You will certainly expect that I should tell you what constitutes the talent of this performer. He is small in stature, thin in person, and rather ill-made; his arms and legs being bowed, which he takes care to conceal by the fulness of his garments. He has a fine eye, and his features are regular, but too delicate for the perspective of the theatre. He has long since adopted the antique head-dress,[[7]] and has contributed to bring it into fashion. He distinguished himself formerly in Paris by wearing clothes of a strange form. As an actor, he has no nobleness of manner, and not unfrequently his gestures are aukward. His deportment is always ungraceful, though he often endeavours to imitate the posture of the antique statues; but even then he presents only a caricature. His countenance has little or no expression, except in moments of rage or terror. In pourtraying the latter sentiment, all the faculties of his soul appear absorbed; yet, though his distraction seems complete, there is a sort of silliness blended with his stupor, which certain persons take for truth, and which is much more perceptible in the rest of his characters. In rage, he is a tiger mangling his prey, and sometimes you might believe that you heard that animal drawing his breath. TALMA has never expressed well a tender, generous, or noble sentiment. His soul is neither to be softened nor elevated; and, to produce effect, he must be in a terror or in a rage; but then he makes a great impression on the majority of the public. His utterance is slow, minced, and split into syllables. His voice is hollow; but, in moments of rage, it is strong, yet without being of a considerable volume. He is generally reproached with being deficient in sensibility: I think, however, that, by dint of labour, he might paint feeling; for I have heard him render delicate passages happily enough. He is accused here of having adopted the English style of acting, though, as far as my opinion goes, with little or no foundation. Be this as it may, he passed the early part of his youth in London, where his father resides, and follows the profession of a dentist. The son may now be about thirty-eight years of age.
TALMA preserves the reputation of being a zealous partisan of the revolution; but I am confidently assured that he never injured any one, and held in horror the assassinations which have left an indelible stain on that event. He was intimately connected with the deputies, styled Girondists or Brisotins, who perished on the scaffold, after their party was overcome, on the 31st of May, 1793, by that of the ferocious mountaineers. The latter warmly reproached TALMA with having, in the year 1792, after the retreat of the Prussians, given a fête or grand supper to the famous DUMOURIEZ, with whom they were beginning to fall out, and whom they accused of treason for not having taken the king of Prussia prisoner. The hideous MARAT, I am told, went to call on that general at TALMA'S, where the company received him very cavalierly, and when he was gone, DUGAZON the actor, hot-headed revolutionist as he was, by way of pleasantry, pretended to purify the room by burning sugar in a chaffing-dish. All this amounted to more than was necessary for being condemned by the revolutionary tribunal; and TALMA, being detested by ROBESPIERRE, would, in all probability, have been delivered over to that tribunal, but for the protection of DAVID, the celebrated painter, who was concerting with him about changing the form of dress of the French people. During all the reign of terror, TALMA and his wife were in continual fear of the scaffold.
LAFOND. TALMA reigned, and was in possession of the first cast of parts. Of these, he played whatever suited him, and rejected what he disliked, when about a year ago, there appeared in the same line a young actor of a rather tall and well-proportioned stature, and whom Nature had, besides, gifted with an agreeable countenance and a tolerably good voice. He had played in the provincial theatres; but, in order to overcome every obstacle which might be opposed to his début, he became a pupil of DUGAZON, an actor of comedy, and what is more singular, of one more frequently a buffoon than a comedian. The latter, however, is said to possess a knowledge of the style of playing of the actors who, thirty years ago, graced the French stage, and consequently may be capable of giving good advice.
By means of this powerful protection, LAFOND got the better of every difficulty. This actor made his first appearance in the character of Achille in the tragedy of Iphigénie en Aulide by RACINE. He was not the Achilles of Homer, nor even that of the piece, or at best he represented him in miniature. However, his diction generally just, his acting, some grace, and, above all, the fatigue and ennui which TALMA impressed on many of the spectators, procured this rival a decisive success. As is customary in such cases, the newspapers were divided in opinion. The majority declared for LAFOND, and none of the opposite side spoke unfavourably of him. It was not so with TALMA. Some judged him harshly, calling him a detestable actor, while others bestowed on him the epithet of sublime, which, at the present day, has scarcely any signification; so much is it lavished on the most indifferent performers. This instance proves the fact; for if TALMA has reached the sublime, it is le sublime de la Halle.
These two rivals might live in peace; the parts which suit the one, being absolutely unfit for the talents of the other. TALMA requires only concentered rage, sentiments of hatred and vengeance, which certainly belong to tragedy, but which ought not to be expressed as if they came from the mouth of a low fellow, unworthy of figuring in an action of this kind; and LAFOND is little qualified for any other than graceful parts, bordering on knight-errantry or romance. His best character is Achille. I have also seen him perform, if not in a manner truly tragic, at least highly satisfactory, Rodrigue in Le Cid of CORNEILLE, and the part of Tancrède in VOLTAIRE'S tragedy of that name. LAFOND obtains the preference over TALMA in the character of Orosmane in the tragedy of Zaïre; a character which is the touchstone of an actor. Not that he excels in it. He has not a marked countenance, the dignity, the tone of authority, the energy, and the extreme sensibility which characterize this part. He is not the Sultan who commands. He is, if you please, a young commis very amorous, a little jealous, who gets angry, and becomes good-humoured again; but at least he is not a ferocious being, as TALMA represents Orosmane, in moments of rage and passion, or an unfeeling one in those which require sensibility.
LAFOND is reproached sometimes with a bombastic and inflated tone. Feeling that he is deficient in the necessary powers, he swells his voice, which is prejudicial to truth, and without truth, there is no theatrical illusion. Nature had intended him for the parts of young lovers, of which I shall presently speak. His features are too delicate, his countenance not sufficiently flexible, and his person bespeaks too little of the hero, for great characters. But when he first appeared, there was a vacancy in this cast of parts, and none in the other.
Jeunes Premiers, or parts of young Lovers.
ST. FAL, DAMAS, and DUPONT.
ST. FAL. This performer, who is upwards of forty-five, has never had an exterior sufficiently striking to turn the brain of young princesses. Every thing in his person is common, and his acting is really grotesque. However, not long since he frequently obtained applause by a great affectation of sensibility and a stage-trick, which consists in uttering loud, harsh, and hoarse sounds after others faint and scarcely articulated. He has, besides, but a trivial or burlesque delivery, and no dignity, no grace in his deportment or gestures.
DAMAS. He is much younger than ST. FAL, but his gait and carriage are vulgar. He is not deficient in warmth; but all this is spoiled by a manner the most common. He first played at the theatres on the Boulevard, and will never be able to forget the lessons he imbibed in that school. It is with him as with the rabbits of which BOILEAU makes mention, in one of his Satires where he describes a bad dinner,
"-------- et qui, nés dans Paris,
Sentaient encore le chou dont ils furent nourris."