Friday, February 11, 2022

Sarah Bernhardt Visits Mobile, Alabama in 1881







Alabama has had numerous famous visitors over the years. Aaron Burr was arrested for treason in Wakefield and confined briefly to Fort Stoddart in what was then the Mississippi Territory, but both places became part of the Alabama Territory in 1817. Since then the Marquis de Lafayette, Francis Scott Key, Harriet Martineau, Oscar Wilde, John Phillip Sousa, various U.S. presidents and many others have passed through for one reason or another. One who came briefly was Sarah Bernhardt [1844-1923].

The French actress has often been declared the first modern celebrity, the first international stage star, and so forth. The accolades during her lifetime were--almost--universal. In addition to her prolific acting career, she owned a string of theaters in her native France and in her spare time painted, sculpted and wrote. She had to have a leg amputated in 1915 but continued acting on stage and in films until just weeks before her death. 

Wikipedia notes some of the reactions to her talents. "Sarah Bernhardt's performances were seen and appraised by many of the leading literary and cultural figures of the late 19th century. Mark Twain wrote, 'There are five kinds of actresses. Bad actresses, fair actresses, good actresses, great actresses, and then there is Sarah Bernhardt.' Oscar Wilde called her 'the Incomparable One', scattered lilies in her path, and wrote a play in French, Salomé, especially for her; it was banned by British censors before it could be performed.[180] " 

George Bernard Shaw and Anton Chekhov were not impressed, however, as her acting style so full of artificiality and ego did not fit the growing naturalism of all the arts in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. No matter. When she died, 30,000 people followed her casket from the church to the cemetery.

Bernhardt studied acting at the Paris Conservatory under two French actors from 1860 until 1862. By 1880 she had triumphed in different roles at various Parisian theaters, led the Comédie Française on a successful tour of London, and demonstrated her famous temper and talent for scandal numerous times. In that year she led her troupe on its first American tour, riding a special train for 157 performances in 51 cities. By the last performance in May 1881, Bernhardt had earned $194,000, which she carried back to France as a chest of gold coins. The wise Bernhardt insisted on such payment.

Between acting stints in France, other elaborate tours followed over the next twelve years, taking her to the nations of Europe, South America, and also to Russia. Prominent playwrights wrote for her, many of her leading men and others were among her lovers. Bernhardt lived an elaborate lifestyle; her tours were often undertaken when she needed funds. Her son Maurice was born out of wedlock; she had one  marriage early in life that lasted a few years. Bernhardt  eventually established her own theaters in Paris, and had a series of farewell tours from 1901 through 1914, including three in the United States. 

During all these years in Paris and on the road Bernhardt performed in many different roles. In her first one in 1862, she appeared as Iphigenia in the play of that name by Racine, one of France's greatest 17th century playwrights. In 1922 she performed her final role as the title character in Louis Vernouil's Regine Armond. Between those appearances she played an enormous number of characters ranging from Shakespeare's Lady MacBeth, Ophelia AND Hamlet [in different productions] to Cleopatra in the premier of Victorien Sardou's play to Werther in Goethe's play of that title. Of course, many of her roles were in classics or newly written plays by French authors. 

On her first American tour in 1880-81, Bernhardt's visit to Mobile came after performances in New Orleans in early February, 1881. The trip into the Big Easy was a nail-bitter. Bernhardt's train had to cross a bridge in danger of collapse or backtrack and arrive a day later. Bernhardt paid the engineer $2500 to cross the bridge; he telegraphed the money to his wife and promised to return it if he survived. Needless to say, everyone survived, and Bernhardt let him keep the money.

Due to various factors, the scheduled performance in Mobile began but was never completed. You can read the full account below in a chapter from her memoirs. She had traveled through Mobile on her way to New Orleans and tried to sleep in her train car when it stopped. Adoring fans kept her awake, and she doused some and a few reporters as well with a jug of water. 

She wrote that on her return to the city,

"It was therefore in this warlike atmosphere that I appeared before the public of Mobile. I wanted, however, to justify the good opinion of my defenders and confound my detractors. Yes, but the Gnome who had decided otherwise was there."

"Mobile was a city that was generally quite disdained by impresarii. There was only one theater. It had been let to the tragedian Barrett, who was to appear six days after me. All that remained was a miserable place, so small that I know of nothing that can be compared to it. We were playing “La Dame aux Camélias.” When Marguerite Gautier orders supper to be served, the servants who were to bring in the table 
ready laid tried to get it in through the door. But this was impossible. Nothing could be more comical than to see those unfortunate servants adopt every expedient."

The chaos that resulted only increased when part of the cheap scenery fell on the actors. The performance ended, and Bernhardt refunded the audience's money. "La Dame aux Camélias" or the "Lady of the Camelias" was based on the 1848 novel and subsequent play written by Alexander Dumas. They have been adapted numerous times in various media, including the 1936 film Camille with Greta Garbo. 

Biographies of Bernhardt are numerous; the one shown was published in 1991. Her memoirs are also available in printed form; an electronic version is linked below. 












Sarah Bernhardt ca. 1880

Source: Library of Congress via the Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women



Credit...Harvard Theater Collection, Houghton Library, Cambridge, Mass.






Bernhardt as Hamlet in London ca. 1890

Source: Library of Congress via the Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women




This 1891 production of Cleopatra, a melodrama by Sardou and Moreau, allowed Bernhardt to wear some elaborate costumes and featured a prominent death scene. 

Source: Wikipedia




In 1896

Source: Library of Congress via the Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women




Bernhardt in Gismonda from a painting by Theobald Chartran 

Source: Her autobiography, Memories of My Life published in 1907







I have been unable to locate any information on the Mobile Theatre. You can see a photo of Temperance Hall here. That building was demolished in 1923. 








CHAPTER XXIX
FROM THE GULF TO CANADA AGAIN

e arrived at Cincinnati safe and sound. We gave three performances there and set off once more for New Orleans. Now, I thought, we shall have some sunshine and we shall be able to warm our poor limbs, stiffened with three months of mortal cold. We shall be able to open our windows, and breathe fresh air instead of the suffocating and anæmia-giving steam heat. I fell asleep and dreams of warmth and sweet scents lulled me in my slumber. A knock at my door roused me suddenly, and my dog with ears erect sniffed at the door, but as he did not growl I knew it was some one of our party. I opened the door and Jarrett, followed by Abbey, made signs to me not to speak. Jarrett came in on tiptoes and closed the door again.

“Well, what is it now?” I asked.

“Why,” replied Jarrett, “the incessant rain during the last twelve days has swollen the river to such a height that the bridge across the bay of St. Louis threatens to give way. If we go back we shall require three or four days.”

I was furious. Three or four days and to go back to the snow again. Ah, no, I felt I must have sunshine!

“Why can we not pass? Oh, heavens, what shall we do!” I exclaimed.

“Well, the engine driver is here. He thinks that he might get across, but he has only just married, and he will try the crossing on condition that you give him $2,500, which he will at once send to Mobile where his father and wife live. If we 429get safely to the other side he will give you back this money, but if not it will belong to his family.”

“Yes, certainly, give him the money and let us cross.”

As I have said, I generally traveled by special train. This one was made up of only three carriages and the engine. I never doubted for a moment as to the success of this foolish and criminal attempt, and I did not tell anyone about it except my sister, my beloved Guérard, and my faithful Félicie and her husband Claude. The comedian, Angelo, who was sleeping in Jarrett’s berth on this journey, knew of it, but he was courageous and had faith in his star. The money was handed over to the engine driver who sent it off to Mobile. It was only just as we were actually starting that I had the vision of the responsibility I had taken upon myself, for it was risking without their consent the lives of twenty-seven persons. It was too late then to do anything, the train had started and at a terrific speed it touched the bridge. I had taken my seat on the platform and the bridge bent and swayed like a hammock under the dizzy speed of our wild course. When we were half way across it gave way so much that my sister grasped my arm and whispered: “Ah, we are drowning!” I certainly thought as she did that the supreme moment had arrived.

My last minute was not inscribed, though, for that day in the Book of Destiny. The train pulled itself together and we arrived on the other side of the water. Behind us we heard a terrible noise. The bridge had given way. For more than a week the trains from the East and the North could not enter the city.

I left the money to our brave engine driver but my conscience was by no means tranquil and for a long time my sleep was disturbed by the most frightful nightmares.

When getting out of the train I was more dead than alive. I had to submit to receiving the friendly but fatiguing deputation of my compatriots. Then, loaded with flowers, I climbed into the carriage that was to take me to the hotel. The roads were rivers and we were on an elevated spot. The lower part 430of the city, the coachman explained to us in Marseilles French, was inundated up to the tops of the houses. The negroes had been drowned by hundreds. “Ah, hussy!” he cried as he whipped up his horses. At that period the hotels in New Orleans were squalid—dirty, uncomfortable, black with cockroaches, and as soon as the candles were lighted, the bedrooms became filled with large mosquitoes that buzzed around and fell on one’s shoulders, sticking in one’s hair. Oh, I shudder still when I think of it!

At the same time there was an opera company in the city, the “star” of which was a charming woman, Emilie Ambre, who at one time came very near being Queen of Holland. The country was poor, like all the other American districts where the French were to be found preponderating. Ah, we are hardly good colonists!

The opera did a very poor business and we did not do excellently, either. Six performances would have been ample in that city; we gave eight.

Nevertheless, my sojourn pleased me immensely. An infinite charm was evolved from it. All these people, so different, black and white, had smiling faces. All the women were graceful. The shops were attractive from the cheerfulness of their windows. The open-air traders under the arcades challenged one another with joyful flashes of wit. The sun, however, did not show itself once. But these people had the sun within themselves.

I could not understand why boats were not used. The horses had water up to their hams, and it would have been impossible even to get into a carriage if the pavements had not been a meter or more high.

Floods being as frequent as the years, it would be of no use thinking of banking up the river or arm of the sea. But walking was made easy by the high pavements and small, movable bridges. The dark children amused themselves catching crayfish in the streams. Where did they come from? And they sold them to passersby. Now and again, we would see a whole family of water serpents speed by. They swept along 431with raised head and undulating body like long, starry sapphires.

I went down toward the lower part of the town. The sight was heartrending. All the cabins of the colored inhabitants had fallen into the muddy waters. They were there in hundreds squatting upon these moving wrecks, with eyes burning from fever, their white teeth chattering. Right and left, everywhere, were dead bodies floating about, knocking up against the wooden piles. Many ladies were distributing food, endeavoring to lead away the unfortunate negroes, but they refused to go. And the women would slowly shake their heads. One child of fourteen years of age had just been carried off to the hospital with his foot cut clean off at the ankle by an alligator. His family were howling with fury. They wished to keep the youngster with them. The negro quack doctor pretended that he could have cured him in two days and that the white quacks would leave him for a month in bed.

I left this city with regret, for it resembled no other city I had visited up to then. We were surprised to find that none of our party was missing though we had gone through—so they all said—various dangers. The hairdresser alone, a man called Ibé, could not recover his equilibrium, having become half mad from fear the second day of our arrival. At the theater he generally slept in the trunk in which he stored his wigs. However strange it may seem, the fact is quite true. The first night, everything passed off as usual, but during the second night he woke up the whole neighborhood by his shrieks. The unfortunate fellow had got off soundly to sleep, when he woke up with a feeling that his mattress, which hung over his collection of wigs, was being raised up by some inconceivable movements. He thought that some cat or dog had got into the trunk and he lifted up the feeble rampart. Two serpents were within, actively moving about, of a size sufficient to terrify the people that the shouts of the poor Figaro had caused to gather round.

He was still very pale when I saw him embark on board the boat that was to take us to our train. I called him and begged 432him to relate to me the odyssey of his terrible night. As he told me the story he showed me his heavy leg. “They were as thick as that, madame. Yes, like that....” And he quaked with fear as he recalled the dreadful girth of the reptiles. I thought that they were about one-quarter as thick as his leg, and that would have been enough to justify his fright, but the serpents in question were inoffensive water snakes that bite out of pure viciousness, but have no venom fangs.

We reached Mobile somewhat late in the day. We had stopped at that city on our way to New Orleans, and I had had a real attack of nerves caused by the “cheek” of the inhabitants who, in spite of the lateness of the hour, had got up a deputation to wait upon me. I was dead with fatigue and was dropping off to sleep in my bed on the car. I therefore energetically declined to see anybody. But these people knocked at my windows, sang about my carriage, and finally exasperated me. I quickly threw up one of the windows and emptied a jug of water on their heads. Women and men, among whom were several journalists, were splashed. Their fury was great.

I was returning to that city, preceded by the above story embellished in their favor by the drenched reporters. But on the other hand there were others who had been more courteous and had refused to go and disturb a lady at such an unearthly hour of the night. These latter were in the majority and took up my defense.

It was therefore in this warlike atmosphere that I appeared before the public of Mobile. I wanted, however, to justify the good opinion of my defenders and confound my detractors. Yes, but the Gnome who had decided otherwise was there.

Mobile was a city that was generally quite disdained by impresarii. There was only one theater. It had been let to the tragedian Barrett, who was to appear six days after me. All that remained was a miserable place, so small that I know of nothing that can be compared to it. We were playing “La Dame aux Camélias.” When Marguerite Gautier orders supper to be served, the servants who were to bring in the table 433ready laid tried to get it in through the door. But this was impossible. Nothing could be more comical than to see those unfortunate servants adopt every expedient.

The public laughed. Among the laughter of the spectators was one that became contagious. A negro of twelve or fifteen who had got in somehow was standing on a chair, and with his two hands holding on to his knees, his body bent, head forward, mouth open, he was laughing with such a shrill and piercing tone, and with such even continuity, that I caught it, too. I had to go out while a portion of the back scenery was being removed to allow the table to be brought in.

I returned somewhat composed, but still under the domination of suppressed laughter. We were sitting round the table and the supper was drawing to a close as usual. But just as the servants were entering to remove the table, one of them caught the scenery that had been badly adjusted by the scene shifters in their haste, and the whole back scene fell on our heads. As the scenery was nearly all made of paper in those days, it did not fall on our heads and remain there, but round our necks, and we had to remain in that position without being able to move. Our heads having gone through the paper, our appearance was most comical and ridiculous. The young negro’s laughter started again more piercing than ever, and this time my suppressed laughter ended in a crisis that left me without any strength.

The money paid for admission was returned to the public. It exceeded 15,000 francs.

This city had a fatality for me and came very near proving so during the third visit I paid to it.

That very night we left Mobile for Atlanta, where, after playing “La Dame aux Camélias,” we left again the same evening for Nashville.

We stayed for an entire day at Memphis and gave two performances. At one in the morning we left for Louisville.




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