature and that of an _artiste_ completing each other--the
_artiste_ playing with all the sensitiveness of a woman, and the woman
allowing herself to be entirely absorbed in the _artiste_.” Lemaître
also wrote sympathetically: “She came to us, preceded by a European
reputation a rival sister of the great Sarah. We were not deceived, for
Duse is a dramatic _artiste_, original to the core, and of the first
rank. We were told she was beyond everything an astonishing realist;
that she lived her parts rather than played them, and in this way took
her audience by storm. And that statement is doubtless exact.... What
seems to me incontestably Mme. Duse’s is her singular charm and grace,
her sweetness and tenderness. On that account her search for the truth,
her solicitude to avoid the exhibition of any artifice, her realism,
so very minute and so very sincere, reach even to poetry. Hers is the
unique charm of a matured woman,--impassioned, bruised, suffering,
nervous,--in whom, however, survives a young and ingenuous grace,
almost that of a young girl, of a strange young girl.”
Duse promptly and gladly accepted the invitation to give the special
matinée. Her lease of Bernhardt’s theatre had expired and it was
necessary to write to England to ask the use of the house. Bernhardt
tendered it gratuitously, but, wishing still to have a share in all
that was going on, requested that the invitations bear her name and
Duse’s side by side. Duse saw difficulties. “I could not invite
my companions in France to come and admire me. That would be too
presumptuous.” When Sarah could not have her way, she suggested that
the performance be abandoned. Instead, the _Porte St. Martin_ was
secured. The newspapers got wind of the negotiations that Duse’s
manager and Bernhardt had been carrying on by telegraph, and when the
latter’s motives became apparent, there was another reaction in favor
of Duse. There was room in the _Porte St. Martin_ for only one-tenth
of the applicants for seats, and, when the day arrived, the audience
seemed to Sarcey “like a violin whose strings are tightened and ready
to vibrate under the bow.” “It was the first time,” he wrote, “I have
seen an audience thus formed and in such a frame of mind. There was
no artificial commotion; it was expectation, full of security and
joy.” Of what followed Jules Huret wrote in _Figaro_: “I am afraid
of my incompetence to describe the powerful, the profound emotion of
those three hours, where an entire audience composed of the flower of
French comedians, of well-known writers, great painters and celebrated
sculptors, honored a foreign _artiste_ with the most vibrating, the
most enthusiastic, the most poignant manifestation that it is possible
to witness.”
Duse played for them _Cavalleria Rusticana_, the last act of _La Dame
aux Camélias_, and the second act of _La Femme de Claude_. Never had
she acted better. When the curtain fell “the whole audience rose to its
feet, _bravas_ and _vivats_ thundered through the house, handkerchiefs
and hats were waving, flowers flew from boxes,--‘_Au revoir! Au revoir!
Au revoir!_’--and ten times the curtain had to be raised before the
smiling actress, who did not attempt to conceal her joy. Then the stage
was immediately invaded by the crowd. Some wished only to see her once
again; some must embrace her; others asked for a flower from the bunch
she held in her hand. During one whole hour the procession did not
cease. I saw there young actresses and rising actors, with tears in
their eyes, not daring to approach her. Coquelin wishes to act with her
just once and begs her to play in French.... Mme. Laurent comes also,
and slowly, with sober words, expresses her admiration. The Ambassador
of Italy and his wife arrive in their turn, and congratulate her with
happy faces. And her troupe, who leave to-day for Italy, wait to say
good-by.... She kisses them, much moved.” Next day Duse was fêted by
the _Comédie Française_. What a change was this in a few short weeks!
The ending was a fine outburst, of a sort possible only to the Latin
races, and it marked the very zenith of Duse’s career.
Such was Duse’s progress from a poverty-stricken, obscure childhood to
a place, at the age of thirty-eight, equal, to say the least, that of
any actress of her day.