ONCE IDOL OF PARIS

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 33, 2 November 1929, Page 31

ONCE IDOL OF PARIS

FAMOUS ACTRESS DIES A RECLUSE

At last the curtain has rung down on the life of Eve Lavalliere, noted French actress, often called “tbe modern Thais,” and for years tbe idol of the Parisian stage. Yet there remains unsolved the mystery that veiled the latter life of this exotic stage flower—what impelled her to vanish from the public view at the height of her fame and devote the remaining years of her career on earth to alms among the poor and the life of a religious recluse.

Was it because she tired of the gay life —she was once known as the gayest actress in all Paris—and was completely disillusioned of the ease and opulance, the frivolity and extravagance in which this sparkling and capricious favourite reigned for long as queen of beauty? Was she seeking surcease for a broken heart after some flaming love affair, such as consumed Eleonora Duse after her romance with Gabriele D’Annunzio?

. Or was Eve Lavalliere driven from the stage and virtually banished into exile on account of an affair with a German aristocrat and the frowns of her fellow-countrymen when the great war broke upon the world and France and Germany found themselves arrayed against each other? The secret may never be revealed, for with her death Mlle. Lavalliere left no diary nor record of any kind to shed additional light upon her reasons for withdrawal from the world of temporal affairs to remain thereafter virtually in solitude, seeking spiritual consolation.

Yet there are many who believe that her romance with a German diplomat was the impelling motive back of her stage retirement. It is now being pointed out that when the former actress passed out of the world a short time ago this former German diji’lomat and army officer, now said to be living in retirement on his estate in East' Prussia, sent a magnificent wreath of roses for her funeral. In her search for love and happiness, Eve Lavalliere believed that she had finally found it when she met a dashing attache of the German Embassy in Paris in the winter of 1913. It developed later that their first meeting had been under a sinister omen. They bad met at one of the receptions of Gastori Calmette, editor of “Figaro,” who was shot and killed in his office a few months later by Madame Joseph Caillaur, wife of the politician. A gifted comedienne, idol of the Paris stage, the toast of Kings and Princes, it seemed to the admiring Parisians as if the gods had given her their most magic nectar of success to sip. In reality, in the depth of her heart, her life had been one awful tragedy after another—dramas in her childhood home, dramas in her desperate struggle to make a career, dramas with her own children, dramas with her admirers.

Then, at the age of 45. still youthful and still seeking the honest affection she had never known, “the man” came into her life.

A gentleman to his fingertips, the handsome diplomat and soldier proved to be a perfect' lover. He waited on her like a stricken youth, lavished exquisite gifts on her and kept her boudoir filled with magnificent flowers. When Eve appeared in a new play he was always in the front row with the finest > bouquet he could obtain. The two became inseparable, always going out to social affairs to gether.

Suddenly, like a thunderbolt, war burst upon Europe on August 1, 1914, and by a few. pen strokes signed to ultimatums these two were arrayed on opposite sides in the bitter struggle. They parted with bitter tears. The German returned to his fatherland on the diplomatic train with the remainder of the embassy staff, to don a general’s uniform. In spite of her hatred for Germany, the French woman was crushed by the brusque separation and for months remained almost an invalid.. Then gradually she returned to her profession, and in the spring of 1915' started to tour France with a war play called “The Wounded Bird.”

By chance, perhaps, she took her company into Switzerland and, by another strange hazard, the German went there on leave and met her. French spies immediately reported this news to Paris; where it caused a great scandal in'official circles'. In all probability it was simply a lovers’ rendezvous, arranged in advance, but in the intense war fever of the time it appeared very sinister. Returning to France, Lavalliere found that an official investigation hau been started against her; and if it had not been for the influence of powerf"!. friends she would probably have been interned. As a warning and punishment, she was given a fixed residence far from Paris. The affair was quietly hushed up, and to this day the details of the investigation have never been made public. From that moment became a calvary, ending in a religious conversion, that is one of the most touching human experiences in France in modern times. “I am going to God by way of the devil,” she said shortly before she died. The private life of this woman, who became the most sparkling comedienne

of the French stage of her day, was an extraordinary succession of tragedies. Born in Toulon in 1868, her right name being Eugenie Fenoglio, she was only 15 years old when she saw her jealous Italian father, a tailor, kill he? mother in cold blood, and then kill himself. She was so terrified by this killing that she jumped from a window. Her brother, who jumped at the same time, ran away and . was never heard from again. In later years, when she had become wealthy, sb® spent large sums trying to locate him, but without success. Escaping from a reform institutittn. for rebellious girls, she ■ tried to make a living singing in cafes in. the small cities of Southern France, but failed miserably. • — < . ' One night she sat on a park bench' in Marseilles, wondering if she would eat, when a travelling theatrical manager who had been impressed by her act happened along, listened to her tale of woe and then took hen along to Paris with his company. In a few months she had become the darling of the French capital. For twenty years she reigned supreme in her own fiel3. Kings, Princes and Grand Dukes paid court to her. The dramatists fell at her knees to persuade her to play in their pieces. She lived in queenly style in a huge apartment facing the Tuileries Gardens. She saved a large fortune, and Paris worshipped her. But behind all this glitter of fortune and success grim tragedy stalked her footsteps. In her early days in Paris Eve had married Samuels, a theatrical manager, and this unhappy union ended in a divorce. She had two children, a girl and a boy. The daughter, who had been named Louise, after the famous Duchess de La Valliere, a favourite of Louis XIV., fell into the hands of an adventurer. This man broke her heart and wasted her fortune during a few months of marriage, and Eve’s daughter died. Her son also suffered misfortunes.

The same ill-fortune pursued' th® comedienne. Many men killed themselves when she refused to marry them, and an English comedian was killed by his own father when he announced that he was going to marry her. Like Thais, Eve Lavalliere crossed the paths of a holy man, and from that moment she was transformed. It was in Touraine in 1916. She had rented a small castle there in order to take a long rest, the mild disgrace occasioned by her meeting with her old’ friend in Switzerland having shaken her health, but had made preparations to return to the stage as soon as the war ended. The holy man in this case was an aged country priest, who talked to her so simply that she suddenly -felt a deep repentance for her past life. A short time later Eve Lavalliere decided to consecrate the remainder of her life to religious service. She turned over all of her goods to religious orders, took the vows of eternal poverty, and asked" to be admitted to a Carmelite convent. Because of her frail health she was not accepted at the convent, but she did become a member of tbe Third Franciscan Order, or lay sister. . ' “I have never been so happy in all my life,” she told some of her old theatrical friends who went to see her about this time. “Oh, if you could only realise the folly and' the futility of vwrldliness. J The shariie and the hollowness of it. How I Uisb you could discover the beauties ,of the spiritual life. Surely there is. nothing else worth while.” > ■ ; ? She asked tbe beads of her oraer for the most difficult task they could give her. She herself even chose Tunis, where some nursing centres were being opened up for the natives, and this choice was approved. It was her calvary. Tunis is hot, and' the poor natives she worked among were filthy. Both she and her companion, Leona, a former actress, who had become her bosom friend and became converted at the same time, were takeri down by fever after a few months, and after a long stay in a hospital had to be repatriated to France. Returning as an invalid to her humble cottage in tbe Vosges village in 1918, she began to prepare herself for the end that-seemed to be drawing near. She spent her days in prayer. _ On Sundays she would sing in the -little church —in the same sweet voice that had held Paris for twenty years. In her spare moments she went about the countryside doing good as she could; nursing the sick,- comforting those in sorrow and helping the poor from her slender income. Publishers who went to offer huge sums for her memoirs were never even received. To the few old friends she admitted to her little home she spoke only of the happiness of her new life. . - If her last years were a spiritual joy, they were a physical agony, but she accepted both in a devout spirit. To the very end, however, she was filled with a great joy for her new life, and just a short time before her passing she whispered: “I am going to God by way of the devil.”