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Mlle Raucourt

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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MLLE RAUCOURT (1756-1815), French actress, whose real name was Frangoise Marie Antoinette Saucerotte, was born in Nancy on the 3rd of March 1756, the daughter of an actor, who took her to Spain, where she played in tragedy at the age of twelve. By 1770 she was back in France at Rouen, and her success as Euphemie in Belloy's Gaston et Bayard caused her to be called to the Comedie Frangaise, where in 1772 she made her debut as Dido. She played all the classical tragedy parts to crowded houses, until the scandals of her private life and her extravagance ended her popularity. In 1776 she suddenly disappeared. Part of the ensuing three years she was in prison for debt, but some of the time she spent in the capitals of northern Europe, followed everywhere by scandal. Under protection of the queen she reappeared at the Theatre Frangais in 1779, and renewed her success in Phedre, as Cleopatra, and all her former roles. At the outbreak of the Revolution she was imprisoned for six months with other royalist members of the Comedie Frangaise, and she did not reappear upon that stage until the close of 1793, and then only for a short time. She deserted, with a dozen of the best actors in the company, to found a rival colony, but a summons from the Directory brought her back in 1797. Napoleon gave her a pension, and in 1806 she was commissioned to organize and direct a company that was to tour Italy, where, especially in Milan, she was enthusiastically received. She returned to Paris a few months before her death on the 15th of January 1815. Her funeral was the occasion of a riot. The clergy of her parish having refused to receive the body, the crowd broke in the church doors, and were only restrained from further violence by the arrival of an almoner sent post-haste by Louis XVIII. She is buried at Pere Lachaise.