Édouard de Max

Édouard Alexandre de Max (born Eduard-Alexandru Max Romalo; His father was the physician Emil Max, whose home regularly hosted actors, cultural figures and writers. Emil was Jewish, while his wife Pulheria descended from two Phanariote (Greco-Romanian) families, the Romalos and Rosettis (or Rusets). Not a very diligent student, according to the memoirist Rudolf Suțu, Eduard attended the first two grades at the National College, following which he was sent to study at Lausanne. Returning to Romania in 1884, he briefly studied at Mihai Viteazul High School in Bucharest. He then moved to Paris and entered the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, going on to the Paris Conservatoire in 1888. Earlier, in Sinaia, he had appeared on an improvised set beside Elena Văcărescu in an André Theuriet play; despite public enthusiasm, no Bucharest theatre hired him. according to a biographer, and had a reputation as a gay seducer, although one of his protégés, Jean Cocteau, wrote that this was something of a myth. His acting style was similarly flamboyant, and was disliked by those who preferred subtlety: he was widely regarded as well suited to act with his frequent stage partner, Sarah Bernhardt, who also favoured big, broad dramatic effect. Cocteau wrote that like Bernhardt "he was ignorant of codes or formulas. He searched and invented." Offstage he was known for his generosity to struggling young artists and to the poor in general.

20th century In the first two decades of the 20th century, de Max continued to appear mostly in serious, often tragic plays, but he made a single diversion into opera in 1900, playing the spoken title role in Fauré's Prométhée. His roles included Peter in Quo Vadis?, Claude Frollo in Notre Dame de Paris, Le Roi Christian in Le Manteau du Roi, and De Pantoya in Electra at the Théâtre de la Porte Saint-Martin between 1901 and 1906. At the Odéon in 1906 he played King Lear, and Marc Antony in Julius Caesar.

De Max played the title role in Timon of Athens at the Théâtre Antoine (1907). In 1911–12 he played a season at the Théâtre Sarah Bernhardt in plays including La Conquete d'Athenes, Le Proces de Jeanne d'Arc and Le Typhon. His last appearance was at the Comédie-Française in September 1924, appearing against medical advice in Erckmann-Chatrian's L'Ami Fritz. He died at his flat in the Rue de Caumartin on 28 October 1924, aged 55. In an obituary tribute Le Figaro said:

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