Auguste Lefranc
Born	Pierre-Charles-Joseph-Auguste Lefranc 2 February 1814 Bussières (Saône-et-Loire)
Died	15 December 1878(1878-12-15) (aged 64) Suresnes (Seine).
Occupation(s)	Playwright, journalist

Pierre-Charles-Joseph-Auguste Lefranc (2 February 1814 – 15 December 1878) was a 19th-century French playwright and journalist.

Biography

After secondary studies in Mâcon, he moved to Paris in order to attend law school. There he met Eugène Labiche and Marc-Michel.^{[citation needed]} He obtained his license and registered with the Bar but did not practice law for long, becoming more interested in writing.^{[citation needed]} He worked with small newspapers and founded l'Audience and La Chaire catholique. But his passion was theater.^{[citation needed]}

Through his cousin Eugène Scribe, who then dominated the French playwriting scene, he received helpful advice and support from theatre directors.^{[citation needed]} His first play, a comédie en vaudevilles in one act titled Une femme tombée du ciel, premiered in 1836 at the Théâtre du Panthéon.^[1] In 1838, Labiche, Lefranc and Marc-Michel founded the "Paul Dandré Dramatic Society", a collective literary pseudonym for the production of comedies and dramas. A contract formally linked the three theatrical newcomers, who agreed to write only for their new partnership.^{[citation needed]} While the experience lasted only two years, it ended amicably.^{[citation needed]} Labiche, in a letter to Nadar, however, blamed the dissolution on Lefranc's "laziness and inaccuracy".^{[citation needed]}

Over the next two decades, Lefranc wrote fifty more comedies, mostly with Labiche (the last, L'Avocat d'un Grec, in 1859^[2]).^{[citation needed]}. Except for Embrassons-nous, Folleville! (1850),^[3] which was refashioned into an opéra-comique with music by Avelino Valenti and successfully performed at the second Salle Favart in 1879,^[4] none of his plays is considered significant, and many were not even published. He then changed careers, becoming a banker by taking over the Caisse du Crédit public A. Lefranc and Cie.^{[citation needed]}

From 8 July 1867 until mid 1868 Lefranc was a co-director of the Théâtre des Bouffes-Parisiens, along with Julien-Joseph-Henry Dupontavisse. During their tenure the theatre temporarily presented comédies en vaudevilles.^[5]

He died on 15 December 1878 in his country house in Suresnes.

Works

Theatre