fashion in personal adornment, crowds mark her progress on the street, and large audiences assemble to see her." de Mérode responded to the criticism by saying, "The papers stated that I was a failure, but they lied. I pleased the Americans vastly. The papers pretended that I danced badly, as if Americans could tell. They know nothing about dancing and don't like ballets." Despite the letdown, de Mérode made over forty times her regular monthly Parisian salary, which drew criticism, resulting in de Mérode being dismissed as an "article de Paris" – alluring, but worthless. In 1898, de Mérode was awarded first prize at a exhibit of the New York Camera Club as being the most beautiful woman in Paris. In 1900, she caused a sensation at the Exposition Universelle with her fake Cambodian dance. She also appeared in two films, one of which was hand-tinted in color; both showed her dancing. At the height of her popularity, she chose to dance at the Folies Bergère in a three-act pantomime titled Lorenza, taking the risk to do something other elites of the ballet had never done before. Her performance gained her a new following, and her popularity further increased. In 1902, de Mérode performed at the Alhambra in London, where her performance was not well received. In contrast, she was popular in Sweden, visiting there in 1903 and 1904. In 1904, she reprised her role as Phryne at the Olympia. In 1906, it was reported that 50,000,000 photographs of de Mérode had been sold and that a single Berlin firm produced 4,000,000 a year. The following year, Everybody's Magazine compared her to the Virgin Mary. Jean Cocteau wrote of her, "She is the beauty of beauty, the virgin who is not, the Pre-Raphaelite lady who walks with downcast eyes through groups [...] The profile of Cléo is so graceful, so divine that the cartoonists break it." In 1912, de Mérode appeared in the opera La Danseuse de Pompeii as part of the corps de ballet at the Opéra-Comique. The following year in late June, she appeared in the revue Come Over Here at the London Opera House. During World War I, she entertained wounded soldiers. She continued to dance until her late forties; Rupert Doone's partnering of de Mérode in a 1924 social dance recital reportedly inspired Frederick Ashton to pursue a career in dance. Despite a successful comeback, de