Paula Maxa
| Paula Maxa | |
|---|---|
| Born | Marie-Thérèse Beau 18 August 1892 18th arrondissement of Paris, Paris, France |
| 💀Died | 23 September 1970 (aged 78) 15th arrondissement of Paris, Paris, France23 September 1970 (aged 78) |
| Resting place | Cimetière parisien de Thiais |
| 💼 Occupation | |
| 📆 Years active | 1915–1939 |
| Known for | Performances at the Grand Guignol |
Paula Maxa (born Marie-Thérèse Beau; 18 August 1892 – 23 September 1970) was a French stage and silent film actress. From 1917 to 1933 she performed at the Grand Guignol theatre in Paris, specialising in victim roles in horror plays. She was killed on stage an estimated 10,000 to 30,000 times over her career there, in over sixty different ways, and was nicknamed "the most assassinated woman in the world" (la femme la plus assassinée du monde) and the "Sarah Bernhardt of the impasse Chaptal", after the narrow street where the theatre stood.[1][2][3]
Career at the Grand Guignol
Maxa joined the Grand Guignol in 1917, during the period when Max Maurey managed the theatre.[3] She became its leading performer in horror plays, cast almost exclusively as victims. Her acting style involved exaggerated gestures, screams, bulging eyes, and simulated nervous collapse.[4]
In a 1965 memoir piece published in Les Annales, Maxa catalogued the methods by which her characters had been killed on stage: "flogged, martyred, sliced up, steamed back together, run through a rolling mill, crushed, boiled alive, bled dry, doused in vitriol, impaled, deboned, hanged, buried alive, boiled in a stew, disembowelled, drawn and quartered, shot, hacked to pieces, stoned, torn to shreds, asphyxiated, poisoned, burned alive, devoured by a lion, crucified, scalped, strangled, throat slit, drowned, pulverised, stabbed, shot with a revolver, and raped."[5]
A 1957 report in The New York Times described her as "the undisputed queen of the Grand Guignol" and wrote: "No character in the Comte de Sade's novels ever suffered so many wrongs. Not an inch of her body was spared. She died more than 10,000 times in some sixty different ways, and was raped more than 3,000 times."[1] Her regular stage partner at the theatre was Georges Paulais, who typically played the attacker opposite her victims.[4]
Film career
Maxa's screen appearances were limited. She made her film debut as Laure, the maid of the criminal Moréno, in Louis Feuillade's serial Les Vampires (1915–1916).[6] She then appeared in a handful of silent films: L'Ibis bleu (Camille de Morlhon, 1918), Les Chères Images (André Hugon, 1920), La Révoltée (Gaston Leprieur, 1920), and Fille de rien (André Hugon, 1921).[6] She did not transition to sound film.
Later life
In 1933, Maxa left the Grand Guignol and ran a small theatre near Pigalle, the Théâtre du Vice et de la Vertu on the rue Fontaine.[4] In 1939, she joined Clara Bizou, a former director of the Grand Guignol, at the Moulin Bleu on the rue de Douai, which Bizou had taken over and renamed the Rideau de Montmartre.[4]
Little is documented about Maxa's life after the Second World War. She died on 23 September 1970 in the 15th arrondissement of Paris at the age of 78 and was buried at the Cimetière parisien de Thiais.[4]
In popular culture
The Most Assassinated Woman in the World (French: La Femme la plus assassinée du monde), a 2018 Belgian-French film directed by Franck Ribière and starring Anna Mouglalis as Maxa, is loosely based on her career at the Grand Guignol. It was the first Belgian film produced for Netflix.[6]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 "Fading Horrors of the Grand Guignol". The New York Times. 17 March 1957.
- ↑ Dorinson, David (11 November 1988). "Books of The Times; How the Grand Guignol Made Fear Popular". The New York Times.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Simon, Philippe (2 December 2012). "Le Grand-Guignol fait une scène à la mort". Le Temps.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 Pierron, Agnès (2011). Maxa: la femme la plus assassinée du monde. Éditions l'Entretemps. ISBN 978-2-35539-125-5. Search this book on
- ↑ Maxa, Paula (December 1965). "Quinze ans de théâtre du Grand-Guignol ou la poésie de la peur". Les Annales (182).
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Ribière, Franck (10 April 2018). "Franck Ribière and Anna Mouglalis: "In the end, an actor always has to invent his character in a way"". FilmTalk.
External links
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