Raucourt, Mlle (1756–1815)

French actress. Born Françoise Marie Antoinette Saucerotte in Nancy, France, on March 3, 1756; died on January 15, 1815; buried at Père Lachaise; daughter of an actor.

Mlle Raucourt, whose real name was Françoise Saucerotte, was the daughter of a provincial actor who took her to Spain, where she began appearing in dramatic parts at age 12. By 1770, she was back in France at Rouen, and her success as Euphémie in Belloy's Gaston et Bayard led to a stint at the Comédie Française, where in 1772 she made her debut as Dido . Raucourt played all the classical tragedy parts to crowded houses, until her extravagance and personal scandals ended her popularity.

In 1776, she suddenly disappeared from France. Her next three years were spent in the capitals of northern Europe, though some of that time was spent in jail for debt. Wherever she went, scandal seemed to follow. Under protection of the French queen Marie Antoinette , Raucourt reappeared at the Théatre Français in 1779 and was again triumphant, reprising her former roles which included Phèdre and Cleopatra. At the outbreak of the French Revolution, she was imprisoned for six months with other royalist members of the Comédie Française, and she did not reappear upon the stage of the Comédie until the close of 1793, and then only for a short time. Along with a dozen of the best actors in the company, she founded a rival company, but a summons from the Directory brought her back to the Comédie in 1797. Napoleon gave her a pension, and in 1806 she was commissioned to organize and direct a company to tour Italy, where, especially in Milan, she was enthusiastically received. Raucourt returned to Paris a few months before her death on January 15, 1815. But scandal followed her to her grave. When the clergy of her parish at Saint-Roch refused to accept her body for burial, the crowd of mourners broke down the church doors and were only restrained from further violence with the arrival of an almoner hastily sent by Louis XVIII. She is buried at Père Lachaise.