Singer, Actress. Making her most significant contributions in comedy, she was a star of the French stage in the late 19th. century. Born Anne Marie-Louise Damiens, a niece of the director of the Gymnase, she entered the Paris Conservatory in 1866, but left to make her professional debut the following year at the Gymnase in Edmond Gondinet's "Les Grandes Demoiselles". Later at the Eldorado she developed a following with her repertoire of songs marked by comic double-entendre, at some point during her time there taking her husband's name for the stage. At the Gaite she sang the lead in Jacques Offenbach and Victorien Sardou's "Le Roi Carotte", then moved to the Bouffes-Parisiens where she starred in operettas by Offenbach and by Leon Vasseur. Starting in 1876, Anna was the comedic lead of the Theatre des Varieties for around 20 years, earning good reviews in Offenbach's "La Belle Helene", "The Grand Duchess of Gerolstein", and other pieces, as well as in several works of Herve including "Lili", "La Roussette", and "Mam'zelle Nitouche". She later toured throught France, and in the final years of her time on stage returned to the Gymnase, where she specialized in "mother" roles. In retirement, she lived in Burgundy. The menage a trois in Emile Zola's 1880 novel "Nana" is said to have been based upon the one in which Anna was involved.
Singer, Actress. Making her most significant contributions in comedy, she was a star of the French stage in the late 19th. century. Born Anne Marie-Louise Damiens, a niece of the director of the Gymnase, she entered the Paris Conservatory in 1866, but left to make her professional debut the following year at the Gymnase in Edmond Gondinet's "Les Grandes Demoiselles". Later at the Eldorado she developed a following with her repertoire of songs marked by comic double-entendre, at some point during her time there taking her husband's name for the stage. At the Gaite she sang the lead in Jacques Offenbach and Victorien Sardou's "Le Roi Carotte", then moved to the Bouffes-Parisiens where she starred in operettas by Offenbach and by Leon Vasseur. Starting in 1876, Anna was the comedic lead of the Theatre des Varieties for around 20 years, earning good reviews in Offenbach's "La Belle Helene", "The Grand Duchess of Gerolstein", and other pieces, as well as in several works of Herve including "Lili", "La Roussette", and "Mam'zelle Nitouche". She later toured throught France, and in the final years of her time on stage returned to the Gymnase, where she specialized in "mother" roles. In retirement, she lived in Burgundy. The menage a trois in Emile Zola's 1880 novel "Nana" is said to have been based upon the one in which Anna was involved.
Bio by: Bob Hufford
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