Kean, Dumas, Sartre

Edmund Kean has been called the greatest actor of the Romantic era, perhaps even the greatest actor of all time. (Kean wouldn't disagree with that.) However, his genius also attracted other geniuses, and he became the subject of a play by Alexandre Dumas that was later adapted for the 20th-century stage by Jean-Paul Sartre.

Dumas's play Kean is a comedy, while the actual Kean's life was more of a tragedy. (Like Molière, he collapsed onstage and subsequently died.) The play premiered in 1836--just three years after Kean's death--at the Théâtre des Variétés in Paris. No mention of the actor's famous death is made in the piece, as Dumas's play ends happily. It originally starred Frédérick Lemaître in the title role. Lemaître was a highly respected performer, and would go on to originate another title role in Victor Hugo's play Ruy Blas.

The play opens at a society soirée attended by the Danish ambassador and his wife, Elena, who is rumored to be in love with Edmund Kean. The fact is Kean had many lovers, but I'm not familiar with his ever being linked with the wife of a Danish ambassador. It hardly matters, since the scene is an excuse for Kean to at first decline an invitation to the party, and then show up and make a brilliant speech, entreating Elena to read aloud a letter. He then quietly asks her to flip the letter over and read the other side, which is an invitation to a private assignation with him.

Act II takes place in Kean's chambers. (In Sartre's adaptation, it's explicitly his dressing room at the theatre.) Dumas's stage directions state: "Au lever du rideau, le théâtre présente toutes les traces d’une orgie." (As the curtain rises, the theatre presents all the signs of an orgy.) A woman arrives in disguise, but it's not Elena, rather another woman, Anna, who wants to learn acting from Kean.

The third act takes place at the tavern of Peter Patt, which is called the Black Horse in Sartre's adaptation. This might be based on the Coal Hole, a pub Kean frequented with the members of his infamous Wolves Club. Kean agrees to act the role of Romeo at a benefit for a performer down on his luck. Kean was considered weak in that part, so Sartre changed it to Othello.

The performance is a disaster and causes a scandal which Kean is only extricated from by Anna. The French versions of Kean's life--both Dumas's and Sartre's--are historically inaccurate and leave out his wife Mary and son Charles. Still, they are a great deal of fun.