Marthe Régnier
French postcard by FA, no. 148. Photo: Reutlinger.
Marthe Régnier (1880-1967) was a famous French stage actress and singer of the Belle Epoque and beyond. She also acted in six silent and sound films.
In 1901 Marthe Régnier entered the Comédie-Française and made her debut in a play called Agnès. After alternating drama (e.g. Hugo) with comedy (e.g Beaumarchais) at the Comédie, she moved in 1903 to vaudeville, where she acted for years at the Théâtre du Vaudeville in plays by e.g. Bernard and Mirbeau. Favorite authors of her were Robert de Flers (l'Ane de Buridan, le Retour), Stève Passeur (Etienne), Paul Gavault (la Petite Chocolatière). In 1934 she acted as Jocaste opposite Jean-Pierre Aumont as Oedipus in Jean Cocteau's La Machine infernale (1934), which premiered at the Comédie des Champs-Élysées in Paris, then the theater of Louis Jouvet. This more or less signed the end of her stage career.
Married in 1902 to playwright Abel Tarride, Régnier was the mother of director Jean Tarride and actor Jacques Tarride. She divorced to marry in 1916 José de Oliveira Murinelly, secretary of the Brazilian embassy in France.. From ca. 1920 she was the mistress of Baron Henri de Rothschild, who, aside of being a millionaire, doctor, and founder of the first (1902) modern children hospital in France, had developed as a playwright (as André Pascal), e.g. of the controversial play on medical malpractice, La Caducée. He was theater manager too, taking over the Théàtre Antoine in the early 1920s. In four years he had the new, ultramodern Pigalle Theater built, which opened in 1929 and was the 'baby' of his son Philippe, but the theater didn't fare too well. Philippe fared better afterward with wine: the famous Mouton-Rothschild. After the early death of Henri de Rothschild's wife in 1926, Régnier became his companion, who would follow him in exile during the war.
Marthe Régnier was highly interested in fashion and jewelry, and as a businesswoman ahead of her time, she was often photographed to publicize her own creations. In the 1910s she launched her own perfume, entitled Suivez-moi, jeune homme [Follow me, young man]. Régnier was portrayed by famous painters like Giovanni Boldini, who painted a magnificent, dynamic portrait of her in 1905, and photographers such as Reutlinger, Henri Manuel and Adolph Meyer.
In 1910, Régnier debuted in the title role of the short film Manon, produced by Pathé Frères and based on the famous novel (1731) by Abbé Prevost and the opera (1884) by Jules Massenet. Her co-actors were also popular stage actors: Jean Périer played Lescaut, while Émile Dehelly played Des Grieux. In 1918 Régnier acted opposite Musidora in Germaine Dulac's film La jeune fille la plus méritante de France (1918). When sound film set in, Régnier returned to the sets to act as the maid in the comedy Y'en a pas deux comme Angélique (Roger Lion, 1931), starring Colette Darfeuil. Next, she was the wife of Jacques Baumer in Étienne (1933), directed by her son Jean Tarride, and with Jean Forrest in the title role. It was based on a play by Jacques Deval, in which she had acted in 1929. Opposite Charles Boyer as Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria, Régnier was Danielle Darrieux's mother, Baroness Vetsera, in the romantic historical drama Mayerling (Anatole Litvak, 1936).
Régnier's last film was Les hommes sans peur (Yvan Noë, 1942), about the inventors of X-Rays, in which she played a sick woman. Perhaps her shots were taken before the German invasion, because Rothschild's biographer Harry W. Paul and others too write that she remained with Rothschild in Lisbon, Portugal, during the war years. Anyway, she stayed close to him till the end. Rothschild, a heavy smoker and diabetic, died near Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1947, at the age of 75. Marthe Régnier died in Paris on 30 August 1967, at the age of 86. She rests in the cemetery of Marly-le-Roi (Yvelines).
In 2011 Boldini’s Portrait of Marthe Régnier was sold to a private European buyer for $1,874,500. In 2012 part of her jewelry was sold in Fontainebleau.
Sources: French Wikipedia, IMDB, Wikimedia Commons, and biographies of Henry de Rothschild by Harry W. Paul and Nadège Forestier,
Marthe Régnier
French postcard by FA, no. 148. Photo: Reutlinger.
Marthe Régnier (1880-1967) was a famous French stage actress and singer of the Belle Epoque and beyond. She also acted in six silent and sound films.
In 1901 Marthe Régnier entered the Comédie-Française and made her debut in a play called Agnès. After alternating drama (e.g. Hugo) with comedy (e.g Beaumarchais) at the Comédie, she moved in 1903 to vaudeville, where she acted for years at the Théâtre du Vaudeville in plays by e.g. Bernard and Mirbeau. Favorite authors of her were Robert de Flers (l'Ane de Buridan, le Retour), Stève Passeur (Etienne), Paul Gavault (la Petite Chocolatière). In 1934 she acted as Jocaste opposite Jean-Pierre Aumont as Oedipus in Jean Cocteau's La Machine infernale (1934), which premiered at the Comédie des Champs-Élysées in Paris, then the theater of Louis Jouvet. This more or less signed the end of her stage career.
Married in 1902 to playwright Abel Tarride, Régnier was the mother of director Jean Tarride and actor Jacques Tarride. She divorced to marry in 1916 José de Oliveira Murinelly, secretary of the Brazilian embassy in France.. From ca. 1920 she was the mistress of Baron Henri de Rothschild, who, aside of being a millionaire, doctor, and founder of the first (1902) modern children hospital in France, had developed as a playwright (as André Pascal), e.g. of the controversial play on medical malpractice, La Caducée. He was theater manager too, taking over the Théàtre Antoine in the early 1920s. In four years he had the new, ultramodern Pigalle Theater built, which opened in 1929 and was the 'baby' of his son Philippe, but the theater didn't fare too well. Philippe fared better afterward with wine: the famous Mouton-Rothschild. After the early death of Henri de Rothschild's wife in 1926, Régnier became his companion, who would follow him in exile during the war.
Marthe Régnier was highly interested in fashion and jewelry, and as a businesswoman ahead of her time, she was often photographed to publicize her own creations. In the 1910s she launched her own perfume, entitled Suivez-moi, jeune homme [Follow me, young man]. Régnier was portrayed by famous painters like Giovanni Boldini, who painted a magnificent, dynamic portrait of her in 1905, and photographers such as Reutlinger, Henri Manuel and Adolph Meyer.
In 1910, Régnier debuted in the title role of the short film Manon, produced by Pathé Frères and based on the famous novel (1731) by Abbé Prevost and the opera (1884) by Jules Massenet. Her co-actors were also popular stage actors: Jean Périer played Lescaut, while Émile Dehelly played Des Grieux. In 1918 Régnier acted opposite Musidora in Germaine Dulac's film La jeune fille la plus méritante de France (1918). When sound film set in, Régnier returned to the sets to act as the maid in the comedy Y'en a pas deux comme Angélique (Roger Lion, 1931), starring Colette Darfeuil. Next, she was the wife of Jacques Baumer in Étienne (1933), directed by her son Jean Tarride, and with Jean Forrest in the title role. It was based on a play by Jacques Deval, in which she had acted in 1929. Opposite Charles Boyer as Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria, Régnier was Danielle Darrieux's mother, Baroness Vetsera, in the romantic historical drama Mayerling (Anatole Litvak, 1936).
Régnier's last film was Les hommes sans peur (Yvan Noë, 1942), about the inventors of X-Rays, in which she played a sick woman. Perhaps her shots were taken before the German invasion, because Rothschild's biographer Harry W. Paul and others too write that she remained with Rothschild in Lisbon, Portugal, during the war years. Anyway, she stayed close to him till the end. Rothschild, a heavy smoker and diabetic, died near Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1947, at the age of 75. Marthe Régnier died in Paris on 30 August 1967, at the age of 86. She rests in the cemetery of Marly-le-Roi (Yvelines).
In 2011 Boldini’s Portrait of Marthe Régnier was sold to a private European buyer for $1,874,500. In 2012 part of her jewelry was sold in Fontainebleau.
Sources: French Wikipedia, IMDB, Wikimedia Commons, and biographies of Henry de Rothschild by Harry W. Paul and Nadège Forestier,