Guimard, Marie Madeleine (1743–1816)

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Guimard, Marie Madeleine (1743–1816)

French dancer . Born in Paris, France, on October 10, 1743; died in Paris on May 4, 1816; married Jean Etienne Despréaux (a choreographer and poet), in August 1789; children: (with Benjamin de Laborde) a daughter, also named Marie-Madeleine Guimard (1763–1779).

Star of the Paris Opéra for 25 years and known as much for her love affairs as her dancing, Marie Madeleine Guimard was the illegitimate daughter of an inspector of a Paris cloth factory. When she was 15, she secured a place in the corps de ballet of the Comédie-Française. She first appeared at the Paris Opéra in May 1762, as Terpsichore in Les Fêtes Grecque et Romaines, replacing her friend Marie Allard . Guimard became première danseuse the following year and went on to perform in many ballets, including Le Premier Navigateur, Ninette à la Cour, La Fête de Mirza, Le Déserteur, and Les Caprices de Galatée, perhaps her best work. Despite her less than perfect technique and her slim stature, for which she was often criticized, Guimard was a superb actress, a skill that served her particularly well as she grew older. In 1778, during her 16th year with the ballet, her performance as the simple farm girl Nicette in La Chercheuse d'Esprit was praised by the critics as a masterpiece of coy innocence and naiveté.

Of Guimard's numerous paramours, the most significant was a ten-year liaison with Benjamin de Laborde, first gentleman-in-waiting to Louis XV. (Guimard had a daughter with Laborde, also named Marie-Madeleine, who died at age 16.) In 1772, Laborde oversaw the building of a lavish house on the Chaussée d'Antin that boasted a winter garden and a private theater, the Temple of Terpsichore, where Guimard staged many performances and supposedly held wild parties. In defiance of the archbishop of Paris but to the delight of Paris society, she presented some of the most scandalous plays of the day, including Les Fêtes d'Adam and Colle's Partie de chasse de Henri IV. So many of the best actors from the Opéra and the Comédie-Française began turning up in Guimard's productions that the minister finally issued an order forbidding the actors to appear anywhere except in their own theater without special permission from the king. Guimard also had a country estate in Pantin, with yet another attached theater.

When Laborde's money began to dwindle, Guimard also became the mistress of the Prince de Soubise and, for at least five years, managed to keep both relationships humming along without incident. However, even the treasury of the prince could not withstand her expenditures, and Guimard moved on to a liaison with the bishop of Orléans, who provided yet a new store of revenue from the dioceses. For all her extravagance, however, Guimard was also known for her kind heart and contributed generously to the poor. When the House of Soubise came upon hard times, she voluntarily returned a pension the prince had given her.

In 1786, Guimard evidently ran out of rich lovers and was compelled to sell the Temple of Terpsichore. It was disposed of by lottery for the sum of 300,000 francs, although the winner sold the property almost immediately for nearly double the sum. Guimard's career at the Opéra, which survived a bout of smallpox in 1783 and a subsequent knee injury, endured until 1789,

when at age 46 she retired to marry Jean Etienne Despréaux (1748–1829), a choreographer and poet who was 15 years her junior. During the long years of the Revolution, the couple lived in a small apartment at the top of Montmartre. Although their dancers' pension allowed few luxuries, Guimard appeared truly content for the first time in her life. After eight years, they moved back to Paris, where the dancer died on May 4, 1816. At the time of her death, the public had forgotten her, though her grieving husband noted that along with Marie Guimard "the divine century" of ballet had also died.