It was Sarah Bernhardt who arguably first truly rinsed it for its fame-stoking, headline-winning potential. She wasn’t the first woman to play it, but the French actress was well-aware of the fuss gender-blind casting would cause in 1899. It was “the most controversial move of all her ventures” according to Robert Gottlieb, the former New Yorker editor who wrote a biography of her in 2010. Bernhardt would make celluloid history in the part in 1900, too – rather gratifyingly, the first Hamlet on film was a woman.

But then, Bernhardt was not just any woman – she was the most famous actress in the world. And frankly, the field of her “controversial” ventures is a pretty crowded one.

- The most painted woman in the world

- The wide-eyed poster girl for the swinging 60s

- Australia’s ‘million-dollar mermaid’

The illegitimate daughter of a Jewish prostitute, she first achieved notoriety while still a teenager: she lost her first job with the prestigious Comédie-Française theatre, after refusing to apologise for slapping its star (the older actress had shoved Bernhardt’s little sister into a marble pillar for accidentally treading on her costume). Such ferocity in the face of perceived injustice would never be checked: later in life, Bernhardt also hit the headlines for chasing a fellow actress with a whip, furious about the scandalous biography she’d penned.