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50 free Sarah Bernhardt trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Sarah Bernhardt trivia quiz covers the French actress who was arguably the first global celebrity of the stage. It begins with her birth in the Latin Quarter to a Dutch-Jewish courtesan, the convent school where she buried a pet lizard with full rites, the Duke of Morny who steered her to the Conservatory, and the slap that ended her first spell at the Comédie-Française. It follows her to the Odéon, the Franco-Prussian War hospital she ran there, Victor Hugo's toast to her golden voice, and the tantrum-prone superstar years of Fédora, Theodora, La Tosca and Cleopatra's live snakes. The quiz also takes in the legends and the facts behind them: the satin-lined coffin, the balloon flight over Paris, the whale in Boston, the menagerie, the disastrous marriage to Jacques Damala, Mucha's Gismonda poster, her Hamlet, L'Aiglon, the theatre she named after herself, the leg amputated in 1915 and the wartime recitals that followed, the early films and Edison recording, and the 30,000 mourners at her funeral. Every answer is checked against Wikipedia's articles on Bernhardt, her theatre and Alphonse Mucha, and each explanation adds one further fact. Good for theatre students, Belle Époque enthusiasts and quiz setters looking for a subject nobody else has covered this deeply.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What was Sarah Bernhardt's name at birth?
Henriette-Rosine Bernard
She was born in the Latin Quarter of Paris on 22 October 1844 to a Dutch-Jewish courtesan.
Q 02What was the profession of Bernhardt's mother, Judith Bernard?
Courtesan
Her patrons included the Duke of Morny, half-brother of Napoleon III, who later steered Sarah towards the stage.
Q 03For what act was the young Bernhardt accused of sacrilege at her convent school near Versailles?
Giving her pet lizard a Christian burial
She had declared she wanted to be a nun; she took first communion as a Catholic in 1856.
Q 04Which powerful figure proposed at a family council in 1857 that Bernhardt should become an actress?
The Duke of Morny
He arranged her first-ever theatre visit, to Racine's Britannicus, where she sobbed so loudly she disturbed the audience.
Q 05Which writer, comforting the weeping girl after her first play, called her 'my little star'?
Alexandre Dumas père
He told Morny she was destined for the stage and later coached her for her Conservatory audition.
Q 06Which composer, then head of the Paris Conservatory, arranged Bernhardt's audition?
Daniel Auber
Morny used his influence with Auber; the jury of Auber and five leading actors was won over by her recitation.
Q 07What did Bernhardt do in 1863 that ended her first stint at the Comédie-Française?
Slapped a senior actress in the face
Madame Nathalie had shoved her little sister Regina into a stone column; Bernhardt refused to apologise unless Nathalie did first.
Q 08Whose poems did Bernhardt unwittingly recite before Napoleon III at the Tuileries, offending the emperor?
Victor Hugo's
Hugo was a bitter critic of the emperor in exile; the imperial couple rose and left after the first poem.
Q 09With which Belgian aristocrat did Bernhardt have her only child, Maurice, in 1864?
Henri, Prince de Ligne
His family sent an uncle to break up the romance under threat of disinheritance; Maurice later managed her theatre and gambled away its receipts.
Q 10At which Left Bank theatre did Bernhardt make her name from 1866, in plays such as Kean and Le Passant?
The Odéon
Director Felix Duquesnel called her 'intelligent to the point of genius, with enormous energy under an appearance frail and delicate'.
Q 11How did Bernhardt calm a rowdy 1868 audience heckling Dumas's Kean in favour of an exiled rival author?
She addressed them directly from the stage
She asked whether they served justice by blaming Dumas for the exile of the man they were shouting for; the audience laughed and applauded.
Q 12What did Bernhardt turn her theatre into during the Prussian siege of Paris in 1870?
A hospital for wounded soldiers
She placed 32 beds in the lobby and foyers and had her personal chef cook soup for the patients.
Q 13After the 100th performance of Ruy Blas, its author toasted Bernhardt as his adorable queen and her what?
Q 21Which playwright wrote Fédora, Theodora, La Tosca and Cleopatra for Bernhardt?
Victorien Sardou
For Theodora he invented a strangling for the empress, who historically died of cancer; Bernhardt sketched Ravenna's mosaics for the costumes.
Q 22What live creatures did Bernhardt keep for Cleopatra's death scene?
Two garter snakes
They played the asp; she also painted the palms of her hands for realism.
Q 23Which future king was among Bernhardt's lovers?
The Prince of Wales, later Edward VII
She renewed the relationship after her husband Damala left her in the 1880s.
Golden voice
Rostand later called her 'the queen of the pose and the princess of the gesture'.
Q 14What piece of furniture did Bernhardt famously keep in her bedroom and sometimes sleep in?
A satin-lined coffin
Contrary to legend she never took it on tour; she also let her tubercular sister sleep in her bed while she used it.
Q 15How did Bernhardt view the 1878 Paris Universal Exposition from above?
In a hot-air balloon
She flew with balloonist Pierre Giffard and painter Georges Clairin, and Perrin of the Comédie-Française fined her for the stunt.
Q 16Which composer's question about whether she ever prayed drew the reply 'No, never. I'm an atheist'?
Charles Gounod
Asked by a reporter years later if she was a Christian, she said she was 'a Roman Catholic and a member of the great Jewish race'.
Q 17How big was Bernhardt's first American tour?
157 shows in 51 cities
She travelled in a private palace car with two maids, two cooks, a waiter and her leading man Édouard Angelo.
Q 18Which inventor recorded Bernhardt reciting Phèdre at Menlo Park during her first American tour?
Thomas Edison
The recording has not survived; she posed on the back of a dead whale in Boston on the same tour.
Q 19On what unusual object did Bernhardt pose for photographs in Boston?
The back of a dead whale
She was condemned as immoral by some clergy on the tour but sold out everywhere.
Q 20Whom did Bernhardt marry in London in April 1882?
Jacques Damala, a Greek diplomat
Eleven years her junior and a morphine addict, he was dismissed by critics as handsome but talentless; she said she married because it was the one thing she had never tried.
Q 24Which Brazilian ruler attended all Sarah Bernhardt's Rio performances and gave her a diamond bracelet, promptly stolen?
Emperor Pedro II
On the same tour both her leading men caught yellow fever and her manager died; she went crocodile hunting in Guayaquil regardless.
Q 25Which then-unknown artist made Bernhardt's poster for Gismonda in 1894, launching his career?
Alphonse Mucha
She was delighted and signed him for six more posters; his Art Nouveau style became the look of the era.
Q 26How much did Bernhardt pay for the Théâtre de la Renaissance in 1893?
700,000 francs
She ran every aspect of it and appeared eight times a week, but her debts had reached two million gold francs by 1898.
Q 27How many seats did the Théâtre des Nations, which she took over and renamed after herself in 1899, hold?
1,700
Twice the size of the Renaissance, its façade blazed with 5,700 electric bulbs and its lobby had life-size portraits of her by Mucha, Abbéma and Clairin.
Q 28Which Shakespeare title role did Bernhardt premiere on 20 May 1899 in a prose adaptation?
Hamlet
She played the Dane as direct, natural and 'very feminine'; Paris reviews were positive, London's mixed.
Q 29In Rostand's L'Aiglon (1900), the 56-year-old Bernhardt played which historical figure?
Napoleon's son, the Duke of Reichstadt
She cut her hair short and studied the walk of young cavalry officers; the play ran nearly a year during the 1900 Exposition.
Q 30Which Irish writer called Bernhardt 'the Incomparable One' and wrote Salomé in French for her?
Oscar Wilde
British censors banned the play before it could be staged; he had scattered lilies in her path on her arrival in London.