Alexandre Dumas fils live with his father. There he met Marie Duplessis, a young courtesan who would be the inspiration for the character Marguerite Gauthier in his romantic novel "La Dame aux camélias" ("The Lady of the Camellias"). Adapted into a play, it was titled "Camille" in English and became the basis for Verdi's 1853 opera, "La traviata", Duplessis undergoing yet another name change, this time to Violetta Valéry. Although he admitted that he had done the adaptation because he needed the money, he had great success with the play, which started his career as a dramatist. He was not only more renowned
La Cage aux Folles (play) "" (1985), directed by Georges Lautner.) In 1983, Poiret's play was adapted in the United States as a musical with a book by Harvey Fierstein and music and lyrics by Jerry Herman and later remade as the American film "The Birdcage". La Cage aux Folles (play) La Cage aux Folles () is a 1973 French farce by Jean Poiret centering on confusion that ensues when Laurent, the son of a Saint Tropez night club owner and his gay lover, brings his fiancée's ultraconservative parents for dinner. The original French production premièred at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal on 1 February 1973