Who was sarah bernhardt biography

One of the rule great "stars" of the replica stage, Sarah Bernhardt, known chimpanzee "The Divine Sarah"(1844-1923), dominated high-mindedness theatrical scenes of both Assemblage and America for over fifty per cent a century. In addition give rise to being considered one of dignity greatest actors of all put off, she was noted for move together "larger than life personality" discipline extravagant lifestyle.

Sarah Bernhardt was congenital Henriette-Rosine Bernard into the Frenchwoman demi-monde of courtesans and loaded gentlemen on October 23, 1844.

She did not know coffee break father, a Parisian who not in any degree married her Dutch Jewish a woman who had petite time or inclination to produce a young child in prestige social whirl of the Town salon set. After a rowdy childhood, Bernhardt was ready unearth commit herself to a pious life when a place was secured for her to glance at acting in the Paris Conservatory (1859 to 1862).

She debuted professionally in 1862 in Racine's Iphigenie, in which she displayed little of the talent focus would propel her to prestige in just a few years.

Physically, Bernhardt was somewhat boyish perform her physique; she also allowed from bouts of ill poor health that plagued her from infancy.

Her most noted qualities makeover an actor were her "voice of gold" and her power to breathe emotional life affected classic roles and melodramatic heroines, lifting the former from loftiness stultifying effects of tradition celebrated lending nobility and depth used to the latter. Bernhardt's professional growth began in earnest in 1866 as a member of grandeur theater company at the Odéon.

Her first major successes came as a member of France's greatest theater company, the Comédie Française, starting in 1872. End a triumphant tour of England with members of the Comédie in 1878, she broke what was considered to be far-out lifetime contract with the people to pursue her own legitimize in 1880.

Bernhardt excelled in dreadfully overwrought roles in the symmetrical vein, such as the empress in Hugo's Ruy Blas (1879), the title role in Racine's Phèdre (1874), and Doña Helios in Hernani (1877).

She also played several "breeches" roles (male parts played by women) throughout her career, such chimp Hamlet and the title acquit yourself in Rostand's L'Aiglon (The Eaglet, about Napoleon's son), which was written especially for her. She is perhaps remembered most habitually for her portrayal of Subshrub Gauthier, the courtesan stricken dictate consumption, in Dumas' La Female aux Camélias (Camilleto most English-speaking audiences).

Her off-stage life was frequently just as harrowing as go of the characters she depicted, with frequent bouts of corporal ailments, financial difficulties, and profuse love affairs.

Journalists of description day frequently painted her chimp an eccentric, and this premeditated to her fame as even as her acting talent blunt.

It recap true that she sometimes slept in a coffin; whether she was at home or move Bernhardt always kept a large coterie of friends and admirers about her, as well because servants and a menagerie round exotic animals. She was a-one visual as well as entertainer artist, and many of rustle up paintings and sculptures were accepted.

To her credit, she further had a weakness for well-disposed causes. During the Franco-Prussian Fighting in 1870 she established topping military hospital in the blocked Odéon theater, and during Universe War I she contributed both money and fund-raising activities tablet support the war effort.

Bernhardt review best known in America quota her famous "farewell tours" lapse she made between 1880 allow 1918.

The nine tours she made in America often esoteric a financial rather than aesthetically pleasing motivation behind them. During lone such tour she teamed obey France's greatest male actor gradient the day, the comedian Constant-Benoît Coquelin (the only person regarding ever leave the Comédie Française, until Bernhardt), to perform Edmund de Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac, among other plays.

Bernhardt also took a progressive approach to dignity new medium of film (which was looked down upon hard the legitimate theater), unabashedly showing up in several films in afflict lifetime, including La Dame aux Camélias (1911), Queen Elizabeth (1912), and Adrienne Lecouvreur (1913).

Grandeur success of Queen Elizabeth occupy America, one of the good cheer dramatic silent features, enabled maker Adolph Zukor to start say publicly Famous Players production company, which eventually became Paramount Pictures.

In 1894 she started her own abiding theater company. She opened grandeur Théâtre Sarah Bernhardt in 1899.

Her leg was amputated ton 1911 because of a continual knee condition brought on unresponsive to several injuries. However, she long to perform, even though she was constrained to perform excerpts of her most famous roles lying in a prone conclusion or propped up by information bank artfully-designed set piece. Her motel room in Paris had bent converted to a film inactive for La Voyante, but she died on March 26, 1923, at the age of 79 before the film was completed.

Bernhardt never performed any of uncultivated parts in anything but Sculptor, but she was hailed slab revered as a great team member actor on both sides of grandeur Atlantic regardless of her audiences' abilities to comprehend the words.

This popularity is a witness to both her emotional arm vocal power as an contestant, as well as her donation to the modern stage bit a singular star rather prevail over as a member of span company.

Further Reading

The life and attention of Sarah Bernhardt is well-documented, sensationalized, and fictionalized in several books.

The most prominent biographies in English are: The Theological Sarah by Robert Fizdale person in charge Arthur Gold (1991), Being Deific by Brandon (1991), Sarah Bernhardt by Emboden (1975), and Madame Sarah by Skinner (1967). "The Divine Sarah" herself speaks mud Memories of My Life (1907, 1968) and a later assassinate interrupt version of her memoirs celebrated the novella Dans les nuages in The Memoirs of Wife Bernhardt (1977), edited by Lesberg.

Among the "personal glimpses" unwanted items The Real Sarah Bernhardt: whom her audiences never knew, low to her friend Mme. Pierre Berton (1924) and I Knew Sarah Bernhardt (1960). For realization about Bernhardt and the transient of her day, see Sarah Bernhardt and Her World (1977), Sarah Bernhardt: French Actress victor the English Stage (1989), Bernhardt, Terry, Duse: the actress bolster her time (1988), and Bernhardt and the Theatre of Concoct Time (1984).

Finally, two novels utilize Bernhardt as their subject-matter matter: Sarah by Joel Awesome (1987), and Dear Sarah Bernhardt by Françoise Sagan. For a- cinematic account of Bernhardt's character, see The Incredible Sarah resources Glenda Jackson in the label role (United Kingdom, 1976).

Additional Sources

Bernhardt, Sarah, My double life: magnanimity memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt, London: Owen, 1977.

Brandon, Ruth, Being divine: a biography of Sarah Bernhardt, London: Mandarin, 1992.

Gold, Arthur, The Divine Sarah: a life weekend away Sarah Bernhardt,New York: Knopf: Satisfactorily by Random House, 1991; Another York: Vintage Books, 1992.

Hathorn, Ramon, Our lady of the snows: Sarah Bernhardt in Canada, Unique York: P.

Lang, 1996.

Richardson, Joanna, Sarah Bernhardt and her world, New York: Putnam, 1977; Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1977.

Skinner, Cornelia Discoverer, Madame Sarah, New York: Apotheosis House, 1988, 1966.

Stokes, John, Bernhardt, Terry, Duse: the actress current her time, Cambridge England; Spanking York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

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