Bernhardt, Sarah

(1844-1923)

   Actress. Born Henriette-Rosine Bernard, Sarah Bernhardt was probably the greatest stage actress of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Born of French and Dutch Jewish parents, she was sent to a convent school and converted to Christianity. She studied acting at the Paris Conservatoire d'art dramatique, where she excelled and won prizes for both tragedy and comedy. Bernhardt went on to debut at the Comédie Française at the age of seventeen. Despite her success at the Conservatoire, success on the stage did not come immediately. However, by 1880 or so, after very hard work and several great performances, most notably in Racine's Phèdre (1874) and in Victor Hugo's Hernani (1877), she had become recognized as the greatest actress of her time, so great that her reputation as a temperamental, hypochondriac diva did little to diminish her standing as an actress.

   Given Bernhardt's standing, she did not seek out the cinema. Rather, the cinema came to her in order to advance its own prestige. Bernhardt's first appearance on film came in 1900, when Clément Maurice filmed part of her performance in Shakespeare's Hamlet. She starred in 1908 in Charles le Bargy's ill-fated La Tosca, which was never formally released. She went on to star in André Calmettes and Henri Pouctal's La Dame aux camélias (1912), Henri Desfontaines and Louis Mercanton's Les Amours de la reine Elizabeth (1912) and Adrienne Lecouvreur (1913), and Mercanton and René Hervil's Jeanne Doré (1915) and Mères voyantes (1917). She died during the filming of Mercanton and Léon Abrams's La Voyante (1923), although her role was included in the final film.

   Historical Dictionary of French Cinema by Dayna Oscherwitz & Mary Ellen Higgins