Theatre · Champs-Élysées · 8e arrondissement

Théâtre Marigny

The buildingStill standing

Getting inHours or admission

What's there nowStill the same

Still operating in the gardens at the lower end of the Champs-Élysées.

The theatre in the Champs-Élysées gardens where Colette played Paniska in Pan in 1906.

Address: Carré Marigny, avenue de Marigny, 75008 Paris
Years: 1894–present

Illustration The Théâtre Marigny pavilion in colour amid the gardens off the Champs-Élysées

The theatre today, in the Marigny gardens.

Editorial illustration

The place, briefly

In late November 1906 Colette appeared at the Théâtre Marigny as Paniska in Pan, a verse play by the Belgian poet Charles Van Lerberghe, in performances on the 28th, 29th and 30th. It fell between her run at the Olympia and the Moulin Rouge engagement that would end in scandal a few weeks later — part of the same short, intense period as a working performer.

The theatre stands in the gardens near the foot of the Champs-Élysées. Its present building dates from 1894, when Édouard Niermans converted an earlier panorama rotunda designed by Charles Garnier into a playhouse. It is still in use.

Key facts

Address: Carré Marigny, in the Champs-Élysées gardens, 8th arrondissement
Built: 1894, converted from a Garnier panorama rotunda
Colette's connection: Played Paniska in Pan, 28–30 November 1906
Today: Still operating

In images

Pen-and-ink illustration of the Théâtre Marigny, a Neoclassical pavilion off the Champs-Élysées with 'THÉÂTRE MARIGNY' on its pediment and entrance canopy — The Théâtre Marigny, where Colette played Paniska in Pan in 1906.Editorial illustration

The Théâtre Marigny pavilion in colour amid the gardens off the Champs-Élysées — The theatre today, in the Marigny gardens.Editorial illustration

Timeline

1894
The panorama rotunda near the Champs-Élysées is converted into the Théâtre Marigny.
1906
Colette plays Paniska in Pan, 28–30 November.

On the map

Writers who knew this place

Colette

French · The French novelist who wrote the Claudine books under Willy’s name, earned her independence on the music-hall stage, and made women’s private lives a serious literary subject.

Performed here · 1906

Colette played Paniska in Charles Van Lerberghe's Pan at the Théâtre Marigny, 28–30 November 1906.

— Société des amis de Colette — Chronology; Une balade sur les pas de Sidonie devenue Colette

Within walking distance

Color present-day editorial view of the pale stone mansion at 10 rue de l'Élysée with its long iron balcony

Library · Madeleine–Élysée

American Library in Paris — 10 rue de l'Élysée

The surviving mansion that housed the American Library in Paris from 1920 to 1936—a center of transatlantic reading and literary life where Langston Hughes unsuccessfully asked for work.

Visit the place

Nightclub · Champs-Élysées

Le Bœuf sur le Toit

The bar-cabaret Louis Moysès opened in 1922, named for the Cocteau–Milhaud ballet — headquarters of the postwar avant-garde around Jean Cocteau, and one of Blaise Cendrars's regular Paris stops.

Visit the place

The imagined Colette beauty-shop storefront in colour, a dark-green front with gold lettering and a display of perfumes

Shop · Madeleine

6 rue de Miromesnil

The beauty shop Colette opened in 1932, selling cosmetics she made herself — her attempt to turn her fame into a business.

Visit the place

Hotel · Place de la Concorde

Hôtel de Crillon

The grandest address on the Place de la Concorde — where Jake Barnes, the narrator of Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, crosses the river to write letters on impressive stationery and drink a Jack Rose with George the barman.

Visit the place

The Friday Letter

Paris, one address at a time.

The cafés, studios, and walk-up flats where the work was made — one story from the map in every letter.