“The Théâtre du Grand-Guignol, located in a former Baroque chapel, presented each evening two tragic plays, filled with violence, coupled with two comic, almost vaudeville-like, plays. Spectators regularly passed out in the theatre. This theatre originated the adjective ‘grandguignolesque’ (an incongruous combination of appalling violence and slapstick comedy) which has become part of common French speech. The guillotine depicted in La Machine Rouge (The Red Machine) was probably one of the more harmless accessories on stage. Tension is added here by the jostling couple, the tipping bottle and table, the fence, and the bloody blade of the guillotine” (Colin, p. 10).
Imp. H. Chachoin, Paris
literature: Colin, 61