[LIVRE] Louis XIV and Molière: the pleasure, talent and glory of France

It’s a strange story told by Laurent Dandrieu, journalist and writer, in The King and the Harlequin: Louis XIV, Molière and the theater of power (Artège), that of lifelong companionship between an acrobat and the greatest monarch of his time.

Basically, Molière was not only a man of the theater and Louis XIV not only a man of power. One carried out for a time the task inherited from his father as valet upholsterer of the king, the other loved dance and the arts more than reason before emitting the rays of the Sun King. The collaboration between these two lovers of the arts began on the evening of October 24, 1658. The troupe of eleven actors led by Molière was applauded all over France, particularly in Lyon. But, yesterday as today, everything happens in Paris. The actors were given an evening at Versailles. “ Once obtained the invitation to perform before the king, it was necessary to act quickly because on October 26, Louis would leave the capital for many months, having to go to Lyon to meet a potential wife, Marguerite of Savoy. », says Laurent Dandrieu.

All in all

Molière will play Nicomedesa tragedy written by Corneille, in the prestigious setting of the Louvre. He is 36 years old. The welcome was “ polite but not very enthusiastic », Specifies the author. It was then that Molière went all out: he asked the king to be able to play a second play straight away. No longer a tragedy, but a farce, The Doctor in Love. The king laughs to stick to the sides “. The next day, the troop is authorized to present itself as that of “ Sir, only brother of the king “. The beginning of a career that will bring Molière’s glory to this day. The prince of French theater gave hundreds of performances in front of Louis XIV, who returned to see a play he particularly appreciated up to five times.

Where and how did Molière acquire his talent? Child of the ball, man of the court? We know almost nothing about the cultural and social bath in which his genius grew up. We know that he studied at the Parisian college of Clermont, now the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, dressed in a black cassock and wearing a square cap, among the sons of the nobility and the upper bourgeoisie. But Paris did not immediately recognize the talent of this impecunious artist, twice imprisoned for debt at the Grand Châtelet prison in 1645.

The king had to get involved. Louis XIV gave in to the charms of theatrical performance from a very young age. “ Louis did not hesitate to go to Parisian theaters to attend their performances », writes Dandrieu. Crazy about Italian comedy as he was crazy about dance, Louis XIV was waiting for his great playwright. The monarchy is superior to the Republic in that it very often remunerates the lucky elect with eternal glory, in addition to material goods, the talents which approach it.

As the Earth revolves around the Sun, everything revolves around Louis XIV. We have forgotten that Molière was forced, upon the death of his father, to resume the role of valet of the king, which he fulfilled for a time. “ The office of ordinary upholsterer of the king allowed the person who exercised it to have, every morning of his quarter, access to the king’s rising », specifies Laurent Dandrieu. Molière thus attended, among a few privileged people from the kingdom, the king’s toilet, breakfast and dressing.

The love of the stage anchored in the body

He will continue to dialogue with Louis XIV until the end, in particular by dedicating his pieces to him. Courtier, Molière? It’s more subtle. Laurent Dandrieu slips in this short analysis of the very different relationships with the king between Molière and the fabulist La Fontaine. “ Molière and La Fontaine were linked by a solid friendship, which did not prevent them from subsequently following divergent paths.writes Dandrieu. More linked to Fouquet than the actor was, La Fontaine remained faithful to him and paid this loyalty with a consented distance from the court and the prebends. »

Molière will maintain this loyalty until the end, based on a reciprocal interest but also on a community of tastes. He who could have lived on his sole income as an author and theater director had a love of the stage anchored in his body, even if he lost his health. On February 10, 1673, Molière created The Imaginary Sickwritten and edited in record time, for the city and not for the court. It’s a triumph. But Molière’s respiratory illness is not imaginary. On February 17, 1773, this immense actor played the role for the fourth time when “ the spectators themselves noticed that he was no longer playing the illness », says Dandrieu. He asks for a priest and breathes his last. It’s 10 p.m. Born sixteen years after Molière, Louis XIV would survive him by more than thirty years. For the man of the theater, Louis XIV was more than a patron, concludes Dandrieu. “ He was also and undoubtedly first the one who forced him to surpass himself, to always raise his demands […]to constantly renew ourselves, to always be more daring, always more inventive, always more courage too. » Laurent Dandrieu signs an enlightening and subtle dive into the soul and art of two virtuosos who bequeathed their glory to France. As far as possible from state contemporary art, the one which produced, for example, the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games on July 27… Read urgently.