Jan Clarke’s chapter examines the period of Molière and his contemporaries from the perspective of theatrical establishments. Focusing on three companies – Molière’s troupe (1658–73), the Hôtel Guénégaud company (1673–80) and the Comédie-Française (from 1680 onwards) – Clarke highlights a number of interrelated factors: the prime importance of a theatre’s location within the capital; financial structures ranging from royal patronage and ticket sales to concessions, for example, for the refreshment booth, as well as theatres’ multiple expenditures, including for rent, heating, transport and above all company members’ pensions. Across the analysis, Clarke illustrates how a theatre not only provided a living for company members and their employees but also contributed to the livelihoods of myriad other associates, from the most skilled to the most humble, the majority of whom remain anonymous, while others have left only fleeting traces in contemporary documents.

The award-winning actor, director, and scenographer Éric Ruf discusses his role since 2014 as administrateur general (artistic director) of the Comédie-Française. In discussion with Clare Siviter, Ruf offers readers a glimpse into the world’s oldest continually performing troupe. He describes the legacy and symbolic weight for performers today of the building and its history, and how they negotiate innovations such as price reform and live streaming, when steeped in such tradition.

In his Négligent (1692), Charles Dufresny has an aspiring playwright exclaim: ‘Molière has spoiled the theatre all right. Follow his example and immediately critics cry out that you pilfered his work; deviate from it in the slightest, and they complain that you are not staying close enough to Molière!’ – an ironic but fitting encapsulation of the ‘post-moliéresque’ era, when authors, facing increasingly challenging conditions, still somehow managed to reinvent comedy. The growing aura of commedia dell’arte and opera influenced productions of the newly formed Théâtre-Français, which for almost twenty years struggled in the shadow of the hugely successful Théâtre-Italien, then allowed to stage plays partly in French. When the latter was shut down by royal decree in 1697, the taste for ‘irregular’ comedy remained dominant, ultimately leading to the emergence of a new venue – the fairgrounds – and a new genre: the opéra-comique. Contrary to a long-standing negative vision, the Fin de Règne (1680–1715), with dramatists like Dancourt, Dufresny, Regnard and Lesage, was an apex of comedic innovation that never forgot or betrayed what Molière had accomplished.

One of the most significant developments over the last fifty years has been the study of Molière in performance. His plays have been a major box-office success in France, and a fixture in the repertoire of the Comédie-Française, thereby justifying its historic entitlement to the popular designation as the ‘Maison de Molière’ (House of Molière). This chapter looks at the contribution directors have made over the last 120 years to a fresh understanding of the plays. The diversity of approaches maps the broad shift in theoretical perspectives, from the largely historicist attempts to recreate the early staging to some of the many rereadings that reflect the changing cultural, social and political agendas, which transcend the original context of the first performances. The productions studied raise interesting questions with regard to Molière’s stagecraft, highlight the divided critical opinion regarding generic specifications, and show the richness of Molière’s work that continues to resonate with each new generation of theatregoers.

This chapter examines the fate of Molière’s plays in the years immediately following the author’s death as first the Hôtel Guénégaud company (1673–80) and then the Comédie-Française (from 1680) battled to capitalise on their Molière inheritance and make the most of plays with which the public was becoming increasingly tired. Strategies employed included ‘resting’ plays and then reviving them, digging deep into the Molière stockpile to produce plays that had not been seen for some time, and increasing the number of double bills given so as to enhance the diversity of their programmes. By these and other means, the Guénégaud company and the Comédie-Française actually succeeded in growing the number of Molière plays in the repertoire and in so doing began the process of turning Molière into the cornerstone of the French national canon. An analysis of statistical information from the company account books enables us to see how successful these strategies were at the box office, at the same time as revealing which of Molière’s plays were most popular in this period.