The Grand Guignol.

One photograph.

There's so much we don't know. From 1897 to 1962 there was something calling itself The Theatre of the Grand Guignol at the end of a little side street. It evolved. It went through numerous revisions. It's possible that the Grand Guignol of 1940 wouldn't have recognised its 1897 self. We can argue that the theatre itself died somewhere around 1940, being replaced by a museum exhibit and tourist novelty. Not that the theatre itself would have agreed with that. Throughout the entirety of that time though it appears to have been outsider art.

The Grand Guignol wouldn't have agreed with that either.

It really wouldn't have thought of itself as outsider. It may have been small but it was a straight commercial theatre. With 185 tickets a night to sell it was shaped by commercial pressures to become its unique self. The actors were proper professionals, it paid proper wages. It was, for most of its existence, a profitable and successful theatre. Probably. It's hard to get proper numbers.

Anyway, the photo. Retrieved from an Ebay listing, it's a promotional postcard, which holds out the salivating possiblity that this was a regular promotional tool and there are more somewhere (so far there aren't, was this a one off? A failed experiment?). It shows eight smartly dressed individuals, three women and five men, standing outside the Grand Guignol. I'm taken by the two proto-goths on the left there. For dates we have the poster to either side of the door. The second piece "Les Nuits Hampton-Club" is clearly visible. Fortunately for us Les Nuits was only ever produced once (according to Agnes Pierron's magnum opus (Pierron 95)), allowing us to date the photo to somewhere between January and April 1908.

photograph of eight people outside the theatre of the Grand Guignol. Probably taken in spring 1908. Three women and five men, I currently have no names for them.
Fig 1. A postcard (retrieved from an Ebay listing). The poster advertises "Nights at the Hampton Club" (Les Nuits du Hampton-Club). According to Agnes Pierron that was only presented once in February to May 1908. That's consistent with dress, so I'm calling this spring 1908. I currently have no idea who the people are. It's tempting to think they're actors, but there's no evidence for or against. The only play from the spring 1908 programme carried in Pierron's book is Les Nuits du Hampton-Club, which rather helpfully gives its cast as:

  • HERBERT FORBES - MM BRIZARD
  • PRESIDENT - TUNC
  • PROFESSOR TRIGGS - BUSSY
  • RIVERS - DEFRESNE
  • SIR ARCHIBALD - LOUVIGNY
  • OWENS - RATINEAU
  • GURNBRIDGE - VALBEL
  • COLVILLE - VERNAUD
  • SAM - NICOLLE

I'm assuming at this stage that Ratineau is Paul Ratineau, who will go on to become the Grand Guignol's special effects wizard. There are photos of him in the Time Magazine special from 1947, but they are still copyright. Also we have "Tunc" in 1908 and "Tung Frere" in 1907. Both rendered in upper case, so the possibility of a typo exists.

A moment in history.

The script for Hampton-Club contains the following:

"In Les Nuits du Hampton-Club, it was Max Maurey who encouraged Mouëzy-Éon to go as far as possible in the horror: "I can still hear him say to me, about the final scene where the suicide in spite of himself screams his terror in the dark: “Your man's monologue is too mushy! Lock yourself in your cellar and try to imagine and translate the reactions of a guy who feels that his death is near and cannot guess where it will come from!" I did not lock myself in my cellar where I only went down for more pleasant purposes, but I ended up giving birth to a monologue which satisfied our sadistic director and which revolted, as he wished, his loyal audience.""

André Mouëzy-Éon, Farewells to the Troupe, Memories of the Theatre, The Round Table, 1963. Cited in Pierron 1995 p260.

So by 1908 the Grand Guignol is very much taking on the shape it will become legendary for, and it's Max Maurey who is pushing that.

A possibility.

The postcard I found on Ebay was presumably printed in 1908. It was one of a set of four. There is nothing to indicate that they were all part of a set, but could they be the same actors? If that's the case, then the three portraits could match to the three women in the group photo.

Case One.

A publicity photo of actress Jane Fontaine. A closeup taken from the postcard.
Fig 2. Mlle Jane Fontaine. They do look similar. To me at least. If that is the same woman then it supports the possibility that the group is at least part of the spring 1908 company, and it gives us a name for at least one of the actors.

Case Two

a publicity photo from the Grand Guignol showing the actress Vatta. a closeup from the postcard.
Fig 2. This could be Vatta? I'm mostly working off the shape of the jawline. It's to be regretted that we don't have a more extensive resource for the Grand Guignol. A search of Pierron 95 indicates that Vatta appeared in what looks to be a minor role in Un Concert Chez Les Fous by Charles Foleÿ and André De Lorde in January 1909 (Pierron 1995, p344). I do notice that in May 1908 Vatta will play in Une leçon à la Salpêtrière by Binet and de Lorde (Pierron 1995, p308). She will play Suzanne, a 16 year old girl. It creates a plausibility at least that that's the May 1908 company posing on the steps of the theatre in front of the February '08 programme. A plausibility slightly dented by there being eight people in that photo, and seventeen in Une leçon à la Salpêtrière alone. That little stage did not fear big casts.

Case Three

A publicity photo of actress Mivella(?). a closeup from the postcard.
Fig 3. Mivella? Minella? This one is a bit of a stretch given the difference in angle and expression. I'm mostly relying on the shape of the nose here, and I'm losing faith in that; the tip looks different.

It's a tiny bit chilling just how much these people have disappeared into a fog of gossip and half memory.

Now I am curious.

It can wait, I have found Les Archives du Spectacle

I refer my gentle reader to this marvellous database of performances.

If we combine Pierron's running order for spring 1908 with Le Spectacle's cast list, we get:

1908. Février :
  • La Suicidette, c. de Johannès Gravier;
    • no cast given
  • Le Cyprin ou la Précaution inutile, c. de Charles Martel ;
    • no cast given
  • Les Nuits du Hampton-Club, d. d'André Mouëzy-Éon, d’après Robert-Louis Stevenson
    no cast given in Le Spectacle. From Pierron 1995 we have:
    • Herbert Forbes - Mm Brizard
    • President - Tunc
    • Professor Triggs - Bussy
    • Rivers - Defresne
    • Sir Archibald - Louvigny
    • Owens - Ratineau
    • Gurnbridge - Valbel
    • Colville - Vernaud
    • Sam - Nicolle
  • Les Bâtons dans les roues, e. de Robert Dieudonné ;
    • no cast given
  • L'Angoisse, d. de Pierre Mille et Ceylia de Vylars
    • Brizard
    • Jane Meryem
    • René Bussy
  • Les Donnadieu, c. de Maurice de Féraudy et Jean Kold.
    • no cast given

Alright, so not colossally useful. Still, better than I had, and there is Brizard and Bussy in at least two pieces. Common sense confirmed, Grand Guignol actors played multiple parts. I do notice that in May 1908 Vatta Brizard and Bussy will play in Une leçon à la Salpêtrière by Binet and de Lorde (Pierron 1995, p308), which might indicate a stable-ish ensemble. Or it might not.

Back to Pierron.

Pierron's list of plays is in chronological order, so if Hampton Club is 1908, then before it we have:

Les Operations du Professeur Verdier (by Elie de Bassan. 16th May, 1907.)

PERSONNAGES

at first read it seems they had a strange way of rendering some names prenom surname and others surname prenom.

The split casting for Alice is interesting. It's likely that Lantelme is Genevieve Lantelme, a very interesting character who divided her time between acting, prostitution, and if Laurent Tailhard is to be believed, having a violent relationship with Oscar Méténier. One is tempted to add two and two and come up with a confection where she's fired mid-run for throwing a chair at her lover and theatre manager.

There are only two problems with that confection - the first is that in 1907 Lantelme is 24 years old and Méténier is 48, and in all likelihood solidly in the grip of the syphilis that will kill him six years later. If we're to believe contemporary accounts (actually account, singular, by actress Simone le Bargy (better known as Madame Simone) in her 1957 memoir Sous de nouveaux soleils), then by 1907 Lantelme has been a sex worker for at least the past ten years, pandered by her own mother as a mistress to old rich men with many lovers both male and female (it's quite the tale). If a fiftieth of this is true then surely she'd have known Méténier was syphilitic? Was she?

The second is that Méténier handed the theatre over to Max Maurey in 1898. By 1907 Méténier has been gone (certainly as an active manager) for nine years. Is my current understanding. What did Oscar do from 1898 to 1913?

I have no idea.

Another unfortunate is that despite the 24 year age gap, Méténier will outlive Lantelme by two years. He will die in 1913 of what sounds like tertiary syphilis (Tailhard, ). Lantelme will fall off her husband's yacht and drown in 1911. One can only imagine how heavy those dresses were if they got wet. A dreadful waste of both of them.

Back to Pierron.

Apres Coup, ou Tics! (by René Berton, 28th April, 1908)

which does look to have been a decent hit. The cast for that is:

PERSONNAGES

A question of numbers.

This one has been mostly answered above - I would still like to know how big the acting company was - we're told in Pierron's biography of Paula Maxa that Maxa was allowed to use Choissy's office as a dressing room, which implies space was tight. Go back to the Fevrier 1908 programme and we see:

1908. Février :
  • La Suicidette, c. de Johannès Gravier;
  • Le Cyprin ou la Précaution inutile, c. de Charles Martel ;
  • Les Nuits du Hampton-Club, d. d'André Mouëzy-Éon, d’après Robert-Louis Stevenson
  • Les Bâtons dans les roues, e. de Robert Dieudonné ;
  • L'Angoisse, d. de Pierre Mille et Ceylia de Vylars
  • Les Donnadieu, c. de Maurice de Féraudy et Jean Kold.

Six plays, one with an all male cast of nine. I'm going to say that's every man in the company on stage. The Grand Guignol isn't afraid of big casts - Une leçon à la Salpêtrière has a cast of seventeen - so cast size probably isn't the sole reason it was never revived. Still, Paula Maxa liked it.

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