The Art of Ballet

by Mark Edward Perugini

In the ballet of “Les Fêtes de l’Hymen et de l’Amour,” in 1766, Guimard had the misfortune to have one of her arms broken by a piece of falling scenery. Such was her place in public regard even at this time, that a Mass was said at Notre-Dame for her recovery.

It was not long after success came to her that Guimard accepted the protection of the notorious Prince de Soubise. One of her first acquisitions, in 1768, was a superb residence at Pantin, just outside Paris, which was decorated by Fragonard. It was visited by everybody who was anybody, for, apart from the charms of its mistress, there was a theatre in the mansion, where entertainments of a very special kind were staged, little poetic trifles or risky comedies, which while delighting a circle of appreciative connoisseurs would not have been staged in the ordinary way, as being caviare to the general.

The place at Pantin, however, did not suffice the exigent Madeleine, and a town-house was taken also in the Chaussée d’Antin,—next to that of Sophie Arnould by the way—where another theatre was built and where even more festive entertainments were provided, a theatre which could seat five hundred persons (only present by invitation) which received the name of The Temple of Terpsichore. It was designed by the architect Ledoux, decorated by Fragonard, who did numerous lovely panels in which Guimard appeared; and by David, then a youthful assistant, whom Madeleine’s generous aid is said to have sent to Rome for the furtherance of his art education.

Here in the course of time all Paris came. Here Guimard held her famous receptions—three a week, to the first of which were invited members of the Court circles, the aristocracy of the aristocracy; to the second—artists, actors, actresses, musicians, poets, the aristocracy of the world of intellect; to the third—all the polished rakes and roués, with their attendant Phrynes, the aristocracy of vice.

There seem to have been wild times in the Chaussée d’Antin Hôtel, and some of Madeleine’s private theatrical productions must have been worthy of tottering Rome. Well might discreet Abbés, and reputedly virtuous ladies of the Court hide behind the curtains of the darkened and mysterious boxes with which her theatre was provided. Not be seen while seeing was their only chance to retain a virtuous reputation! It was now doubtless that after having long danced le genre sérieux, Guimard abandoned it as one record says for the genre mixte, and was “inimitable” in “les ballets Anacréontiques!”

One example of the sort of dramatic fare Madeleine was giving her guests on occasion at Pantin, or at the Chaussée d’Antin residence, will suffice. In 1721 at the Château of St. Cloud, in the presence of the Duc d’Orléans as Regent, there had been given a ballet called “Les Fêtes d’Adam.” Some of her friends suggested that Madeleine should go one better and produce a ballet on a classic subject with herself as Venus rising from the sea. But the Archbishop of Paris got news of the affair and managed to nip the suggestion in the bud. Perhaps it was never seriously intended; it may have been “merely a suggestion—nothing more.”

One of her first lovers was Delaborde the financier, poor only as an amateur musician, who directed her theatre at Pantin till it was closed in 1770; and only of greater importance in her life, financially, was Soubise. But Madeleine had a particular penchant for bishops it seems, and incidentally some of her later and most devoted friends were De Jarente, Bishop of Orleans, De Choiseul, the Archbishop of Cambrai, and Desnos, Bishop of Verdun.

The first-named of these clerical worthies had the disposal of a whole sheaf of livings, that is to say, he was supposed to have, but it was really Madeleine who allotted them—abbeys, priories, chapels and so forth. She did not forget her friends, and De Jarente found himself unable to resist. “What Guimard wishes one must wish!” It was this allotment of the bishops’ feuille des bénéfices which drew from Sophie Arnould the whimsical remark that “Ce petit ver à soie (Guimard) devrait être plus gras. Elle ronge une si bonne feuille.”

Another favour which, through the Prince de Soubise, Madeleine was able to dispense among her friends was permission to hunt in the Royal forests, and it led to trouble on more than one occasion—her friends were so much of a genre mixte.

But if men were weak where Guimard was concerned, there is no need to consider her as infamous. There is so often a tendency among chroniclers to consider that because a pretty woman, with every inducement to succumb to temptation, had a “protector,” all her men friends found her equally ready to receive their attentions. Nothing could be more unjust. There may have been reasons why Madeleine did not marry sooner than she did, and she may not have been quite that paragon of virtue our present time prefers, but in an age notorious for its callousness and cruelty as well as for its moral laxity she was distinguished as a woman not merely of fascination but of good heart and generous impulses.