French history in the English-speaking theatre

Did You Know?

• Edmund John Eyre's The Maid of Normandy (1794) concerns Charlotte Corday's murder of Jean-Paul Marat.
• Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey's The Fall of Robespierre (1794) dramatizes Robespierre's overthrow and arrest.
• Joel Gross's Marie Antoinette: the color of flesh (2007) depicts the queen exploited by her portrait-painter Élisabeth-Louise Vigée-Le Brun.

16th century

Christopher Marlowe's The Massacre at Paris (1593) depicts events under Charles IX and Henry III of France, opening with the marriage of Marguerite of Valois to Henry of Navarre. The assassination of Gaspard de Coligny by a man hired by Henry I, Duke of Guise triggers the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre of August 1572. William Shakespeare wrote several plays involving French rulers: King John (1596) shows John of England refusing Philip II of France's demand to abdicate for Arthur I of Brittany, leading to war and a marriage between Blanche of Castile and Louis the Lion; Arthur is captured and dies. Henry V (1599) follows the English king's claim to the French crown under Salic law, the siege of Harfleur, the Battle of Agincourt, and his marriage to Catherine of Valois. Shakespeare's Henry VI trilogy (1591–1592) covers the reigns of Henry VI of England alongside Charles VI and Charles VII of France.

17th century

George Chapman wrote several plays on French subjects: Bussy D'Ambois (1603) involves duels and the seduction of Montsoreau's wife, ending with Bussy's death in 1579; its sequel, The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois (1613), includes the assassination of Henry I, Duke of Guise in 1588. The Conspiracy and Tragedy of Charles, Duke of Byron (1608) follows the duke's embassies for Henry IV, his conspiracy with the duke of Savoy, arrest, trial, and execution by beheading at the Bastille in 1602. Chapman also collaborated on Rollo Duke of Normandy (1633) and The Tragedy of Chabot, Admiral of France (1639), the latter showing Chabot condemned in 1541 and dying from suspicion in 1543. John Crowne's The History of Charles the Eighth of France (1672) covers Charles VIII's invasion of Naples. John Dryden and Nathaniel Lee's The Duke of Guise (1683) treats events under Henry III.

19th century

Fanny Kemble wrote Francis the First based on the life of that king. Sarah Pogson Smith's The Female Enthusiast (1807) dramatizes Charlotte Corday's murder of Jean-Paul Marat during the Reign of Terror. Dion Boucicault adapted Casimir Delavigne's French play Louis XI (1855) about that monarch's reign. Edward Bulwer-Lytton's Richelieu (1839) focuses on the cardinal who dominated politics under Louis XIII. Harry Forrest and Paolo Giacometti's Marie Antoinette (1890) treats her life. Richmond Sheffield Dement also wrote a play titled Napoleon (1893).

20th century

Herbert Trench wrote his own Napoleon (1919). Percy MacKaye's Jeanne d'Arc (1906) and George Bernard Shaw's Saint Joan (1923) both treat Joan of Arc; Shaw's play shows her petitioning Robert de Baudricourt, raising the siege of Orléans with Jean de Dunois, and her trial and burning in 1431. Frank Harris wrote Joan la Romée (1926), and Maxwell Anderson's Joan of Lorraine (1946) uses a play-within-a-play structure. William Devereux's Henry of Navarre (1909) covers the future Henry IV. David Belasco's Madame du Barry (1901) focuses on Louis XV's mistress. Doug Wright's Quills (1996) depicts the Marquis de Sade's imprisonment at Charenton, the efforts of Abbé de Coulmier to suppress his writings, and his relationship with Madeleine Leclerc.