Clair Josèphe Hippolyte Leris (25 January 1723 â€" 29 January 1803),
known as Mademoiselle Clairon or La Clairon was a French actress, born
at Condé-sur-l'Escaut, Hainaut, the daughter of an army sergeant.In
1736 she made her first stage appearance at the Comédie Italienne, a
small part in Pierre de Marivaux's L'ÃŽle des esclaves. After several
years in the provinces she returned to Paris. Her life, meanwhile, had
been decidedly irregular, even if not to the degree indicated by the
libellous pamphlet Histoire de la demoiselle Cronel', dite Frétillon,
actrice de la Comédie de Rouen, écrite par elle-mme (The Hague,
1746), or to be inferred from the disingenuousness of her own
Mémoires d'Hippolyte Clairon (1798); and she had great difficulty in
obtaining an order to make her debut at the Comédie-Française.
Succeeding, however, at last, she had the courage to select the
title-role of Phèdre, and she obtained a veritable triumph. During
her twenty-two years at this theatre, dividing the honors with her
rival Marie Françoise Dumesnil, she filled many of the classical
roles of tragedy, and created a great number of parts in the plays of
Voltaire, Marmontel, Bernard-Joseph Saurin, de Belloy and others.She
retired in 1766, and trained pupils for the stage, among them Mlle
Raucourt. Oliver Goldsmith called Mlle Clairon "the most perfect
female figure I have ever seen on any stage" (The Bee, 2nd No.); and
David Garrick, recognizing her unwillingness or inability to make use
of the inspiration of the instant, admitted that she has everything
that art and a good understanding with great natural spirit can give
her.She was a mistress of Charles Alexander, Margrave of
Brandenburg-Ansbach, who renovated his "White Castle" at his country
seat and hunting estate in Triesdorf for her. La Clairon Biography, NetWorth, Height, Age, Weight, Family, Married, Son, Daughter