Scribe, (Augustin) Eugène

Scribe, (Augustin) Eugène (1791–1861), French dramatist, originator and exploiter of the well-made play. A prolific writer, he was responsible, alone or in collaboration, for more than 400 works, comprising tragedies, comedies, vaudevilles, and librettos for light opera. His early plays were failures and it was not until 1815 that he achieved fame with Une nuit de la Garde Nationale. Even more successful was Un verre d'eau (1850), translated into English as A Glass of Water; or, Great Events from Trifling Causes Spring (1863) and also as The Queen's Favourite (1883). The most successful of Scribe's plays, however, and the only one now remembered, was Adrienne Lecouvreur (1849), written in collaboration with Legouvé. The play, though historically incorrect, provided a fine part for Rachel and later for Bernhardt. In translation it was played by Ristori, Modjeska, and Helen Faucit, among others. Scribe's plays, skilfully constructed with the utmost neatness, economy, and banality, came as a relief to a middle-class audience surfeited with the incoherence of the Revolution and the excess of the Romantics. Though his collaborators contributed much to the common stock, the stagecraft was his alone; with no depth or delicacy of perception, he had an uncanny flair for knowing what the public wanted, and how to give it to them with the maximum dramatic effect. Although he was to some extent unfairly blamed for all the shortcomings of the dramatists who succeeded him, he had an immense influence on them, particularly on Labiche and Sardou, and there is no doubt that his much-sought-after librettos, written for such musicians as Meyerbeer, Offenbach, and even Verdi (Les Vêpres siciliennes, 1855), helped to make French romantic opera a model of theatrical effectiveness.