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Memoir
Famed for her "golden voice" and her highly emotional performances in tragic and melodramatic roles, French actress Sarah Bernheardt (1845-1923) was the foremost leading lady of her age. Legendary for her unconventionality and her extremes of passion, she counted among her triumphant performances as Corlia in "King Lear", the Queen in "Ruy Blas", Phedra, Marguerite Gautier, Tosca and Fedora. She also enjoyed great success in "Hamlet" - not as Ophelia, but as the Prince - and as Pellead, her love of challenge led her to take on the most demanding of roles regardless of disparities of age or even gender. In "Memoir", John Murrell choreographs a memory dance for Bernhardt as she recalls the forces and personalities that have shaped her life. Facing an overwhelming need to preserve her experiences, she begins to dictate her memoirs to her faithful secretary, George Pitou. As she and George begin to recreate the personalities and events of long ago, past and present merge into one gloriously poignant moment and the Mediterranean background fades into the recollected landscape of a life fully and exuberantly lived. Produced at the state of the art recording studios of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation with sound effects and music. Performed by Douglas Chamberlain and Pat Galloway Music Composed by Laura Burton Approximate Duration 1 Hour
Audio Cassette
First published February 1, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
March 26, 2023
The image on the cover is a drawing of Sarah looking like a Mucha painting, and her assistant Pitou, chin in hand, looking like Prince! (LOL) The play is two acts, just these two characters. The premise is that he is Sarah's caretaker and also there to help with her "Memoirs". Whenever she has a memory she calls for Pitou to write it down. He is looking out for her best interests, but also must indulge the aged star. She makes him enact scenes with her in order for her to get into the moment and truly catch her memories. Pitou plays her manager, and her mother among others, and right at the end, my favorite, and also listed as Pitou's best characterization - Oscar Wilde - so she can discuss with him the 19th Century, and fame. I quite enjoyed this little book. I'd love to see it performed sometime.
Oh, and best of all - Sarah talks to the sun, that "self-satisfied old bitch"!
Oh, and best of all - Sarah talks to the sun, that "self-satisfied old bitch"!
October 7, 2010
My first encounter with this riveting work was hearing it performed - for CBC Radio, directed and produced by my father Robert Chesterman.
I was initially convinced to listen because of the play's subject matter (Sarah Bernhardt) - being a drama freak growing up - and because both its lead actors had entranced my youthful heart when introduced by Dad (whose repeated referral to "Teddy" on the one hand and a virtual living goddess of the stage on the other, probably didn't help)...
But all that superficial silliness took its proper place as soon as the play's sparkling dialogue drew me in, and indeed Martha Henry as La Bernhardt and Edward Atienza as her faithful (sweet, darling...) assistant Georges Pitou came alive. And in those two short hours it seemed as if we were there with these old sweeties, crippled a little at that pont in their lives by time - for which they compensated with their minds, as razor-sharp as that of their... creator?
Having already at that early age (tho my darling mother Margie says I taught myself to read at two) read The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt – who'd become a legend in her time, if not in mine, as THE original drama queen of all – I'd had my girlish qualms allowing these and similar precious perceptions to be trampled [by a man!]... Course, such pettiness proved exactly that: aggrandized fears to which young girls are sometimes prone – since Dad turned out in this case to be RiGHT (was there the slightest doubt? – no, not from him 'at any rate'!): this John Murrell was genius incarnate!
(And so, I'd realized – swept up in a spirit of heady delirium, having had all that highly grown-up fun shared with little MOi! - was Robert C, my dad, for catalyzing such a sweet performance from this trio of perfection…)
I'M stoked today too, full of my experiences revolving round this rare theatrical event - one that celebrates (with the utmost respect) delight in adding flights of fancy to history as it's written - and gaining, in the process, unexpected insight into times past. Those two rare hours of auditory absorption induced in me a deeper bond with history – one more down-to-earth, which recognizes as the stuff of stories real people relating rather than their publicized personas.
Writing this review adds yet another layer to the fullness of a well-spent moment, transported back to giddy times shared with my daddy-bud - when the world was our never-boring stage, and the rest would melt away as he and I would relish what we had as father-daughter and recognize the best of what the other had to offer.
[Marking this down as yet another moment to remember, brought to me – and you – by John Murrell's unparalleled Memoir.]
I was initially convinced to listen because of the play's subject matter (Sarah Bernhardt) - being a drama freak growing up - and because both its lead actors had entranced my youthful heart when introduced by Dad (whose repeated referral to "Teddy" on the one hand and a virtual living goddess of the stage on the other, probably didn't help)...
But all that superficial silliness took its proper place as soon as the play's sparkling dialogue drew me in, and indeed Martha Henry as La Bernhardt and Edward Atienza as her faithful (sweet, darling...) assistant Georges Pitou came alive. And in those two short hours it seemed as if we were there with these old sweeties, crippled a little at that pont in their lives by time - for which they compensated with their minds, as razor-sharp as that of their... creator?
Having already at that early age (tho my darling mother Margie says I taught myself to read at two) read The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt – who'd become a legend in her time, if not in mine, as THE original drama queen of all – I'd had my girlish qualms allowing these and similar precious perceptions to be trampled [by a man!]... Course, such pettiness proved exactly that: aggrandized fears to which young girls are sometimes prone – since Dad turned out in this case to be RiGHT (was there the slightest doubt? – no, not from him 'at any rate'!): this John Murrell was genius incarnate!
(And so, I'd realized – swept up in a spirit of heady delirium, having had all that highly grown-up fun shared with little MOi! - was Robert C, my dad, for catalyzing such a sweet performance from this trio of perfection…)
I'M stoked today too, full of my experiences revolving round this rare theatrical event - one that celebrates (with the utmost respect) delight in adding flights of fancy to history as it's written - and gaining, in the process, unexpected insight into times past. Those two rare hours of auditory absorption induced in me a deeper bond with history – one more down-to-earth, which recognizes as the stuff of stories real people relating rather than their publicized personas.
Writing this review adds yet another layer to the fullness of a well-spent moment, transported back to giddy times shared with my daddy-bud - when the world was our never-boring stage, and the rest would melt away as he and I would relish what we had as father-daughter and recognize the best of what the other had to offer.
[Marking this down as yet another moment to remember, brought to me – and you – by John Murrell's unparalleled Memoir.]
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews