“Zaza” was first produced, December 25, 1898, at the Lafayette Opera House (now, 1917, the Belasco Theatre), Washington, D. C. The first presentment of it in New York occurred, January 9, 1899, at the Garrick Theatre, where it was acted till June 17, receiving 164 performances. “Zaza” is not so much a play as it is a series of loosely jointed, sequent episodes. The story is simple and vulgar. _Zaza_ is a French prostitute. She has passed from the streets to the stage of country music halls and has become a singer. She is a common, shameless, termagant wanton, possessed, however, of an animal allurement which infatuates a man of respectable position and outwardly decent character. His name is _Dufrène_. By him she is removed from a life of miscellaneous degradation and,--“purified” by “love”!--she dwells with him, in contentment, for six months,--remarking, as she pulls on her stockings, “I do think it’s the most beautiful thing in the world when two lovers come together.” At the end of that time she discovers that her paramour is married, and that he maintains his wife and their child in a respectable rural home and, at intervals, bestows upon them the boon of his precious company. With the tigerish resentment often characteristic of her class, she immediately repairs to that home, intent to “revenge” herself upon _Dufrène’s_ wife by revealing the husband’s infidelity. Her amiable purpose is diverted by an encounter with his child, whose prattle so profoundly affects her supersensitive “better feelings” that she quits the field, returns to her civic bower, which has been provided by _Dufrène_, there provokes a violent quarrel with that hypocritical libertine, so enrages him that he threatens to strike her, and finally elicits from him the assurance that his wife is much more precious to him than his harlot is. The separation of this edifying couple ensues. Stimulated by this experience of “purification by love,” _Zaza_ determines to achieve artistic greatness without further delay, and this she incontinently does, becoming, within two years,--“through much misery, much grief, much work, and a little luck,” as she expresses it,--a great artist, wealthy and (general concomitant of wealth!) respected, and, most delightful of all, a paragon of virtue, gently dismissing her recalcitrant paramour, _Dufrène_ (who, unable to forget the rapturous interlude of his amatory association with her, has sought to renew it), in the peaceful seclusion of the Champs Elysees!