'A Woman's Torture' was acted at the Comédie Française with extraordinary success. This success was for Dumas a warning and a lesson. 'A Woman's Torture' was a three-act play, short, concise, panting, which hurried to the coup de théâtre of the second act, upon which the drama revolved, and rushed to its conclusion. The time of five-act comedies, with ample expositions, copious developments, philosophical disquisitions, curious and fanciful episodes, was gone. Henceforth the dramatist had to deal with a hurried and blasé public, which, taking dinner at eight, could give to the theatre but a short time, and an attention disturbed by the labor of digestion. 'A Woman's Torture,' which lasted only an hour and a half, and proceeded only by rapid strokes, was exactly what that public wanted. After that time Dumas wrote only three-act and one-act plays; using four acts only for 'Les Idées de Madame Aubray' (Madame Aubray's Ideas); and these four acts are very short. In 1867 this play announced Dumas's return to the stage; and Dumas is here more paradoxical than he had ever been. His theme looked like a wager not simply against bourgeois prejudices, but even against good sense, and, I dare to say, against justice. This wager was won by Dumas, thanks to an incredible display of skill. He took up the thesis a second time in 'Denise,' and won his wager again, but with less difficulty. In 'Denise' the lover struggles only against social prejudices, and allows himself to be carried away by one of those emotional fits which disturb and confound human reason. In 'Madame Aubray's Ideas' the triumph is one of pure logic.
'Une Visite de Noces' (A Wedding Call) and 'La Princesse Georges' followed rather closely on 'Madame Aubray's Ideas.' 'A Wedding Call'!—what a thunderbolt then! It was of but one act, but one act the effect of which was prodigious, the echo of which is still heard. Time and familiarity have now softened for us the too sharp outlines of this bitter play. It has been acknowledged a masterpiece. It is certainly one of the boldest works of this extraordinary magician, who, thanks to his unerring skill and to the dazzling wit of his dialogue, brought the public to listen to whatever he chose to put upon the stage. It seemed that, like a lion tamer in the arena, Dumas took pleasure in belaboring and exasperating this many-headed monster, in order to prove to his own satisfaction that he could subdue its revolts.
'La Princesse Georges' is a work of violent and furious passion. We find in it Madame de Terremonde, the good woman who adores her husband, but who adores him with fury, who wants him all to herself, and who, when sure that she is betrayed, passes from the most exasperated rage to tears and despair. There is in the first act a scene of exposition which has become celebrated. No one ever so rapidly mastered the public; no one ever from the first stroke so painfully twisted the heart of the spectators.
Let us pass rapidly over 'La Femme de Claude' (Claude's Wife: 1873). Of all his plays it is the one Dumas said he liked best, the one he most passionately defended with all sorts of commentaries, letters, prefaces, etc.; the one which he insisted on having revived, a long time after it had failed. To my mind that play was a mistake; and the public, in spite of Dumas's arguments, in spite of the protests of the critics, who are often very glad to distinguish themselves by not yielding to the common voice,—the public insisted on agreeing with me.
Only a few months later, Dumas brilliantly retrieved himself with 'Monsieur Alphonse.' His Madame Guichard is the most cheerfully vulgar type of the parvenue which any one ever dared to put upon the stage. She can hardly read and write; she is no longer young, and she is "to boot" very proud of her money; she has no tact and no taste; but at heart she is a good sort of woman. Her morality is as primitive as her education. But deceit disgusts her; she hates but one thing, she says,—lying. She is not troubled by conventionalities; and her speech has all the color and energy of popular speech. But see! Dumas in depicting this woman preserved exquisite measure. Madame Guichard says many pert and droll things; she never utters a coarse word. Her language is picturesque; it is free from slang. Hers is a vulgar nature, but she does not offend delicate ears by the grossness of her utterance. Dumas never drew a more living picture; she is the joy of this rather sad play.
All that remain to be reviewed are 'L'Étrangère,' 'La Princesse de Bagdad,' and 'Françillon'; all of which were given at the Comédie Française. 'L'Étrangère' is indeed a melodrama, with an admixture of comedy. Had he gone further in that direction, Dumas might have made a new sort of play, which would perhaps have reigned a long time on the stage. But after this trial, successful though it was, he stopped. 'La Princesse de Bagdad' entirely failed. 'Françillon' was Dumas's last success at the Comédie Française.
After 1887 Dumas gave nothing to the stage. He had completed a great five-act play, 'The Road to Thebes,' which the manager of the Comédie Française hoped every year to put on the boards. Dumas kept promising it; but either from distrust of himself or of the public, or from fatigue, or fear of meeting with failure, he asked for new delays, until the day when he declared that not only the play would not be acted during his life, but that he would not even allow it to be acted after his death.
This death he saw coming, with sad but calm eyes. It was a sorrow for us to see this man, whom we had known so quick and alert, grow weaker every day, showing the progress of disease in his shriveled features and body. The complexion had lost all color, the cheeks had become flaccid, the eye had no life left.
On October 1st, 1895, he wrote to his friend Jules Claretie:—"Do not depend upon me any more; I am vanquished. There are moments when I mourn my loss, as Madame D'Houdetot said when dying." He was at Puys, by the seaside, when he wrote that despairing letter. He returned to Marly, there to die, surrounded by his family, on November 28th, 1895, in a house which he loved and which had been bequeathed to him years before by an intimate friend.
His loss threw into mourning the world of letters, and the whole of Paris. People discovered then—for death loosens every tongue and every pen—how kind and generous in reality was Dumas, who had often been accused of avarice by those who contrasted him with his father; how many services he had discreetly rendered, how open his hand always was. His constant cheerfulness and good-nature had finally caused him to be forgiven for his wit, which was sarcastic and cutting, and for his success, which had thrown so many rivals into the shade. This witty man, who was always obliging and even tender-hearted, had no envy, and gave his applause without a shadow of reserve to the successes of others. Every young author found in him advice and support; he did not expect gratitude, and therefore was soured by no disappointment. He was a good man, partly from nature, partly from determination; for he deemed that, after all, the best way to live happy in this world is to make happy as many people as possible.