Renee Hewitt plays the title character, Sarah Bernhardt, in Collaborative Theatre's production of "Bernhardt/Hamlet."

Sarah Bernhardt, by all accounts, was one of the greatest and most prolific actresses who ever lived. She was almost larger than her own life, and the embodiment of the theater.

From the time she was born in 1844, acting — as they say — was in her blood. In her 60 years as the grande dame of the Paris stage, she starred in hundreds of plays by some of the world’s greatest authors, many of whom she knew and who wrote characters for her. Bernhardt performed in more than 15 countries (including the U.S.), lived through two major wars (the Franco-Prussian and World War I), set up a hospital for wounded soldiers, purchased several theaters, continued to perform after a leg amputation and even made movies.

So ensconced in the theater world was she, that if you know anything about her life — it’s truly hard to know where Sarah began and the theater left off.

Bernhardt was the product of two great movements in France, La Belle Epoque and Art Nouveau. These eras allowed for her creativity and feminist leanings to triumphantly emerge.

She is fascinating to read and write about, but for an actress to play her, it would probably seem like a dream come true.

And if you were going to take her on, you would have to be really good. So good, in fact, that all of your instincts as an actress would need to kick in. Your timing, coordination and voice intonations (Bernhardt was known for her voice) would have to be front and center. You would have to have the ability to interpret dialog as prose, confidence bordering on hubris, know the art of seduction and possess an ability to chase down a character’s emotions like a gendarme racing to the site of a burglary.

There just so happens to be such an actress.

Her name is Renée Hewitt, and she’s currently playing Bernhardt in “Bernhardt/Hamlet” at the Collaborative Theatre Project in Medford through Sept. 10. If you appreciate fine acting, you will appreciate Hewitt’s interpretation of this sometimes hard to bear but wildly independent and brilliant woman.

Actor Cody Pettit is a lover to be reckoned with, playing a witty, vibrant, defiant Edmond Rostand, Bernhardt’s sometime playwright and paramour. Pettit and Hewitt are the flint who light the fuse, that allows for each to be the other’s muse. They are able to take the actress’ and playwright’s creative temperaments and turn them into artistic foreplay.

Yes, there’s a little R-rated bed-hopping going on here. But it works. In real life, there does not seem to have been a romantic involvement between Rostand and Bernhardt, but it is not beyond the realm of possibility since she was known to have slept with many of her “content creators,” to put it in today’s terms.

What a really superb job Director Rick Robinson has done here with the rather complicated material.

This would not be an easy play to direct under any circumstances. It is demanding with its dialog. A bit schizophrenic with its main character’s stubbornness and inability to settle. And then you have the playwright, Theresa Rebeck, who went a little off the rails with the story in the second act.

The first act is enthralling. You see our Sarah deciding to play Hamlet, maybe Shakespeare’s most tragic character, or at least the one we can most relate to. We have purity of prose in his soliloquies, we feel the depth of despair in his personage.

Rebeck’s Bernhardt can see the tragedy that lives in Hamlet. His immaturity. The right of passage he is facing. Both Rebeck and Bernhardt could sense Hamlet’s insecurity, the weightiness of his being alive, and the correlation to Bernhardt’s own struggles. Rebeck recognizes that Bernhardt knew Hamlet intimately. She knew him the way Laurence Olivier knew him in the 1948 film in which he proclaims, “This is a tragedy about a man who could not make up his mind.” Rebeck could see it. She knew Bernhardt had seen it too. And so, in this respect the first act works.

It works until …

Rebeck has Bernhardt go off on a tangent about the length of Hamlet’s soliloquies, emphatically stating the prose is so long it takes away from the story. And in some respects, she’s right. Ironically, it’s Bernhardt’s rant about Hamlet that takes away from Rebeck’s play. Rebeck knows how well Bernhardt knew Hamlet, but Rebeck stops trusting Bernhardt and in doing so disrupts her story.

And this is where the play goes right when it probably should have gone left.

In the second act, Bernhardt’s playwright/lover, Rostand, writes “Cyrano de Bergerac” and Bernhardt suddenly becomes focused on Cyrano. She views him as a pathetic man. She resents how the woman Cyrano is in love with, Roxane, has been relegated to a stereotypical role — a woman who is rather superficial, lacking in depth and is stupid enough to be wooed by a man who she thinks is Cyrano.

“Cyrano” is a curveball playwright Rebeck throws in, making us wonder if she didn’t miss the point of her own play. Yoo-hoo? Rebeck, what happened to Hamlet?

In real life, as it turns out, Bernhardt played a very convincing Hamlet, and even filmed scenes of it in 1899. It played successfully in Paris, if not in London, and was praised by the great Oscar Wilde himself.

The rest of the cast really does this funny, surprising but difficult play justice.

Russ Lloyd (for this performance) drew our attention as the wise Constant, the King opposite Bernhardt’s Hamlet. Tamara Mathias as Rosamund, wife of Edmond Rostand, plays a lady with class and ardor for her husband as she confronts Bernhardt about doing the right thing by him. Jonathan Beran plays Maurice, Bernhardt’s son. We really believe he has his mother’s best interests at heart.

Rigo Jimenez is fine as Francois, an actor, and Charles Isen as Louis makes a convincing critic and friend who doesn’t want Bernhardt to risk playing Hamlet. Jon Klimoski, who might be more effective and understandable without an accent, plays Alphonse Mucha, master of motifs and Art Nouveau theater posters, still beloved today.

The costumes were impressive for this small production. The satins, embroidery and attention to detail by Susan Aversa really highlight the many moods of Bernhardt. The scenic design by Sean O’Skea shows a dressing room of that era; however, one can’t help but think a bit of quirkiness and imagination was missed here. Bernhardt was an avid collector of beautiful things and animals.

Hats off to the entire production team, including Charles Baldwin on lighting and projection, sound design by Ryan Kelley and Estrella Cervantes, and dramaturg Judith Rosen.

In reality, Bernhardt was afraid of being stereotyped and only remembered for her role as La Dame aux Camélias, aka “Camille.” Her desire to risk doing Hamlet may have been one way of rebelling against this. It would have been good if Rebeck had trusted the original direction in which her play was going, as much as Bernhardt trusted the direction her Hamlet was going.

However, the acting alone makes it an experience worth having.

Performances of “Bernhardt/Hamlet” start at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, and 1:30 p.m. Sundays, through Sept. 10, at Collaborative Theatre Project, 555 Medford Center, Medford. Tickets are $35, $28 for seniors and students; group rates are available. Tickets and information are available at ctpmedford.org or by calling the box office at 541-779-1055.