1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Mars, Mlle

MARS, MLLE [ANNE FRANÇOISE HYPPOLYTE BOUTET] (1779–1847), French actress, was born in Paris on the 9th of February 1779, the natural daughter of the actor-author named Monvel [Jacques Marie Boutet, 1745–1812], and Mlle Mars Salvetat, an actress whose southern accent had made her Paris début a failure. Mlle Mars began her stage career in children’s parts, and by 1799, after the rehabilitation of the Comédie Française, she and her sister (Mars aînée) joined that company, of which she remained an active member for thirty-three years. Her beauty and talents soon placed her at the top of her profession. She was incomparable in ingénue parts, and equally charming as the coquette. Molière, Marivaux, Sedaine, and Beaumarchais had no more accomplished interpreter, and in her career of half a century, besides many comedy rôles of the older répertoire, she created fully a hundred parts in plays which owed success largely to her. For her farewell performance she selected Elmire in Tartuffe, and Silvia in Jeu de l’amour et du hasard, two of her most popular rôles; and for her benefit, a few days after, Célimène in Le Misanthrope and Araminthe in Les Femmes savantes. She retired in 1841, and died in Paris on the 20th of March 1847.