The First Actress

by C. W. Gortner

I spun toward her, my fist clenching. I heard Jean whisper, “Sarah, no,” but it was the flicker of something indecipherable in Perrin’s gaze that detained my advance.

  “Regardless,” he said, “you are part of this company now. And while your methods leave much to be desired, you are perhaps the very attraction we require at this time.”

  “Would you indulge her?” Madame Nathalie heaved herself to her feet. “After she flouts every rule sacrosanct to us, performing in our greenroom as if it were a circus arena?”

  He shifted his regard to her. “Madame, this house’s receipts are lower than they’ve ever been. Though it may pain us, indulgence is necessary.” He forestalled her tirade as her face turned apoplectic. “If you do not wish to play Agrippina, I will recast the role. But we will stage Britannicus this season, with Mademoiselle Bernhardt as Junie.”

  “Never. We refuse! We own a stake in this company and you cannot move forward without us.” She gestured to her fellow sociétaires. To my disbelief, and no doubt hers, not one of them lifted their voice in support. Only Samson, her most stalwart ally but also supposedly Marie Colombier’s patron, surprised me by muttering, “Nathalie, be sensible. We must feed ourselves. We can no longer afford to quibble over who provides the meal.”

  She gaped at him, her immense bosom taking in shallow breaths. An unexpected surge of pity came over me, though she didn’t deserve it. I was witnessing the end of her era, which I’d unwittingly set into motion.

  “You…you agree?” she whispered. “You would condone this buffoonery?”

  “It’s not buffoonery.” He glanced at Jean and me in reluctant admiration. “Anyone can see they are the future. We must accept it, if we are to survive.”

  Madame Nathalie’s entire person seemed to cave upon itself. Gripping her cane, she waddled past me. I made myself stand firm as she paused to hiss, “You’ve not won anything yet. You need my approval to be a sociétaire, and you will never have it.”

  I returned her stare. I didn’t need her approval; she was only one, and elevation to the status of sociétaire didn’t require a unanimous vote. All it required was a majority.

  After she departed, the rest of the company sat in stunned quiet and Perrin retreated to the sociétaires to conduct a hushed discussion; when he looked up at me, I flinched. “Sarah Bernhardt and Mounet-Sully will play Junie and Britannicus. Monsieur Samson shall play Nero and Madame Courvasel has agreed to the role of Agrippina. Rehearsals will commence immediately.” He gave an arid smile. “Considering Mademoiselle Bernhardt has already begun to rehearse, I see no reason to delay.”

  It was a victory, no matter what Madame Nathalie declared, but I was so affected by the confrontation to obtain it that I could only turn in relief to Jean when Perrin said, “Everyone save Mademoiselle Bernhardt is excused.”

  The company hastened from the room, Marie Colombier casting a malignant look at me. Jean squeezed my arm in encouragement, and then I was left alone with Perrin, who took his time reviewing his roster before he said, “You are…what? Twenty-six?”

  “Twenty-eight this October,” I replied.

  “Still young, even for our profession. Surely you must realize that making a foe of a senior sociétaire cannot serve your interests.”

  “Madame Nathalie was my foe before she had reason to be. If I can play the roles I want, so be it.”

  He gave a dry chuckle. “You are rather confident, after one unremarkable season.”

  “I did tell you that Mademoiselle de Belle-Isle would be a mistake….” My protest faded. “I did not intend it,” I added, hating the fact that I felt the need to apologize to him.

  “Oh, I think you did. I think you cannot help but intend it. You are disruptive by nature. I was indeed warned by Madame Nathalie and de Chilly himself before his death. Nevertheless,” he added, before I could defend myself, “while I do not approve of your methods, as I’ve stated, nor do I enjoy having my authority being challenged before the company, the sociétaires agree.”

  “Agree?” I braced for the worst.

  “We will accept you as a junior sociétaire, with a lesser share in our receipts, providing Britannicus exceeds expectations.” He let his words sink in. “You’d best be certain this is how you wish to proceed and that Mounet-Sully is ready for the challenge. If not, now is the time to admit it. One scene, no matter how impressive, is not an entire play.”

  “I am certain,” I said. “Jean and I…we will prove it to you.”

  “Not to me. Prove it to our patrons.”

  VI

  Rehearsals were terrible. There was no other way to describe it. Samson made every attempt possible to assert his leading status, no doubt incited by his fellow sociétaires, so that his pompous diction and penchant for appearing in full costume when there wasn’t yet an audience to witness it turned his Nero into an aging matron fretting over a cracked teapot. Nor was Madame Courvasel a convincing Agrippina, unlike Madame Nathalie, who I had to admit had always commanded the stage in her signature role. And Jean, to my disbelief, reverted to declaiming as if he were delivering a lecture, gesticulating toward the empty seats until I flung up my own arms and cried at him, “Who are you playing to?”

  With our opening a fortnight away, I was in despair. Perrin attended our first dress rehearsal and his tight-lipped grimace impeded my own performance, so that I found myself stalking the stage in a fluster, shrill as a banshee.

  At the back door, he waited for me. “Two weeks,” he intoned. “If this is what you expect to prove, consider yourself forewarned.”

  When I reached my flat, I discovered that Régine had suffered a setback, her cough racking her until Madame G. doused her into a stupor with the syrup. “She’s dying,” wept ma petite dame as I stood at my sister’s bedside, her thin form barely making an indent under the sheets. I had been so engrossed in my struggle to salvage the disaster Britannicus threatened to be, I’d spent most of my time in the theater, staggering home well after midnight to collapse in the spare room. In my absence, Madame G. had resumed her nightly vigil over Régine. Maurice was fretful, too; now in his ninth year, he was old enough to understand his lifelong playmate was very ill, and he’d turned rebellious at school, picking fights with other students and playing the truant, until the head instructor sent me a stern letter stating that unless my son improved his marks and his attitude, he ran the risk of imminent expulsion.

  Everything was falling apart. I couldn’t stanch my grief as I caressed Régine’s feverish brow and told Madame G. we must call again for the physician.

  “Why?” She collapsed onto a stool, so frail I feared she’d fall ill herself. “He cannot save her.”

  I clasped her hand. “We mustn’t give up hope. There must be a way….”

  “There isn’t,” she whispered.

  I went to Maurice’s room. He was asleep, his blankets tousled and arms akimbo, with a trio of cats slumbering by him and Clotilde sprawled on the carpet. Her luminous amber eyes lifted to me as I nestled at his side, shoving the grumbling cats out of the way so I could hold him. My beautiful boy. I fell asleep, clutching him like a talisman. I’d thought of sending him away, in fear for his own health, but Madame G. said it would be unbearably cruel to separate him from my sister, as every day after school, he ran upstairs to read to her. Only then did he seem content, as if reciting stories to her eased his troubled heart.

  In the morning, the physician emerged from Régine’s room with a grim expression. “I’m afraid there’s nothing more we can do, except ensure she’s kept as comfortable as possible.”

  “But the spa,” I said. “What if we sent her there?”

  He sighed. “It is too late for a spa. I’m very sorry, Mademoiselle Bernhardt.”

  I had to return to work; it was our week of dress rehearsal. As I performed, I kept swallowing my wail. All of a sudden, none of it mattered. I couldn’t feel
my character, but perversely, the sorrow I fought to contain inspired my performance, so that when I was done, Perrin declared, “If the rest of this cast can do half as well as Mademoiselle Bernhardt, we may actually be ready to open on our scheduled date.”

  Jean followed me to my dressing room, a tiny closet of a space into which I’d stuffed as much as I could, including a cot for those nights when I was too weary to return home. He stood on the threshold, watching me shove my makeup tubes into the battered box.

  “Is everything all right? You seem distressed.”

  I whirled to him. “Everything is not all right. What on earth has come over you? I championed you for this role. I assured Perrin you were perfect for it, and this is how you repay me? By performing like a younger version of Samson? Is that your plan? To prove you can be as outdated as any sociétaire in the hope they’ll grant you the pension, too?”

  “I had no idea we had a debt.” He stepped toward me, even as I raised a hand to ward him off. “Sarah, whatever is troubling you, it must be more than the play.”

  “Don’t.” My voice snagged in my throat. “I don’t want your pity. I want you to be as you were when we rehearsed alone together. I don’t understand how you can be satisfied, when you have so much grandeur within you.”

  “I…” He lowered his gaze. “I want you so much,” he whispered.

  “What?” I stared at him.

  He raised his gaze. The anguish in his expression…it quenched my very breath. “I cannot perform because all I can do, all I can think of, is you.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” I said, even as I recalled Sophie’s words: He must be in love, to follow you around like that.

  “Am I?” He held my stare with that intensity he’d displayed when I didn’t yet know his name. “Can you honestly say you don’t feel the same for me?”

  “My sister is dying,” I whispered. “This is not the time or place to—”

  He came at me so swiftly that I couldn’t evade him as he seized me, as his large taut body pressed into mine and his mouth was at my throat, the shadow of his beard scalding my skin, his hands everywhere, incinerating my flesh under my dress.

  I hadn’t felt such an explosion of lust since Kératry. I hadn’t realized how much desire I’d kept pent up inside me until he was lowering me to the floor, upon my discarded costume and sandals, until I heard my groan, like an animal in a snare, a desperate combustion of yearning and fury that turned molten with heat.

  He rucked my skirts to my waist, ripping at my undergarments; when his fingers found me, I gasped. He thrust himself into me, whispering my name over and over, violating me even as I welcomed it, even as I bucked in climax against him and he spilled his seed inside me, something I’d allowed no man since Kératry to ever do.

  We lay panting, our breath mingling in the fraught aftermath. He started to rise, his face contorted in shame. “Forgive me. Sarah, please…I didn’t mean it. Not like this.”

  I raked my tangled hair from my face, feeling the bruise of his ardor on my lips.

  “Use it,” I said, and he froze. “I want to see this same passion on opening night.”

  I saw him swallow. “Is that all you have to say?”

  “For now.” I pushed him aside. “We shall see about later.”

  * * *

  Opening night. A full house. Britannicus was always a draw, its timeless theme of ambition, power, and murderous envy, coupled with its ancient Roman setting, still an attraction for audiences.

  Backstage, I kept away from Jean. We’d begun an affair. Or rather, an affair had consumed us. There was no way to avoid it; the moment we found ourselves together, the passion between us was inescapable—and evident to everyone, provoking smirks and whispered asides. He was ferocious in his desire, as if he sought to devour me to my bones. His ardent declarations of love were disconcerting, and if I let myself dwell on them, frightening, as well. The very thing I had vowed to not let get out of hand had erupted past any attempt I might make to contain it. Yet I found him irresistible, and as I’d hoped, our lust ignited his fire onstage, as if bedding me had given him the confidence he needed to fully inhabit his role. I wanted to tell him we should never rely on personal gratification in order to perform, for we’d always suffer disappointment. I refrained. As long as he performed the role as I intended, I couldn’t quibble over his source of inspiration. We had to make our first play together an unrivaled success.

  Sarcey, Meyer, and a host of other critics flocked to the complimentary orchestra seats that Perrin proudly provided. He may not have relayed equal enthusiasm to me, but we both knew what was at stake. Perrin had lured me from the Odéon to cast me in a role that failed to meet expectations; to prove my engagement still merited attention, he, too, required a success. If Racine’s Britannicus, a staple of the Comédie’s repertoire, did not accomplish it, he’d face a censure he might never overcome, while I’d destroy any chance I had to be a sociétaire.

  And we had our drawbacks. Samson lumbered about in his heavy sandals with inset lifts, so he could tower over Jean and exert his dominance. Madame Courvasel, arrayed in a veiled tunic voluminous as a pavilion, was beset by nerves, aware she’d inevitably be compared to Madame Nathalie’s incomparable embodiment of Agrippina. On their shoulders rested the bulk of the play; to counter their weakness, Jean and I had to overpower them.

  As the curtain rose on the first act to an apprehensive applause that weighed on me like lead, I watched Jean stride onto the stage in his red-mantled toga and gilded wreath. As he commenced his monologue, relief flooded me. Here was the actor I’d first admired in that insipid play—magnetic and authoritative, still declaiming too loudly, but refraining from doing so at the audience. He dwarfed Samson in his absurd red Nero wig and lifts; by the end of the first act, the audience’s response was fervent. No one could deny they were bearing witness to the emergence of a superb tragedian, whose skill belied his limited experience.

  At my cue, I drew down my veil and invoked Junie’s longing to escape Nero’s seduction. I must hold my own against my lover in the play.

  Deafening applause greeted my entrance. Evidently, I hadn’t lost my appeal despite my last season, but I couldn’t let it affect me. Instead, I chose to improvise, playing Junie not as a craven girl torn between rival brothers, but as a champion for her right to love as she sees fit. I acted out our scene as if I were fighting a duel, forcing Jean to improvise his reaction. I demanded the very best of him, and I felt his palpable rage when he took me in his arms to force Junie to confess her love for him.

  By the time the curtain fell, I was spent. Unlike de Chilly, Perrin didn’t hover backstage during performances. He perched in the first-tier mezzanine like a hawk, annotating every misspoken line or missed gesture from above.

  But the standing ovation as we took our curtain call must have warmed even his sterile heart.

  Despite everything, Britannicus was the defining event I’d set out to achieve.

  VII

  “‘Not since the great Talma, the Théâtre-Français’s preeminent interpreter of classical tragedy, has another actor shown such virtuosity.’ ” Jean brandished the copy of Le Figaro with Meyer’s final notice of our play, his entire person suffused with satisfaction. The self-congratulatory moment was marred somewhat by his lack of attire, though no man was better suited to it, every muscle coiled under his taut frame, his sculpted thighs and broad chest dusted with dark hair exuding virility.

  I lay on his bed, equally unclothed, gratified not only by his lovemaking—every night after our performance, he charged at me like a bull—but also by the fact that we’d concluded the season to such acclaim that my acceptance as a sociétaire was a given.

  “Before you let his praise go to your head,” I remarked, casting a look at his semi-erect manhood and recalling how I, too, had once pranced about in self-indulgent glee with a newspaper no
tice by my lover’s bed, “you should know that Meyer…”

  “What?” He seized a cigarette from his case on the side table. “You don’t think what he says about me is true?”

  “I would hope you aspire to more than a dead man’s reputation,” I said, electing not to inform him that Meyer was clearly infatuated with more than his talent. Why spoil his moment? I’d learned from experience that we players would rather not have our praise marred by sordid truth.

  His eyes narrowed. “Are you jealous? He barely mentioned you this time.”

  “Should I be?” I reached for my pantalettes and chemise, tumbled on the floor by the bed where he’d torn them off. “Bring the notice to Perrin and demand a raise. You’ve earned it. And once you get it, you need to replace my underthings. This is the sixth petticoat you’ve ruined in as many days, rutting at me like a beast.”

  His voice darkened. “Do you ever take anything seriously?”

  I paused, looking up at him. I’d also learned from experience that besides his obstinacy, he had this repressed fury inside him, fueled by his need to prove his worth. “I took our play seriously enough. If our notices hadn’t reflected as much, I’d be very concerned, indeed.”

  Pulling on my dress, I turned to the looking glass over his bureau—surprisingly, for such a handsome man, he lacked outward vanity, without much in the way of mirrors in his flat, where I’d insisted we conduct our affair so as to not disrupt my household.

  “I suppose this means you’ll be leaving me,” he said.

  I met his stare in the glass. “Why would you say that?” The vulnerability I had first sensed in him was actually a persistent bane. Having defied his family to pursue a player’s life, he sought constant reassurance he’d made the right choice, and it seeped into our relationship, his insecurity converted into this unfounded fear of my eventual desertion.

  “Because our play is done.” His exhale of smoke muffled the resentment in his eyes, but not his tone. “You don’t need me to be your Britannicus anymore.”