[2] In 1736 she made her first stage appearance, at age 12, at the Comédie Italienne, a small part in Pierre de Marivaux's L'Île des esclaves.

In her memoirs, she establishes her opinions on a new style of acting in which the actor use inspiration from their own emotions and experiences in order to create a greater lasting impact on the audience.

During her twenty-two years at this theatre, dividing the honors with her rival Marie Françoise Dumesnil, she filled many of the classical roles of tragedy, and created a great number of parts in the plays of Voltaire, Marmontel, Bernard-Joseph Saurin, de Belloy and others.

); and David Garrick, recognizing her unwillingness or inability to make use of the inspiration of the instant, admitted that she has everything that art and a good understanding with great natural spirit can give her.

[1] She was a mistress of Charles Alexander, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach, who renovated his "White Castle" at his country seat and hunting estate in Triesdorf for her.