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Dramatic Act (1780)
Source: Archives nationales, 01/844 (document conservé aux Archives nationales, Paris)
Citation:
Dramatic Act (1780), Primary Sources on Copyright (1450-1900), eds L. Bently & M. Kretschmer, www.copyrighthistory.org
Back | Record | Images | No Commentaries
Translation only | Transcription only | Show all | Bundled images as pdf
9 translated pages
Chapter 1 Page 1
Extract from the Registers of the King’s Council of State
THE KING, being informed that there are still legal contentions going on
between the dramatic authors and the Comédiens-Français, even though a part
of their disputes had been amicably set at rest through an agreement signed by the
Comédiens on the 11th of March last, approved on the 31st of the same month by the First
Gentleman of His Majesty’s Bedchamber and signed by the authors on the 7th of the
following month, and also despite the fact that on the 17th of March and 12th of May last
two rulings [arrêts] intervened in this matter, which, it would seem, ought to have put
an end to all the other difficulties, His Majesty has deemed it essential to have the most
detailed accounts rendered to him as to the various mémoires containing the arguments of
the Comédiens and those of the authors, and to make a definitive pronouncement by means
of provisions so clear and so precise, that henceforth there can remain no doubt whatsoever
as to his true intentions. Wishing to ensure this, having heard the report, the King being
present at his Council has ordered and does order what follows.
Article 1
All the decisions of acceptance into the repertory [réceptions] made up to and
including this day by the Comédie regarding plays which have not yet been performed
are to be treated as null and void. However, the authors of the said plays are allowed to present
them again for a fresh reading in front of the troupe [lecture]. His Majesty wishes and demands
that at the time of this new reading, the Comédiens should show consideration for authors
who are already well-known in the theatre thanks to their fine works [ouvrages]. The
plays which are received for this new appraisal will retain amongst themselves the order
of seniority which they previously had, and the authors whose plays are rejected will
have the period of their free entrance tickets discontinued, since these were acquired by
decisions of acceptance [réception] made before [this ruling].
Art. 2
In order to prevent in future all abuses in decisions of acceptance, be it for new
Chapter 1 Page 2
plays, be it for those plays whose first acceptance has been annulled by the preceding
article, His Majesty wishes that they should be read in front of the nine persons from the
Comédie who make up the Committee established by another ruling [arrêt] of this day,
and in front of four other persons from the Comédie, of whom two will be chosen by
the author of the play which is to be read, or by he who is to present it in the author’s stead,
and two will be chosen by the Committee, so that there will always be thirteen
examiners who attend the reading of a play and judge whether it should be
accepted or rejected, or sent back for correction; Which examiners are obliged
to comply with the regulations that are to be observed for the readings and acceptance
[réception] of plays.
Art. 3.
The author, or he who is going to present the play in his stead, may, if he
considers it appropriate, choose amongst the group of examiners the person whom
he would like to entrust with the reading of the said play. The General Commissioner for the
Bureau of the Maison du Roi [Royal Household] who is in charge of the Département des
Menus [entertainments and festivities], or his representative will attend these readings as
often as they are able to, and, above all, those of plays whose acceptance [réception] has been
annulled by Art. 1 of the present ruling, whereby their absence does not, however, mean
that the said readings have to be called off or suspended.
Art. 4
So that the author may know the order of performance of his play, a table
with three columns will be drawn up – one for the grandes comédies,* another for
tragedies and the third for petites pièces.** A play that has been accepted will be
recorded immediately in the column to which it should belong, so that it may be
staged in accordance with its order of performance, regardless of whether it is the winter or the
summer season, and this order will not be interrupted unless the author gives his
consent thereto.
Art. 5
Every acceptance of a play [réception] and its date is to be certified
by the mention which shall be made of it in the author’s manuscript and in a
register which is to be kept for this purpose.
______
*) Five-act comedies in verse, such as Molière’s Tartuffe or Le Misanthrope.
**) One- or three-act plays in prose, often with musical accompaniment.
Chapter 1 Page 3
Art. 6
If the author consents to surrender his turn [in the repertoire] to another – something
that may only be done once – he is obliged to take the order of performance of him to
whom he has surrendered his, but such a substitution may only be done for plays that
belong to the same genre, and, moreover, it will not be allowed if other plays are found
[in the repertory] which have been accepted at an earlier point and whose theme is the
same as that of the play which would be leaving its original order.
Art. 7
The distribution of the Roles and even the choice of substitutes will be decided
not by the principal actors, but by the author alone or by the person who has presented
the play to the Comédie in his name; and the actors originally entrusted with the
Roles may not pass them on to their substitutes except with the consent of the
author or of his representative, unless, that is, they should be absent; all the same,
authors may not force the Comédiens to take on any Roles other than those which
fall within their genre and their normal emploi.
Art. 8
No actor or actress of the Comédie may refuse, without valid reasons – the
cognizance of which is to be left to the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s
Bedchamber – a Role of his or her emploi which the author has selected for
him or her, on pain of a fine of one hundred livres the first time round, and of
forfeiting, if it should happen again, his or her participation in the staging of the
play in which he or she had refused to play the part chosen by the author.
Art. 9
The Comédiens may not, except for serious reasons – the cognizance of
which is reserved to the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s Bedchamber –
refuse to perform an accepted play on its scheduled days, or delay its
performances, without the consent of the author, and if the performance
has been delayed because of any member of the Comédie’s troupe, he will
have to pay a fine of three hundred livres for the benefit of the poor, amongst
whom preference will be given
Chapter 1 Page 4
to veteran employees [gagistes] or workers of the Comédie.
Art. 10
Authors will have the right to give [free] Tickets on each day that
their plays are staged, as long as they themselves also attend the
performances – namely, to six persons for seats in the Amphitheatre for
5- and 4-act plays, to four persons for 3-act plays, and to two persons
for those in one or two acts, in addition to which seats the author may
also designate one in the Stalls [parquet], the surcharge, if he should
ask for such a seat, being payable by him, as well as all seats in the pit
[parterre], if he should ask for such seats, too; but in total no more
than twenty seats may be allocated to him, and only for the first
three performances.
Art. 11
His Majesty has fixed and set at two thousand three hundred livres
for performances in winter, and at one thousand eight hundred livres for
summer performances, the sums below which the plays will be held to
have fallen under the rules [tombées dans les régles] and shall
belong to the Comédie.* His Majesty wishes and demands that the total
gross receipts, without any deduction of the expenses, should be used in
calculating the said sums of two thousand three hundred livres and of
one thousand eight hundred livres, whereby the sum should include not
just the gate receipts and the revenues from the box seats [loges] hired
out for each performance, but also the proceeds from the annual leases
of the box seats, that is the price of the subscriptions converted into
daily proceeds by dividing [the subscription fee] by the number of
performances in each year, the revenues from lifetime subscriptions to be
evaluated on the basis of an annual interest of ten per cent, and, in general,
all such possible components & the whole receipt from the performance,
in whichever form and under whatever denomination it is cashed in
or happens to be cashed in in future.
Art.12
His Majesty has likewise fixed and regulated the share due to
authors [les parts d’auteurs] as follows: one hundred and forty-two
livres and sixteen sols per thousand livres for plays in 5 or 4 acts; one
hundred and seven livres and two sols per thousand livres for
______
*) The mechanism known as the ‘fall’ [chute], which had developed in
the French theatre early on in the seventeenth century, whereby if
audience interest (measured by the ticket sales) in a play fell below
a certain level, that play would be withdrawn from the active
repertory and the company didn’t have to pay the author any more
remuneration. In the case of the Comédie Française, the ‘fallen’
play was regarded as belonging to its permanent repertory and the
author effectively lost all economic rights to it. For more details,
see Gregory S. Brown, A Field of Honor: Writers, Court Culture and Public
Theater in French Literary Life from Racine to the Revolution
(Columbia U.P., 1997), chapter 4.
Available online at: http://www.gutenberg-e.org/brg01/frames/fbrg05.html
Chapter 1 Page 5
plays in 3 acts; and seventy-one livres and eight sols per thousand
livres for plays in one or two acts. It is understood by His Majesty that
the said shares are to be taken as a proportion of the net revenue for
the performance, such as it is explained in the preceding article, from
which the poor tax [quart des pauvres] and the sum of six hundred
livres for ordinary and daily [operating] expenses will be subtracted,
in accordance with the agreement signed by the Comédiens on the
eleventh of March last, approved by the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s
Bedchamber on the thirty-first of the same month and signed by the
Authors on the seventh of May following, of which agreement a copy
shall remain attached to the original [minute] of the present agreement,
His Majesty having approved and confirmed it, approving and
confirming it in all that is not contrary to the present regulation of the
shares due to authors [parts d’auteurs]. In addition, His Majesty
makes most express interdictions and prohibitions, both to authors
and the Comédiens, that they must not make any private agreements
[traiter à forfait] regarding plays, His Majesty henceforth declaring
all such agreements which might be made in future to be null and
void, and desiring that both the authors and the Comédiens should
be entitled to withdraw, or keep to, the consent [to performance]
which they may have given, taking into account the shares due to
the author [parts] fixed by the present article.
Art. 13
The provisions made in the two preceding articles regarding
the fall of plays under the rules [la chute dans les régles]* and the
share due to authors must be executed as and from the date of
the present ruling, both for plays which have not yet been staged
at all, and for those which, having already been performed and
not having fallen under the old rules,** happen to be revived;
without this meaning, though, that the authors of such revived
plays are entitled to claim, for performances which took place
before the present ruling, any shares of the revenue [parts] other
than the one-ninth, one-twelfth, or one-eighteenth shares which
have been in place until now.
Art. 14
Every author may print his play without losing his
_____
*) See the explanatory note on p.4.
**) i.e. having been withdrawn from the active repertory.
Chapter 1 Page 6
order of performance, if the Comédiens have let two years
pass without staging it, counting from the date of its
acceptance; in all other cases, the Comédiens have the
right not to stage a play which has been printed prematurely.
Art. 15.
Every distinction between so-called ‘big’ and ‘small’ days
will provisionally cease to take place.* His Majesty wishes that in
future good works [ouvrages], tragic or comic, ancient and modern,
by authors who are receiving shares of the revenue [qui partagent]
or by those who are no longer doing so, should be staged on
alternate days, without distinction of the day, so that a Tragedy
which is staged on a Wednesday is staged again two days later
and so on. His Majesty intends that this provisional arrangement
should commence to be effective for at least three consecutive
months, with a series of good ancient plays, both comic and
tragic, before any new ones [nouveautés] can be proposed.
Art. 16
All the articles in the old rulings and regulations concerning
the Comédie [Française] in which nothing is revoked by the present
ruling, shall continue to be executed as in the past, with the exception,
though, of the rulings of the seventeenth of March and the twelfth of
May last, and the regulations thereto attached, which by another
ruling of today His Majesty has revoked and declared null and void.
His Majesty commands and orders the First Gentlemen of His
Bedchamber, the General Commissioner of the Bureau of the
Maison du Roi who is responsible for the Département des Menus,
or his representative, to ensure, each in his right, that the present
ruling is executed, whereby His Majesty wishes it to be executed
in accordance with its form and tenor, notwithstanding all
objections or hindrances of any kind, for which no differences
will be made, and if any [such objections] should intervene,
His Majesty reserves to himself and to his Council its
cognizance, forbidding the latter to all his courts and other
judges. Done at the King’s Council of State, His Majesty
being present, held at Versailles, the ninth of December
of seventeen hundred and eighty.
Amelot
_______
*) The Comédie Française had performances on all week-days,
but on ‘small days’ (Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays) attendance
numbers were lower. See Gregory S. Brown, op. cit.
Chapter 1 Page 7
Extract from the Registers of the King’s Council of State
THE KING Being informed that a lot of abuses and
disorders have crept into the inner workings [la police interieure] of the Comédie Française;
that the all too great number of persons who are entitled to have their say at meetings
is almost always leading to confusion and entails a waste of time which is detrimental
to the [theatre’s] public service and to the Comédiens themselves; that in order to remedy
this the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s Bedchamber had, by a Regulation of the
first of July, seventeen hundred and sixty-six entrusted a Committee with the
administration of the Comédie; that this first precaution and other more extensive
precautions which His Majesty had prescribed, both by two rulings of his Council on
the seventeenth of March and the twelfth of May last, and by the Regulations thereto
attached, have not hitherto had the success which was expected of them; but that in
order to render the establishment of a Committee suitable for the prevention of all the
existing inconveniences and advantageous for the Comédiens themselves, all that has
to be done is to give it a new composition, and to determine the various aspects which
it is to be authorized to occupy itself with. Wishing to ensure this, the Report [saying]
yes, the King, being present at His Council, has ordered and does order that the
Society of the Comédie-Française will be governed and administrated in its internal
Matters by a permanent Committee which is to be made up of six actors and two
actresses from the Comédie, and one Secretary having advisory influence; His
Majesty wishes that this Committee should alone have the right to draw up the
fortnightly repertories, to appoint the time during which plays are to be studied
and rehearsed, to carry out readings of new plays and accept them, if so be the case;
to hear the report of the troupe leaders [semainiers]* with regard to the
regulation of the Society and to pronounce, after hearing these reports, whatever
should be necessary; to judge and suppress everything that might be contrary to good
order, and to impose, with regard to all that [is mentioned] above the fines which
the said Committee deems to be necessary; to examine the individuals who present
themselves [for auditions], to gather information about their conduct, to give its
advice to the Superiors who will make the final decision
______
*) The semainier was an actor in the Comédie-Française who was in charge,
for the duration of a week, of all the details concerning the plays which were going
to be performed then.
Chapter 1 Page 8
as to their rejection or admission; to calculate, together with the authors,
their share in the revenues from performances and to try to settle any
difficulties, if such should arise, with regard to the accounts; to give each
year, eight days before the closure of the Theatre, an opinion on the
distribution of any sequestered assets, regarding which it is to submit a
Roll to the Superiors, so that the allocation might be approved or
modified by them, as the case may be; to conclude bargains [faire les
marchés], to make up statements of accounts, to check the Ticket-
office, to decide on the daily ordinary and extraordinary expenses; to
inspect, regulate and give orders in and to all the parties which are
dependent on the performance; to judge the differences of opinion which
might arise between the Comédiens, as well as the disputes raised
by the Directors and Actors of the Provinces; to notify both the
Comédiens and other interested persons of the orders which are addressed
to them by the Superiors; to name each year those who will be
entrusted with the compliments de cloture et de rentrée,* and to make
sure that the content of the said compliments is entirely suitable; in
short, to regulate all the affairs of the Comédie, general or particular,
of whatever nature they may be, His Majesty’s intention being that
the said Committee, assisted by the ordinary Counsellors of the
Comédie, should henceforth be the representative and superintendent
[gérant] of the said Society, with the sole exception of cases in
which real estate [immeubles] is to be alienated or pawned through
loans – something that may be proposed only in a general assembly;
nevertheless, His Majesty permits the said Committee to
assemble all of the Society when it considers this to be useful and
convenient, after having requested the Superiors’ agreement to such
an assembly, and in such a case decisions will be taken in the said
general assembly according to the accustomed manner and on the
basis of a majority vote; His Majesty likewise wishes that the weekly
general assemblies on Mondays with regard to the repertory should
continue to take place, but only so that each and everyone of the
Society’s members might be notified there of the repertory for the
fortnight and of any decisions which may have been taken by the
Committee; every member of the Society is obliged to comply with
the said repertory and decisions, on pain of a fine of three hundred
livres, which will be incurred by the sole fact [of non-compliance].
_________
*) Direct addresses to the audience spoken by a selected actor or
actress to mark the end of a theatre season or the opening of a new one.
Chapter 1 Page 9
His Majesty authorizes the First Gentlemen of His Bedchamber to
appoint the members who will make up the Committee and to
replace them when they deem it to be appropriate, and even to
draw up such Regulations which they consider to be suitable and
to give their Decisions on any difficulties which might emerge
with regard to the said Regulations, or the present ruling, with
which Regulations and Decisions the Comédiens are obliged
to comply, on pain of [punishment for] disobedience. His Majesty
commands and orders the First Gentlemen of His Bedchamber,
the General Commissioner at the Bureau of the Maison du Roi
who is responsible for the Département des Menus, or his
representative, to ensure, each in his right, that the present
ruling is executed, His Majesty, furthermore, revoking and
declaring to be void the rulings of his Council of the seventeenth
of March and twelfth of May last, and the Regulations thereto
attached. Done at the King’s Council of State, His Majesty
being present, held at Versailles, the ninth of December,
seventeen hundred and eighty.
Amelot
Translation by: Luis Sundkvist
Source: Archives nationales, 01/844 (document conservé aux Archives nationales, Paris)
Citation:
Dramatic Act (1780), Primary Sources on Copyright (1450-1900), eds L. Bently & M. Kretschmer, www.copyrighthistory.org
Back | Record | Images | No Commentaries
Translation only | Transcription only | Show all | Bundled images as pdf
9 translated pages
Chapter 1 Page 1
THE KING, being informed that there are still legal contentions going on
between the dramatic authors and the Comédiens-Français, even though a part
of their disputes had been amicably set at rest through an agreement signed by the
Comédiens on the 11th of March last, approved on the 31st of the same month by the First
Gentleman of His Majesty’s Bedchamber and signed by the authors on the 7th of the
following month, and also despite the fact that on the 17th of March and 12th of May last
two rulings [arrêts] intervened in this matter, which, it would seem, ought to have put
an end to all the other difficulties, His Majesty has deemed it essential to have the most
detailed accounts rendered to him as to the various mémoires containing the arguments of
the Comédiens and those of the authors, and to make a definitive pronouncement by means
of provisions so clear and so precise, that henceforth there can remain no doubt whatsoever
as to his true intentions. Wishing to ensure this, having heard the report, the King being
present at his Council has ordered and does order what follows.
All the decisions of acceptance into the repertory [réceptions] made up to and
including this day by the Comédie regarding plays which have not yet been performed
are to be treated as null and void. However, the authors of the said plays are allowed to present
them again for a fresh reading in front of the troupe [lecture]. His Majesty wishes and demands
that at the time of this new reading, the Comédiens should show consideration for authors
who are already well-known in the theatre thanks to their fine works [ouvrages]. The
plays which are received for this new appraisal will retain amongst themselves the order
of seniority which they previously had, and the authors whose plays are rejected will
have the period of their free entrance tickets discontinued, since these were acquired by
decisions of acceptance [réception] made before [this ruling].
In order to prevent in future all abuses in decisions of acceptance, be it for new
Chapter 1 Page 2
plays, be it for those plays whose first acceptance has been annulled by the preceding
article, His Majesty wishes that they should be read in front of the nine persons from the
Comédie who make up the Committee established by another ruling [arrêt] of this day,
and in front of four other persons from the Comédie, of whom two will be chosen by
the author of the play which is to be read, or by he who is to present it in the author’s stead,
and two will be chosen by the Committee, so that there will always be thirteen
examiners who attend the reading of a play and judge whether it should be
accepted or rejected, or sent back for correction; Which examiners are obliged
to comply with the regulations that are to be observed for the readings and acceptance
[réception] of plays.
The author, or he who is going to present the play in his stead, may, if he
considers it appropriate, choose amongst the group of examiners the person whom
he would like to entrust with the reading of the said play. The General Commissioner for the
Bureau of the Maison du Roi [Royal Household] who is in charge of the Département des
Menus [entertainments and festivities], or his representative will attend these readings as
often as they are able to, and, above all, those of plays whose acceptance [réception] has been
annulled by Art. 1 of the present ruling, whereby their absence does not, however, mean
that the said readings have to be called off or suspended.
So that the author may know the order of performance of his play, a table
with three columns will be drawn up – one for the grandes comédies,* another for
tragedies and the third for petites pièces.** A play that has been accepted will be
recorded immediately in the column to which it should belong, so that it may be
staged in accordance with its order of performance, regardless of whether it is the winter or the
summer season, and this order will not be interrupted unless the author gives his
consent thereto.
Every acceptance of a play [réception] and its date is to be certified
by the mention which shall be made of it in the author’s manuscript and in a
register which is to be kept for this purpose.
______
*) Five-act comedies in verse, such as Molière’s Tartuffe or Le Misanthrope.
**) One- or three-act plays in prose, often with musical accompaniment.
Chapter 1 Page 3
If the author consents to surrender his turn [in the repertoire] to another – something
that may only be done once – he is obliged to take the order of performance of him to
whom he has surrendered his, but such a substitution may only be done for plays that
belong to the same genre, and, moreover, it will not be allowed if other plays are found
[in the repertory] which have been accepted at an earlier point and whose theme is the
same as that of the play which would be leaving its original order.
The distribution of the Roles and even the choice of substitutes will be decided
not by the principal actors, but by the author alone or by the person who has presented
the play to the Comédie in his name; and the actors originally entrusted with the
Roles may not pass them on to their substitutes except with the consent of the
author or of his representative, unless, that is, they should be absent; all the same,
authors may not force the Comédiens to take on any Roles other than those which
fall within their genre and their normal emploi.
No actor or actress of the Comédie may refuse, without valid reasons – the
cognizance of which is to be left to the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s
Bedchamber – a Role of his or her emploi which the author has selected for
him or her, on pain of a fine of one hundred livres the first time round, and of
forfeiting, if it should happen again, his or her participation in the staging of the
play in which he or she had refused to play the part chosen by the author.
The Comédiens may not, except for serious reasons – the cognizance of
which is reserved to the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s Bedchamber –
refuse to perform an accepted play on its scheduled days, or delay its
performances, without the consent of the author, and if the performance
has been delayed because of any member of the Comédie’s troupe, he will
have to pay a fine of three hundred livres for the benefit of the poor, amongst
whom preference will be given
Chapter 1 Page 4
to veteran employees [gagistes] or workers of the Comédie.
Authors will have the right to give [free] Tickets on each day that
their plays are staged, as long as they themselves also attend the
performances – namely, to six persons for seats in the Amphitheatre for
5- and 4-act plays, to four persons for 3-act plays, and to two persons
for those in one or two acts, in addition to which seats the author may
also designate one in the Stalls [parquet], the surcharge, if he should
ask for such a seat, being payable by him, as well as all seats in the pit
[parterre], if he should ask for such seats, too; but in total no more
than twenty seats may be allocated to him, and only for the first
three performances.
His Majesty has fixed and set at two thousand three hundred livres
for performances in winter, and at one thousand eight hundred livres for
summer performances, the sums below which the plays will be held to
have fallen under the rules [tombées dans les régles] and shall
belong to the Comédie.* His Majesty wishes and demands that the total
gross receipts, without any deduction of the expenses, should be used in
calculating the said sums of two thousand three hundred livres and of
one thousand eight hundred livres, whereby the sum should include not
just the gate receipts and the revenues from the box seats [loges] hired
out for each performance, but also the proceeds from the annual leases
of the box seats, that is the price of the subscriptions converted into
daily proceeds by dividing [the subscription fee] by the number of
performances in each year, the revenues from lifetime subscriptions to be
evaluated on the basis of an annual interest of ten per cent, and, in general,
all such possible components & the whole receipt from the performance,
in whichever form and under whatever denomination it is cashed in
or happens to be cashed in in future.
His Majesty has likewise fixed and regulated the share due to
authors [les parts d’auteurs] as follows: one hundred and forty-two
livres and sixteen sols per thousand livres for plays in 5 or 4 acts; one
hundred and seven livres and two sols per thousand livres for
______
*) The mechanism known as the ‘fall’ [chute], which had developed in
the French theatre early on in the seventeenth century, whereby if
audience interest (measured by the ticket sales) in a play fell below
a certain level, that play would be withdrawn from the active
repertory and the company didn’t have to pay the author any more
remuneration. In the case of the Comédie Française, the ‘fallen’
play was regarded as belonging to its permanent repertory and the
author effectively lost all economic rights to it. For more details,
see Gregory S. Brown, A Field of Honor: Writers, Court Culture and Public
Theater in French Literary Life from Racine to the Revolution
(Columbia U.P., 1997), chapter 4.
Available online at: http://www.gutenberg-e.org/brg01/frames/fbrg05.html
Chapter 1 Page 5
plays in 3 acts; and seventy-one livres and eight sols per thousand
livres for plays in one or two acts. It is understood by His Majesty that
the said shares are to be taken as a proportion of the net revenue for
the performance, such as it is explained in the preceding article, from
which the poor tax [quart des pauvres] and the sum of six hundred
livres for ordinary and daily [operating] expenses will be subtracted,
in accordance with the agreement signed by the Comédiens on the
eleventh of March last, approved by the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s
Bedchamber on the thirty-first of the same month and signed by the
Authors on the seventh of May following, of which agreement a copy
shall remain attached to the original [minute] of the present agreement,
His Majesty having approved and confirmed it, approving and
confirming it in all that is not contrary to the present regulation of the
shares due to authors [parts d’auteurs]. In addition, His Majesty
makes most express interdictions and prohibitions, both to authors
and the Comédiens, that they must not make any private agreements
[traiter à forfait] regarding plays, His Majesty henceforth declaring
all such agreements which might be made in future to be null and
void, and desiring that both the authors and the Comédiens should
be entitled to withdraw, or keep to, the consent [to performance]
which they may have given, taking into account the shares due to
the author [parts] fixed by the present article.
The provisions made in the two preceding articles regarding
the fall of plays under the rules [la chute dans les régles]* and the
share due to authors must be executed as and from the date of
the present ruling, both for plays which have not yet been staged
at all, and for those which, having already been performed and
not having fallen under the old rules,** happen to be revived;
without this meaning, though, that the authors of such revived
plays are entitled to claim, for performances which took place
before the present ruling, any shares of the revenue [parts] other
than the one-ninth, one-twelfth, or one-eighteenth shares which
have been in place until now.
Every author may print his play without losing his
_____
*) See the explanatory note on p.4.
**) i.e. having been withdrawn from the active repertory.
Chapter 1 Page 6
order of performance, if the Comédiens have let two years
pass without staging it, counting from the date of its
acceptance; in all other cases, the Comédiens have the
right not to stage a play which has been printed prematurely.
Every distinction between so-called ‘big’ and ‘small’ days
will provisionally cease to take place.* His Majesty wishes that in
future good works [ouvrages], tragic or comic, ancient and modern,
by authors who are receiving shares of the revenue [qui partagent]
or by those who are no longer doing so, should be staged on
alternate days, without distinction of the day, so that a Tragedy
which is staged on a Wednesday is staged again two days later
and so on. His Majesty intends that this provisional arrangement
should commence to be effective for at least three consecutive
months, with a series of good ancient plays, both comic and
tragic, before any new ones [nouveautés] can be proposed.
All the articles in the old rulings and regulations concerning
the Comédie [Française] in which nothing is revoked by the present
ruling, shall continue to be executed as in the past, with the exception,
though, of the rulings of the seventeenth of March and the twelfth of
May last, and the regulations thereto attached, which by another
ruling of today His Majesty has revoked and declared null and void.
His Majesty commands and orders the First Gentlemen of His
Bedchamber, the General Commissioner of the Bureau of the
Maison du Roi who is responsible for the Département des Menus,
or his representative, to ensure, each in his right, that the present
ruling is executed, whereby His Majesty wishes it to be executed
in accordance with its form and tenor, notwithstanding all
objections or hindrances of any kind, for which no differences
will be made, and if any [such objections] should intervene,
His Majesty reserves to himself and to his Council its
cognizance, forbidding the latter to all his courts and other
judges. Done at the King’s Council of State, His Majesty
being present, held at Versailles, the ninth of December
of seventeen hundred and eighty.
_______
*) The Comédie Française had performances on all week-days,
but on ‘small days’ (Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays) attendance
numbers were lower. See Gregory S. Brown, op. cit.
Chapter 1 Page 7
THE KING Being informed that a lot of abuses and
disorders have crept into the inner workings [la police interieure] of the Comédie Française;
that the all too great number of persons who are entitled to have their say at meetings
is almost always leading to confusion and entails a waste of time which is detrimental
to the [theatre’s] public service and to the Comédiens themselves; that in order to remedy
this the First Gentlemen of His Majesty’s Bedchamber had, by a Regulation of the
first of July, seventeen hundred and sixty-six entrusted a Committee with the
administration of the Comédie; that this first precaution and other more extensive
precautions which His Majesty had prescribed, both by two rulings of his Council on
the seventeenth of March and the twelfth of May last, and by the Regulations thereto
attached, have not hitherto had the success which was expected of them; but that in
order to render the establishment of a Committee suitable for the prevention of all the
existing inconveniences and advantageous for the Comédiens themselves, all that has
to be done is to give it a new composition, and to determine the various aspects which
it is to be authorized to occupy itself with. Wishing to ensure this, the Report [saying]
yes, the King, being present at His Council, has ordered and does order that the
Society of the Comédie-Française will be governed and administrated in its internal
Matters by a permanent Committee which is to be made up of six actors and two
actresses from the Comédie, and one Secretary having advisory influence; His
Majesty wishes that this Committee should alone have the right to draw up the
fortnightly repertories, to appoint the time during which plays are to be studied
and rehearsed, to carry out readings of new plays and accept them, if so be the case;
to hear the report of the troupe leaders [semainiers]* with regard to the
regulation of the Society and to pronounce, after hearing these reports, whatever
should be necessary; to judge and suppress everything that might be contrary to good
order, and to impose, with regard to all that [is mentioned] above the fines which
the said Committee deems to be necessary; to examine the individuals who present
themselves [for auditions], to gather information about their conduct, to give its
advice to the Superiors who will make the final decision
______
*) The semainier was an actor in the Comédie-Française who was in charge,
for the duration of a week, of all the details concerning the plays which were going
to be performed then.
Chapter 1 Page 8
as to their rejection or admission; to calculate, together with the authors,
their share in the revenues from performances and to try to settle any
difficulties, if such should arise, with regard to the accounts; to give each
year, eight days before the closure of the Theatre, an opinion on the
distribution of any sequestered assets, regarding which it is to submit a
Roll to the Superiors, so that the allocation might be approved or
modified by them, as the case may be; to conclude bargains [faire les
marchés], to make up statements of accounts, to check the Ticket-
office, to decide on the daily ordinary and extraordinary expenses; to
inspect, regulate and give orders in and to all the parties which are
dependent on the performance; to judge the differences of opinion which
might arise between the Comédiens, as well as the disputes raised
by the Directors and Actors of the Provinces; to notify both the
Comédiens and other interested persons of the orders which are addressed
to them by the Superiors; to name each year those who will be
entrusted with the compliments de cloture et de rentrée,* and to make
sure that the content of the said compliments is entirely suitable; in
short, to regulate all the affairs of the Comédie, general or particular,
of whatever nature they may be, His Majesty’s intention being that
the said Committee, assisted by the ordinary Counsellors of the
Comédie, should henceforth be the representative and superintendent
[gérant] of the said Society, with the sole exception of cases in
which real estate [immeubles] is to be alienated or pawned through
loans – something that may be proposed only in a general assembly;
nevertheless, His Majesty permits the said Committee to
assemble all of the Society when it considers this to be useful and
convenient, after having requested the Superiors’ agreement to such
an assembly, and in such a case decisions will be taken in the said
general assembly according to the accustomed manner and on the
basis of a majority vote; His Majesty likewise wishes that the weekly
general assemblies on Mondays with regard to the repertory should
continue to take place, but only so that each and everyone of the
Society’s members might be notified there of the repertory for the
fortnight and of any decisions which may have been taken by the
Committee; every member of the Society is obliged to comply with
the said repertory and decisions, on pain of a fine of three hundred
livres, which will be incurred by the sole fact [of non-compliance].
_________
*) Direct addresses to the audience spoken by a selected actor or
actress to mark the end of a theatre season or the opening of a new one.
Chapter 1 Page 9
His Majesty authorizes the First Gentlemen of His Bedchamber to
appoint the members who will make up the Committee and to
replace them when they deem it to be appropriate, and even to
draw up such Regulations which they consider to be suitable and
to give their Decisions on any difficulties which might emerge
with regard to the said Regulations, or the present ruling, with
which Regulations and Decisions the Comédiens are obliged
to comply, on pain of [punishment for] disobedience. His Majesty
commands and orders the First Gentlemen of His Bedchamber,
the General Commissioner at the Bureau of the Maison du Roi
who is responsible for the Département des Menus, or his
representative, to ensure, each in his right, that the present
ruling is executed, His Majesty, furthermore, revoking and
declaring to be void the rulings of his Council of the seventeenth
of March and twelfth of May last, and the Regulations thereto
attached. Done at the King’s Council of State, His Majesty
being present, held at Versailles, the ninth of December,
seventeen hundred and eighty.
Amelot
Translation by: Luis Sundkvist