Eugène Labiche

Eugène Marin Labiche (; 6 May 181522 January 1888) was a French dramatist. He remains famous for his contribution to the vaudeville genre and his passionate and domestic pochades.

In the 1860s, he reached his peak with a series of successes including Le Voyage de M. Perrichon (1860), La Poudre aux yeux (1861), La Station Champbaudet (1862) and La Cagnotte (1864). He worked with Jacques Offenbach, then director of the Bouffes-Parisiens, to write librettos for operettas and for several comic operas.

His 1851 farce The Italian Straw Hat, written with Marc-Michel, has been adapted many times to stage and screen.

Early life He was born into a bourgeois family and studied law. At the age of twenty, he contributed a short story to Chérubin magazine, entitled "Les plus belles sont les plus fausses" ("The most beautiful are the most fake/false"). A few others followed, but failed to catch the attention of the public.

Career Labiche tried his hand at dramatic criticism in the Revue des théâtres and in 1838, wrote and premiered two plays. The small Théâtre du Pantheon produced, to some popular success, his drama L'Avocat Loubet, while a vaudeville, Monsieur de Coyllin, ou l'homme infiniment poli (written in collaboration with Marc-Michel and performed at the Palais Royal) introduced a provincial actor who was to become and to remain a great Parisian favourite, the famous comedian Grassot.

Statue in Souvigny-en-Sologne, FranceIn the same year, Labiche, still doubtful about his true vocation, published a romance called La Clé des champs. According to Léon Halévy, Labiche's publisher went bankrupt soon after the novel was out: "A lucky misadventure, for this timely warning of Destiny sent him back to the stage, where a career of success was awaiting him." There was yet another obstacle in the way. When he married, Labiche solemnly promised his wife's parents that he would renounce a profession then considered incompatible with moral regularity and domestic happiness. A year later, his wife released him from his vow, and Labiche recalled the incident when he dedicated the first edition of his complete works to her.

In conjunction with Charles Varin, Marc-Michel, Louis François Clairville, Philippe François Dumanoir, and others, he contributed comic plays interspersed with couplets to various Paris theatres. He was considered a successful but undistinguished vaudevillist, until he paired with Marc-Michel to create the five-act farce, Un Chapeau de paille d'Italie (The Italian Straw Hat), which turned out to be a major success upon its opening in August 1851. It is an accomplished specimen of the French imbroglio-style play, in which someone is in search of something, but does not find it till five minutes before the curtain falls. For the next twenty-five years, he continued to write successful comedies and vaudevilles, all basically constructed on the same plan and containing a dose of comic observation and good sense. "Of all the subjects," he said, "which offered themselves to me, I have selected the bourgeois. Essentially mediocre in his vices and in his virtues, he stands half-way between the hero and the scoundrel, between the saint and the profligate."

During the second period of his career Labiche collaborated with Alfred Delacour, Adolphe Choler, and others. Emile Augier said: "The distinctive qualities which secured a lasting vogue for the plays of Labiche are to be found in all the comedies written by him with different collaborators, and are conspicuously absent from those which they wrote without him." Even more important was his professional relationship with actor Jean Marie Geoffroy, who specialized in Labiche's pompous and fussy bourgeois characters. Many of Labiche's roles were written specifically for Geoffroy. Célimare le bien-aimé (1863), Le Voyage de M. Perrichon (1860), La Grammaire, Un Pied dans le crime, La Cagnotte (1864), were some of Labiche's most important plays.

Retirement and death In 1877, he ended his connection with the stage, and retired to his rural property in Sologne. There, he devoted his energies to supervising agricultural work and to reclaiming land and marshes. His lifelong friend, Émile Augier, visited him there, and strongly advised Labiche to publish a collected and revised edition of his works. Though Labiche was initially reluctant, he issued, during 1878 and 1879, his comic plays in ten volumes, which were enthusiastically received. Many people had assumed that Labiche's plays owed their popularity to the actors who had appeared in them, but, upon reading the plays, they realized that their success was due to the writing itself, with its humor and skilled characterization. Due to this re-evaluation of Labiche's writing, he was elected to the Académie française in 1880.

Labiche died in Paris and was buried in the Cimetière de Montmartre.

Plays

1837: La Cuvette d’eau 1838: Monsieur de Coyllin ou l'Homme infiniment poli 1838: Le Capitaine d'Arcourt ou la Fée du château 1838: L'Avocat Loubet 1839: La Forge des châtaigniers 1839: La Peine du talion 1839: L'Article 960 ou la Donation 1840: Le Fin Mot 1840: Bocquet père et fils ou le Chemin le plus long 1840: Le Lierre et l'Ormeau 1842: Les Circonstances atténuantes 1843: L'Homme de paille 1844: Le Major Cravachon 1844: Deux papas très bien ou la Grammaire de Chicard 1845: Le Roi des Frontins 1845: L'École buissonnière 1845: L'Enfant de la maison 1846: Mademoiselle ma femme 1846: Rocambolle le bateleur 1846: Frisette 1846: L'Inventeur de la poudre 1847: L'Avocat pédicure 1847: La Chasse aux jobards 1847: Un homme sanguin 1847: L'Art de ne pas donner d'étrennes 1848: Un jeune homme pressé 1848: Le Club champenois 1848: Oscar XXVIII 1848: Le Baromètre 1848: Une chaîne anglaise 1848: À moitié chemin 1848: Histoire de rire 1848: Agénor le dangereux 1848: Une tragédie chez M. Grassot 1848: À bas la famille ou les Banquets 1849: Madame veuve Larifla 1849: Les Manchettes d'un vilain 1849: Un monsieur qui pose 1849: Une dent sous Louis XV 1849: Mon ours 1849: Trompe-la-balle 1849: Exposition des produits de la République 1849: Rue de l'Homme-Armé, numéro 8 bis 1849: Pour qui voterai-je? 1850: Embrassons-nous, Folleville! 1850: Traversin et Couverture 1850: Un garçon de chez Véry 1850: Le Sopha 1850: La Fille bien gardée 1850: Un bal en robe de chambre 1850: Les Petits Moyens 1850: Les Prétendus de Gimblette 1851: Une clarinette qui passe 1851: La Femme qui perd ses jarretières 1851: On demande des culottières 1851: Mam'zelle fait ses dents 1851: En manches de chemise 1851: Un chapeau de paille d'Italie (The Italian Straw Hat) 1852: Maman Sabouleux 1852: Un monsieur qui prend la mouche 1852: Soufflez-moi dans l'œil 1852: Les Suites d'un premier lit 1852: Le Misanthrope et l'Auvergnat 1852: Deux gouttes d'eau 1852: Piccolet 1852: Edgard et sa bonne 1852: Le Chevalier des dames 1852: Mon Isménie 1852: Une charge de cavalerie 1852: Un coup de rasoir 1853: Un ami acharné 1853: On dira des bêtises 1853: Un notaire à marier 1853: Un ut de poitrine 1853: La Chasse aux corbeaux 1853: Un feu de cheminée 1853: Le Pompadour des Percherons 1854: Deux profonds scélérats 1854: Un mari qui prend du ventre 1854: Espagnolas et Boyardinos 1854: Les Marquises de la Fourchette 1854: Ôtez votre fille, s'il vous plaît 1855: La Perle de la Canebière 1855: Monsieur votre fille 1855: Les Précieux 1856: Les Cheveux de ma femme 1856: En pension chez son groom 1856: Monsieur de Saint-Cadenas 1856: La Fiancée du bon coin 1856: Si jamais je te pince!... 1856: Mesdames de Montenfriche 1856: Un monsieur qui a brûlé une dame 1857: Le Bras d'Ernest 1857: L'Affaire de la rue de Lourcine 1857: La Dame aux jambes d'azur 1857: Les Noces de Bouchencœur 1857: Le Secrétaire de Madame 1857: Un gendre en surveillance 1858: Je croque ma tante 1858: Le Clou aux maris 1858: L'Avare en gants jaunes 1858: Deux merles blancs 1858: Madame est aux eaux 1858: Le Grain de café 1858: Le Calife de la rue Saint-Bon 1858: En avant les Chinois! 1859: L'Avocat d'un Grec 1859: L'Amour, un fort volume, prix 3 F 50 c 1859: L'École des Arthur 1859: L'Omelette à la Follembuche 1859: Le Baron de Fourchevif 1859: Les Petites Mains 1859: Voyage autour de ma marmite 1859: Le Rouge-Gorge 1860: J'Invite le Colonel! 1860: La Sensitive 1860: Les Deux Timides 1860: Le Voyage de monsieur Perrichon (The Voyage of Mr. Perrichon) 1860: La Famille de l'horloger 1860: Un Gros Mot 1861: J'ai Compromis ma femme 1861: Les Vivacités du Capitaine Tic 1861: L'Amour en sabots 1861: Le Mystère de la rue Rousselet 1861: 1862: Les Petits Oiseaux 1862: La Station Champbaudet 1862: Les 37 Sous de Monsieur Montaudoiun 1862: Le première pas 1863: La Dame au petit chien 1863: Permettez, Madame!... 1863: La Commode de Victorine 1863: Célimar: Le Bien-Aimé 1864: La Cagnotte 1864: Moi 1864: Un Mari qui lance sa femme 1864: Le Point de Mire 1865: Premier Prix de piano 1865: L'Homme qui manque le coche 1865: La Bergère de la rue Monthabor 1865: Le Voyage en Chine 1866: Un Pied Dans le Crime 1867: Le Fils du brigadier 1867: La Grammaire 1867: La Main Leste 1867: Les Chemins de fer 1868: Le Papa du prix d'honneur 1868: Le Corricolo 1868: Le Roi d’Amatibou 1868: Le Petit Voyage 1869: Le Dossier de Rosafol 1869: Le Choix d'un Gendre (un pochade en un acte) 1870: Le Plus Heureux des Trois 1870: Le Cachemire X. B. T. 1871: Le Livre bleu 1871: L'Ennemie 1872: Il est de la police 1872: La Mémoire d'Hortense 1872: Doit-on le dire? 1873: 29 Degrés à l'Ombre 1874: Garanti dix ans 1874: Brûlons Voltaire! 1874: Madame est trop belle 1874: La Pièce de Chambertin 1874: Les Samedis de Madame 1875: Les Trente Millions de Gladiator 1875: Un mouton à l'entresol 1875: La Guigne 1876: Le Prix Martin 1876: Le roi dort 1876: La Cigale chez les fourmis 1877: L'Amour de l'art 1877: Un coup de rasoir 1877: La Clé

Filmography L'Affaire de la rue de Lourcine, directed by Henri Diamant-Berger (France, 1923, based on the play L'Affaire de la rue de Lourcine), which starred Maurice Chevalier. La Fille bien gardée, directed by Louis Feuillade (France, 1924, based on the play La Fille bien gardée) The Italian Straw Hat, directed by René Clair (France, 1928, based on the play The Italian Straw Hat) Two Timid Souls, directed by René Clair (France, 1928, based on the play Les Deux Timides) L'Affaire de la rue de Lourcine, directed by Marcel Dumont (France, 1932, short film, based on the play L'Affaire de la rue de Lourcine) Le Voyage de monsieur Perrichon, directed by Jean Tarride (France, 1934, based on the play Le Voyage de monsieur Perrichon) The Leghorn Hat, directed by Wolfgang Liebeneiner (Germany, 1939, based on the play The Italian Straw Hat) My Aunt the Dictator, directed by René Pujol (France, 1939, based on the play Maman Sabouleux) Un chapeau de paille d'Italie, directed by Maurice Cammage (France, 1941, based on the play The Italian Straw Hat) Two Timid Souls, directed by Yves Allégret (France, 1943, based on the play Les Deux Timides) , directed by Paolo Moffa (Italy, 1943, based on the play Le Voyage de monsieur Perrichon) , directed by Géza von Bolváry (Germany, 1945, based on the play Les Trente Millions de Gladiator), unfinished film My Niece Susanne, directed by Wolfgang Liebeneiner (West Germany, 1950, based on the play Les Trente Millions de Gladiator) Three Days of Fun in Paris, directed by Émile Couzinet (France, 1954, based on the play La Cagnotte) Matrimonios juveniles, directed by José Díaz Morales (Mexico, 1961, based on the play The Italian Straw Hat) Straw Hat, directed by Oldřich Lipský (Czechoslovakia, 1971, based on the play The Italian Straw Hat) The Straw Hat, directed by Leonid Kvinikhidze (The Soviet Union, 1974, based on the play The Italian Straw Hat)

Doit-on le dire ?, directed by Jean-Laurent Cochet (France, 1980, based on the play Doit-on le dire ?, live recording of a performance at the Comédie Française) The Voyage of Monsieur Perrichon / Путешествие мсье Перришона, directed by Margarita Mikaelyan / Маргари́та Микаэля́н (The Soviet Union, 1986, based on the play Le Voyage de monsieur Perrichon)