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The inferiority of Mademoiselle CONTAT on this head is particularly remarkable when she plays with MOLE. In a very indifferent comedy, called Le Jaloux sans amour, at the conclusion of which the husband entreats his wife to pardon his faults, MOLE contrives to find accents so tender, so affecting; he envelops his voice, as it were, with sounds so soft, so mellow, and at the same time so delicate, that the audience, fearing to lose the most trifling intonation, dare not draw their breath.
"La Coquette Corrigee" had been selected for representation at the Theatre Francais solely because it was the piece in which Mademoiselle Contat shone most. Yet the notions propagated by the Queen's enemies coinciding in my mind with the name of the play, I thought the choice very ill-judged. I was at a loss, however, how to tell her Majesty so; but sincere attachment gives courage.
For comedy: Messieurs Fleury, Saint-Fal, Baptiste the younger, Armand, Thenard, Michot, Devigny, Michelot and Barbier; Mesdames Mars, Bourgoin, Thenard, Emilie Contat, and Mezeray. The management of the theater was given to M. Despres.
Mademoiselle MEZERAY. She is of the school of Mademoiselle CONTAT, whence have issued only feeble pupils. But she is very pretty, and has the finest eyes imaginable. She plays the parts of young coquettes, in which her principal dares no longer appear. Without being vulgar in her manner, one cannot say that she has dignity.
Mademoiselle CONTAT replies, and, although she has to express the same degree of feeling, the charm is broken. Being aware that the want of nobleness and sensibility was a great obstacle to her success, this actress endeavoured to insure it by performing characters which require not those two qualities. The first she selected for her purpose was Susanne in the Mariage de Figaro.
Susanne is an elegant and artful chambermaid; and Mademoiselle CONTAT possessed every requisite for representing well the part. She had resigned the principal character in the piece to Mademoiselle SAINVAL the younger, an actress who was celebrated in tragedy, but had never before appeared in comedy.
"La Coquette Corrigee" had been selected for representation at the Theatre Francais solely because it was the piece in which Mademoiselle Contat shone most. Yet the notions propagated by the Queen's enemies coinciding in my mind with the name of the play, I thought the choice very ill-judged. I was at a loss, however, how to tell her Majesty so; but sincere attachment gives courage.
Mademoiselle CONTAT has not followed the impulse of Nature, who intended her for the characters of soubrettes; but, when she made her debut, there were in that cast of parts three or four women not deficient in merit, and it would have taken her a long time to make her way through them.
As for sensibility, she expresses it still less than Mademoiselle CONTAT. However, the absence of this sentiment is a defect which is said to be now common among the French. Indeed, if it be true that they are fickle, and this few will deny, the feeling they possess cannot be lasting. Madame TALMA. I have already spoken of her merits as a comic actress, when I mentioned her as a tragedian.
Many persons are not able to endure the emanations from cats, rats, mice, etc., and the mere fact of one of these animals being in their vicinity is enough to provoke distressing symptoms. Mlle. Contat, the celebrated French actress, was not able to endure the odor of a hare. Stanislaus, King of Poland and Duke of Lorraine, found it impossible to tolerate the smell of a cat.
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