Sarah Bernhardt in the Theatre of Films and Sound Recordings (review)

To Assure Immortality

The French actress Sarah Bernhardt was an internationally acclaimed star of the nineteenth-century stage, but she is largely unknown by twenty-first century audiences. David W. Menefee, a contributing writer and marketing representative for The Dallas Times Herald and The Dallas Morning News, seeks to rectify this situation in his profusely illustrated tribute to Bernhardt.

Rather than a conventional biography, Menefee attempts to resurrect the life and career of Bernhardt through an examination of her films and sound recordings. The author lists twelve film credits for Bernhardt, most of which are hidden away in archives and unavailable for public screening. The only Bernhardt film in wide circulation is the 1912 production of Queen Elizabeth. Adolph Zukor paid the actress $40,000 to reprise her stage role on film. Queen Elizabeth proved to be an immensely successful motion picture; convincing Zukor to form the Famous Players Company and employ well known stage performers in productions of established plays. The film industry was now ready to move beyond the one and two reel films of early Hollywood.

Bernhardt's biographer Cornelia Otis Skinner and silent film historian Kevin Brownlee, who has written the foreword to this volume, argue that Bernhardt professed little enthusiasm for cinema. Menefee, however, insists that the actress was fascinated by the emerging celluloid art form; believing that film would assure her immortality. To make Bernhardt's dream come true Menefee hopes that "those curious about her work will find their interest piqued by the revelations in this book and that somehow those distant archives that hide her films in the darkness of cold, isolated vaults will bring them back to the piercing light of modern projectors" (5). The author also provides a survey of Bernhardt's sound recordings "beginning with words like a musician plays an instrument, using beautiful pitch, intonation and vibrato as would a gifted singer" (46).

Beyond her stage, film, and recording career, Bernhardt was an international celebrity, who carefully orchestrated her reputation as a beautiful woman surrounded by younger lovers. In an era before radio, television, and video, her image was promoted via postcards, cabinet cards, character portraits, cigarette cards, and posters. Her tours earned her enthusiastic followings in Europe, South America, and the United States. Ever the image conscious promoter, Bernhardt scheduled almost as many farewell tours as Cher. Bernhardt's career as a prototype for the modern celebrity is a topic worthy of greater examination by scholars.

Menefee discovered the legend of Bernhardt during the early 1960s when he was a junior high school theater student in Fort Worth, Texas. His book is a loving tribute to his muse, but silent films and scratchy sound recordings may not be enough to capture Bernhardt's legendary impact during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.