Cyrano de Bergerac

A libertine is a person questioning and challenging most moral principles, such as responsibility or sexual restraints, and will often declare these traits as unnecessary, undesirable or evil. A libertine is especially someone who ignores or even spurns accepted morals and forms of behaviour observed by the larger society.

The values and practices of libertines are known collectively as libertinism or libertinage and are described as an extreme form of hedonism or liberalism. Libertines put value on physical pleasures, meaning those experienced through the senses. As a philosophy, libertinism gained new-found adherents in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, particularly in France and Great Britain. Notable among these were John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, Cyrano de Bergerac, and the Marquis de Sade.

Gérard Xavier Marcel Depardieu (UK: /ˈdɛpɑːrdjɜː, ˌdɛpɑːrˈdjɜː/, US: /-ˈdjʌ, ˌdeɪpɑːrˈdjuː/, French: [ʒeʁaʁ ɡzavje maʁsɛl dəpaʁdjø] ; born 27 December 1948) is a French actor. Considered an icon of French cinema in the same way as Jean Gabin and Alain Delon, he has completed over 200 films since 1967, most of which as a lead actor. Depardieu has worked with over 150 film directors including François Truffaut, Bertrand Blier, Maurice Pialat, Alain Resnais, Claude Chabrol, Ridley Scott, Peter Weir, Jean-Luc Godard, and Bernardo Bertolucci. He is the second highest-grossing actor in the history of French cinema behind Louis de Funès. Among his films, about 60 have sold more than one million tickets in France. He has portrayed numerous historical and fictitious figures including Cyrano de Bergerac, Georges Danton, Christopher Columbus, Honoré de Balzac, Alexandre Dumas, Auguste Rodin, Jean Valjean, Edmond Dantès, Porthos, commissioner Maigret, Joseph Stalin and Grigori Rasputin, as well as Obelix in four of the live action Asterix films. Depardieu is also a film producer, businessman and vineyard owner. He has occasionally directed films and performed as a singer. His body of work includes many television productions, several records and, as of 2025, 19 stage plays and 9 books.

Growing up in poverty in Châteauroux, central France, Depardieu had a difficult youth before settling in Paris where he became an actor. In 1974, he had his breakthrough role in Going Places, becoming an overnight star. Depardieu quickly established himself as a leading actor in European cinema and proved himself a versatile performer by appearing in a wide variety of productions, including drama, comedy, crime and avant-garde films. He has received acclaim for his performances in The Last Metro (1980), for which he won the César Award for Best Actor, in Police (1985), for which he won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor, Jean de Florette (1986), and Cyrano de Bergerac (1990), for which he won the Best Actor award at the Cannes Film Festival and his second César Award for Best Actor as well as garnering a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. He started a Hollywood career with Green Card (1990), winning a Golden Globe Award, and later appeared in several big-budget English-language films, including 1492: Conquest of Paradise (1992), The Man in the Iron Mask (1998), and Life of Pi (2012).

Cyrano de Bergerac (/ˌsɪrənoʊ də ˈbɜːrʒəræk, - ˈbɛər-/ SIRR-ə-noh də BUR-zhə-rak, – BAIR-, French: [siʁano d(ə) bɛʁʒəʁak]) is a play written in 1897 by Edmond Rostand. The play includes elements of the life of the 17th-century novelist and playwright Cyrano de Bergerac, along with elements of invention and myth. Cyrano's iconic huge nose is based on reality (see the accompanying portrait) but in performance of the play is usually exaggerated.

The entire play is written in verse, in rhyming couplets of twelve syllables per line, very close to the classical alexandrine form, but the verses sometimes lack a caesura. It is also meticulously researched, down to the names of the members of the Académie française and the dames précieuses glimpsed before the performance in the first scene.