Sacha Guitry was a French stage actor, film actor, director, screenwriter, and playwright of the Boulevard theatre. He was the son of a leading French actor, Lucien Guitry, and followed his father into the theatrical profession. He became known for his stage performances, often in boulevardier roles, in the many plays he wrote, of which there were more than 120. He was married five times, always to rising actresses whose careers he furthered. Probably his best-known wife was Yvonne Printemps to whom he was married between 1919 and 1932.
Guitry’s plays range from historical dramas to contemporary light comedies. Some have musical scores, by composers including André Messager and Reynaldo Hahn. When silent films became popular Guitry avoided them, finding the lack of spoken dialogue fatal to dramatic impact. From the 1930s to the end of his life he enthusiastically embraced the cinema, making as many as five films in a single year.
The later years of Guitry’s career were overshadowed by accusations of collaborating with the occupying Germans after the capitulation of France in the Second World War. The charges were dismissed, but Guitry, a strongly patriotic man, was disillusioned by the vilification by some of his compatriots. By the time of his death his popular esteem had been restored to the extent that 12,000 people filed past his coffin before his burial in Paris.
Yvonne Printemps was a French singer and actress who achieved stardom on stage and screen in France and internationally.
Printemps went on the stage in Paris at the age of 12, and at 21 she was singled out by the actor, director and playwright Sacha Guitry as a leading lady. In 1919 they were married, and worked closely together until 1932, when they divorced. Printemps never remarried, but had a personal and professional partnership with the actor Pierre Fresnay which lasted until his death in 1975.
As a performer, Printemps was famed for the quality of her singing voice and for her personal charm. Among those who composed for her were André Messager, Reynaldo Hahn, Noël Coward and Francis Poulenc. Her voice could have led her to an operatic career, but guided by Guitry she concentrated on operette and other types of musical show, along with non-musical plays and films. In addition to her many successes in Paris she appeared to great acclaim in the West End of London, and on Broadway in New York.
Sacha Guitry est un dramaturge, acteur, metteur en scène, réalisateur et scénariste français. Auteur dramatique prolifique, il a écrit cent-vingt-quatre pièces de théâtre, dont beaucoup furent de grands succès. Il a également réalisé trente-six films (dont dix-sept adaptations de ses pièces), jouant dans la quasi-totalité d’entre eux, notamment Le Roman d’un tricheur, Désiré, Mon père avait raison, Quadrille, Ils étaient neuf célibataires, Si Versailles m’était conté…
Yvonne Printemps qu’il épouse à Paris le 10 avril 1919, avec comme témoins Sarah Bernhardt, Georges Feydeau, Lucien Guitry (avec lequel il vient juste de se réconcilier) et Tristan Bernard. Yvonne Printemps crée 34 pièces de Sacha Guitry, en reprend 6 autres et joue dans un de ses films, Un roman d’amour et d’aventures. Si on prête de nombreuses liaisons à Printemps (Georges Guynemer, Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Maurice Escande, entre autres), c’est pour Pierre Fresnay qu’elle quitte Guitry le 15 juillet 1932. Le divorce entre Sacha et Yvonne est prononcé le 7 novembre 1934.
Yvonne Wigniolle, dite Yvonne Printemps est une soprano lyrique et une actrice dramatique française de l’entre-deux-guerres.
Snippet of History 