Sarah Bernhardt. And the woman created the star

"I’m not sure that Madame Sarah Bernhardt, at the point she’s at, is still able to find the right intonation to say "Good morning Sir, how are you?" She needs the extraordinary to be herself [1]" The critic Jules Lemaître may have ironized, but he too succumbed to the actress’s charms and recognized her triumph: "More than any other, she will have known enormous, concrete, intoxicating, maddening glory, the glory of conquerors and Caesars. In all the countries of the world, she has been given receptions that are not given to kings." Jules Lemaître, Les Contemporains, 1886-1899.]].

1. Étienne Carjat (1828-1906)
Sarah Bernhardt as Doña Maria de Neubourg,
in Victor Hugo’s Ruy Blas, 1872
Photograph
Paris, Musée Carnavalet
Photo: Paris Musées/Musée Carnavalet

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And more than a queen, it’s a star that the Petit Palais celebrates (ill. 1). The exhibition, organized on the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of her death, shows that Sarah Bernhardt was not only a great actress - Réjane and Julia Bartet were just as great - she was a veritable star, who was not content to play roles on stage, but made a spectacle of her life, punctuated by skilfully orchestrated antics and scandals. On stage and off, Sarah played with her image to create a myth.

2. Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923)
Self-portrait as a Chimera, c. 1880
Bronze - 8 x 10 x 9.5 cm
Étampes, Musée Intercommunal
Photo: Étampes

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She was "la Divine", the "monstre sacré" that fascinated Cocteau, she was a fantastic creature, appearing as a chimera in a self-portrait as a bonze as in a caricature by André Gill (ill. 2 and 3). She was a phoenix constantly rising from the ashes: whether she was playing Phèdre, Doña Sol - Hernani’s mistress - or the Lady of the Camellias, she knew how to agonize so well on stage, with her revolting eyes and swooning body, that people came to the theater to see her die. Sometimes, in fact, she would threaten to make people give in to her demands: "if you don’t do what I want, I’ll stop dying". She expired on stage as well as at home, being photographed lying in a coffin (ill. 4) or wearing a naturalized bat. In this way, she fed the rumor mill, polishing up her macabre aura.

3. André Gill (1840-1885)
Caricature of Sarah Bernhardt as a chimera, circa 1880
Oil on panel - 54 x 34 cm
Couilly-Pont-aux-Dames, Musée des Artistes
Photo: bbsg

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Her exotic menagerie was the talk of the town. His lion cub not only defecated generously in his hotel room, he terrorized the establishment’s guests, his puma jumped on the knees of his sprawled guests, while Ali Gaga the alligator paced lazily around his living room, eventually dying soaked in champagne. There was also the Chrysagère tortoise, whose golden shell was studded with topazes, the Bizibouzou parrot and the Darwin monkey.

4. Achille Mélandri (1845-1904)
Sarah Bernhardt…