3-089-087 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Prudhomme obligé de prendre des leçons..., 1867. ... de Miss Menken pour arrêter un fiacre. (Prudhomme obliged to take lessons from Miss Menken in order to stop a cab.) Adah Isaacs Menken (1835-1868) was an American actress, painter, performer and poet. She was best known for her performance in the hippodrama Mazeppa (Mazeppa; or, The wild horse of Tartary. A romantic drama, in three acts. Dramatised from Lord Byron's poem by H.M. Milner, and adapted to the stage under the direction of Mr. Ducrow), with a climax that featured her apparently nude and riding a horse on stage. After great success for a few years with the play in New York and San Francisco, she appeared in a production in London and Paris, from 1864 to 1866.