Adrienne Lecouvreur
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Adrienne Lecouvreur (April 5, 1692 – March 20, 1730) was a French actress.
Born in Damery, she first appeared professionally on the stage in Lille. After her Paris debut at the Comédie Française in 1717, she was immensely popular with the public, until her mysterious death.
She was credited with having developed a more natural, less stylized, type of acting[citation needed].
She had a romance with Maurice de Saxe, which ended in tragedy when she was apparently poisoned by her rival, the Duchess of Bouillon. The refusal of the Catholic Church to give her a Christian burial moved her friend Voltaire to write a bitter poem on the subject.
Her life became the inspiration for a tragic drama by Scribe and Legouvé. on which Francesco Cilea's opera Adriana Lecouvreur is based.
