Florence Foster Jenkins was the William Hung of the early 20th century. She loved opera, but it didn’t love her back. Her infamous rendition of Mozart’s “Queen of the Night” remains a perversely popular novelty recording, easily found online. The strangely immortal Jenkins’s life and art, such as it was, has now inspired a Gallic doppelganger, the title character of Xavier Giannoli’s “Marguerite.”
Marguerite Dumont was blessed with a sizable fortune, a love of culture, and a singing voice that sounds like cats being strangled. However, since she cannot really hear herself, those around her willingly indulge her artistic pretensions, due to said fortune.
Her philandering husband Georges owes his title to her, but he finds her private recitals excruciatingly painful to attend. Probably Dumont’s biggest booster is their imposing butler-steward-fixer Madelbos, who regularly photographs his mistress in iconic opera costumes. Yet, his deep-down motivations are crueler than the rest of the hangers-on feeding her delusions.
