Edwige Feuillère, Jean Marais, and Yvonne de Bray are featured in this “tragedy (which has) inspired several accounts - historical, scientific, poetic, passionate, sectarian - and all of these could be true” (Jean Cocteau).
“Loosely based on the murky events surrounding the assassination of the Empress Elizabeth of Austria...L'Aigle à Deux Têtes is a fairy tale for adults, a genre to which Cocteau was attracted. Enriched with stylish cinematic touches, the story unfolds in a mythical Balkan kingdom where poisoned necklaces, two-way mirrors and fanatically loyal minions vie with treacherous secret police and invisible forces of evil - notably ‘The Archduchess,' who, from her unidentified ‘Capital' does her best to eliminate the beautiful Edwige Feuillère, a queen who, in veils and onyxes, has mourned her dead consort for ten years. Enter Jean Marais in Lederhosen through the castle window. He bears an uncanny, impossible, resemblance to the dead King. Need we - or anyone - say more?” --Robert Beers, Museum of Modern Art