Tag Archives: Maurice Chevalier

Harry Cahill

Harry Cahill was a multi-talented American dancer, female impersonator, singer and composer who became a popular and well-known figure in Paris during the 1920s and because of his achievements was once described as ‘a type of product of the Jazz Age.’

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The Costume Designer Zig

The costume designer Zig was the pen-name of one of the great artists  for the Paris music hall in the Jazz Age. Prolific as an illustrator, creating artwork for posters, programme covers and sheet music, Zig also created stunning sets and costumes with a tremendous flair and originality from the mid to late 1920s and early 1930s, before dying at an early age in 1936. He must not to be confused with another illustrator called Zig Brunner.

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Les Acacias, Night-Club, Paris

The Acacias night-club was a hall at the rear of the Hotel Acacias sited at 47 Rue des Acacias near the Bois de Bologne with a garden utilized for the summer. It was one of the many night-resorts in Paris in the Jazz Age that became a favoured rendezvous of high society throughout the 1920s. The roster of performers who appeared at Les Acacias was astonishing, providing a veritable Who’s Who of glittering international stars of stage and cabaret.

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The Elegance of Roseray and Capella

The Elegance of Roseray and Capella

Roseray and Capella were one of the most famous French dancing acts of the Jazz Age. Not only were they accomplished acrobatic and adagio dancers but they were also extremely elegant and beautiful if somewhat audacious in terms of the brevity of their costuming which some thought rather salacious. Indeed, if the gossip about them being mother and son were true, it was an extraordinary act.

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Cafe des Ambassadeurs

Cafe des Ambassadeurs

The Café des Ambassadeurs was one of most fashionable and best-known summer venues in Paris situated on the Avenue Gabriel at the entrance to the Champs-Elysées near the Place de la Concorde. Named after the nearby Hotel Crillon that had become the residence of foreign ambassadors, it was founded in 1764 as a simple open air bar, a small pavilion was added in 1772 and it evolved into one of the most famous of the Parisian café concerts.

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Charles Gesmar

Charles Gesmar by Angelo Luerti

Charles Ges(i)mar, simply known as Gesmar, was one of the greatest designers of costumes and posters during the golden age of the Paris music hall during the Jazz Age and was primarily renowned for his work for the great Parisian star Mistinguett. Although his tenure was short, his output was prolific and his creativity and talent unrivalled.

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Miss Florence

Miss Florence

The stunningly beautiful and dark haired ‘Miss Florence’ startled Parisian audiences as a member of the Gertrude Hoffman troupe in 1924 when she came on stage on an elephant as the Queen of Sheba. She became a popular celebrity in her own right, before teaming with Julio Avarez in a dancing partnership that proved highly successful mainly in New York and Miami cabarets in the 1930s.

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Clifford Fischer

Clifford C. Fischer, the originator of the French Casino Project

One of the most picturesque figures in show business, Clifford C. Fischer was an internationally distinquished booking agent and producer who really made a name for himself staging spectacular stage shows as part of the French Casino theatre-restaurant project in the mid 1930s.

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Dancing Dora Duby

Dancing Dora Duby

The dark, glamorous and exotic sounding Dora Duby was an outstanding American solo dancer who found fame in Europe during the 1920s particularly in Paris where she was called the ‘Pet star’ of the famous Le Perroquet cabaret.

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