The Guilty Mother (), subtitled The Other Tartuffe, is the third play of the Figaro trilogy by Pierre Beaumarchais; its predecessors were The Barber of Seville and The Marriage of Figaro. This was the author's last play. It is rarely revived. Like the earlier plays of the trilogy it has been turned into operatic form, but it has not entered the general opera repertoire.
Background
The characters of Figaro and his associates were so popular that other dramatists had written sequels to The Barber of Seville and The Marriage of Figaro, most notably M-N Delon, who brought out Le Mariage de Cherubin in 1785 and Le Mariage de Fanchette the following year. In the preface to the first published edition of The Marriage of Figaro, Beaumarchais had declared his intention of writing a sequel.
The Tartuffe figure who insinuates himself into the household for his own enrichment is Bégearss. Like Molière's original, he gains such influence over the head of the household that even when the latter finally understands the deception, the intruder is so firmly in control of the family's affairs that is only with difficulty that he is defeated. Bégearss is almost certainly based one of Beaumarchais's enemies, a lawyer called Nicolas Bergasse, with whom the author had been embroiled in an acrimonious legal case in the last days of the Ancien Régime.
Beaumarchais completed the play early in 1791. It was to have been staged by the Comédie-Française, but the author fell out with the management over authors' rights. Instead the piece was premiered at the new Théâtre du Marais on 26 June 1792, and ran for fifteen performances across six weeks. Soon after this, Beaumarchais found it prudent for political reasons to go into voluntary exile. In his absence his friends arranged for the text of the play to be published, in the hope of preventing unauthorised editions by opportunistic publishers. They made some changes to comply with the prevailing orthodoxy of the French Revolution: most particularly they suppressed the Almavivas' aristocratic titles "Count" and "Countess". By 1796 Beaumarchais had returned to Paris and the play was finally presented at the Comédie-Française in 1797 and again in 1799–1800. The work thereafter fell out of the general repertoire, but was revived successfully at the Comédie-Française in 1990.
Characters
The characters, as described by Beaumarchais's characterisations, are: Count Almaviva, a Spanish lord with noble pride but not vanity. Countess Almaviva, very melancholy, and with the piety of an angel. Chevalier Léon, their son (actually, the son of the Countess and Chérubin, who died in battle); young man obsessed with freedom, like all ardent new souls. Florestine, ward of Count Almaviva; a young person full of compassion. Bégearss, Irishman, a Major in the Spanish military, an old secretary to the Count when he was ambassador; a very deep man, and great schemer of intrigues, accomplished in the art of troublemaking. Figaro, servant and confidant of the Count; a man formed by worldly experience and events. Suzanne, maid and confidant of the Countess; wife of Figaro; excellent woman, devoted to her mistress and having left behind the illusions of youth. M. Fal, the Count's notary; a precise and honest man. Guillaume, German valet to M. Bégearss; a man too gentle for such a master.
Plot
Synopsis
The action takes place twenty years after the previous play in the trilogy, The Marriage of Figaro. The story's premise is that several years ago, while the Count was away on a long business trip, the Countess and Chérubin spent a night together. When the Countess told Chérubin that what they did was wrong and that she could never see him again, he went away to war and intentionally let himself be mortally wounded on the field. As he lay dying, he wrote a final letter to the Countess, declaring his love and regrets, and making mention of all the things they had done. The Countess did not have the heart to throw away the letter, and instead had a special box supplied by an Irishman called Bégearss, with a secret compartment in which to store the incriminating note, so the Count would never find it. Soon after, to her dismay, the Countess discovered herself pregnant with Chérubin's child.
The Count has been suspicious all these years that he is not the father of Léon, the Countess's son, and so he has been rapidly trying to spend his fortune to ensure the boy won't inherit any of it, even having gone so far as to renounce his title and move the family to Paris; but he has nevertheless held some doubts, and therefore has never officially disowned the boy or even brought up his suspicions to the Countess.