Josephine Earle was an American actress who made a name for herself at Vitagraph in a series of Vamp movie roles from 1915. She then made herself thoroughly at home in England during the 1920s appearing in British silent films, legitimate stage shows and cabaret.

A portrait of Josephine Earle

She was born in Columbia Heights, Brooklyn on 23rd February 1892 near the spot where the Pilgrim Fathers are said to have made their first settlement. Her real name was Josephine MacEwan (sometimes listed as McEwan) and she was of Scottish descent. At an early age she told her friends that she would make a good actress. They laughed at her so she got herself an engagement to prove them wrong and became the Beauty in Henry W. Savage’s production of Everywoman (1911-1912) staged in New York and, with her soprano voice, played a season singing the prima donna roles in Gilbert and Sullivan operas.

Thereafter she drifted into film and became a featured player for the Vitagraph Film Company from 1915-1917. She described her roles ‘everybody in the company had to play whatever was on the programme for that day. One day it might be a vampire role in a feature drama and on the following day the unhappy wife in a domestic drama or a slapstick comedy character.’ At one point she did say ‘I prefer cinema acting to the stage.’ Despite her vampire roles she was thought of as a loveable and charming person with red gold hair, blue eyes and although she spoke with an American expression there was a hint of an accent that betrayed her Scottish blood.

In late 1917 she accepted an invitation from J.L. Sacks to go to England and appear in the stage production of Lilac Domino. After a very stormy passage she arrived mid December with bombs dropping on London ‘I was really surprised when I arrived to find London was not nearly so black as it was painted in New York.’

The British version of the operatta Lilac Domino was presented in London, with revised dialogue by S. J. Adair Fitzgerald, opening at the Empire Theatre on 21st February 1918 and running there until 27th September 1919. After a brief break, the production transferred to the Palace Theatre in October 1919. The piece ran for a total of 747 performances, closing on December 13, 1919, an extraordinarily long run at that time. Josephine played the part of Leonie Forde along with R. Stuart Pigott, Vincent Sullivan, Frank Lalor, Edwin Wilson, Jamieson Dodds, Dallas Anderson, Clara Butterworth and Andrée Corda.

Josephine Earle in Lilac Domino

During the run of the Lilac Domino, in 1917, she met and then married Captain James Alpheus Glen in September 1918 at Newport, on the Isle of Wight. Glen was a Canadian air force pilot who flew with the RAF during the First World War. He was born in 1890 on a farm near Turtle Mountain, Manitoba and attended high school in Enderby, British Columbia. He joined the Royal Naval Air Service in 1915. Flying the Sopwith Pup, he became an ace during the summer of 1917 but was ill in August and went home to Canada to recuperate. In January 1918, he returned to active duty, scoring nine more victories with the Sopwith Camel. Strangely, for whatever reason, Josephine kept her marriage a secret for two years and it was finally revealed in the summer of 1920.

At some point in mid 1919, she was snapped up by the Gaumont Film Company that was revitalizing its film production after a post war lull and the departure of their prime director George Pearson. Run by the Bromhead brothers it was established in 1898 focused on distribution and renting from the French company but later went into film production with a studio at Shepherds Bush and Lime Grove. In early 1919 they engaged two new directors Will Kellino, a former circus clown and Captain C.C. Calvert and two brands of film – Westminster and British Screencraft were created for the two directors.

Although described by Rachael Low as ‘a sophisticated former Vitagraph star, now fading a little’ Josephine, playing the part of Countess de la Merthe, was the star of Kellino’s thriller The Fall of the Saint (January 1920) in which she made a point of stressing the importance of being well gowned with sixteen different outfits. She appeared with Gerald Lawrence, H. Heaton Grey and Dallas Anderson (with whom she appeared in Lilac Domino). In October 1920 Bioscope announced ‘Josephine Earle has, I hear, the honour of being the first British screen actress to be announced in electric lights in the theatrical centre of New York. The Fall of a Saint, in which she plays lead, commenced its run at the New York Theatre on September 13th.’

Josephine Earle from one of her early British movies, 1920

Next, she appeared in four Calvert films in the British Screencraft series: Walls of Prejudice/Break Down the Walls (April 1920) with Dallas Anderson Pat Somerset, Cecil du Gue and Zoe Palmer; The Edge of Youth (June 1920) with Dallas Anderson, Cecile du Gue and George Bellamy; Branded (September 1920) with Dallas Anderson, Nora Swinburne and Francis Lister and The Way of the Man (January 1921) with Cecil du Gue, Lewis Dayton, Philip Anthony, George Bellamy and Cyril Smith.

In the summer of 1920, when her marriage to Captain Glen was announced, it was also revealed that he was to return to Canada on a three-year visit to help in the establishment of the Canadian Air Force, although subsequently, he hoped to settle permanently in England.

That autumn along with Walter Passmore, George Hassall, Fred Tooze, David Miller, Aimee Bebb and Hilda Guiver, Josephine appeared for three weeks in the touring production of The Purple Lady opening 18th October at the Grand, Blackpool and then visiting Bournemouth and the Royal Brighton. It was muted to then appear in a West End theatre but seemingly this did not happen.

Eventually Josephine and Captain Glen left the UK for Canada in January 1921 arriving in St John Brunswick, but her stay in Canada did not last long and she returned to England nine months later departing Montreal, Quebec and arriving in Liverpool 22nd October 1921. The marriage did not last.

Josephine was swift of the mark and seemingly gained an engagement at Ciro’s, one of London’s leading nightspots, where as part of her performance she gave a sort of monologue called The Language of the Fan. Later, the Stage would comment ‘Jo Earle was one of the very first, first class artists to go into cabaret and the first to introduce the much copied big fan.’ Her act was so popular that Gaumont filmed her for their popular Around the Town serial released in January 1922, where she showed some beautiful fans and did a Spanish dance.

At about the same time she appeared in the short lived Albert de Courville show Put and Take, a gesture to a popular game of the time. Originally staged as Fantasia at the Queens Theatre on 1st December 1921, it was abandoned after a few days and after quick rehearsals Put and Take replaced it as a disconnected vaudeville entertainment with Anita Elson, Jack Morrison, Charles Brooks, Mary Brough (a fine comedienne), Rebla and the Palace Girls. Josephine had one of the prettiest songs in the production called April Showers. But even the new line up did not work and the show closed after merely twenty performances.

In mid February 1922, Josephine joined forces with the well-known author and composer Arthur Klein and made her vaudeville debut at the Glasgow Pavilion, which then toured the provinces and London venues. Their little ‘drawing room act’ with pleasant duets, featuring new songs by Klein, found much favour. Josephine’s voice was described as ‘a dainty and pleasing, if scarcely ‘big’ soprano’ opened the proceedings with a clever rendering of ‘All By Myself’. She then sang a snappy little new number by Klein called ‘Not Tonight Josephine’ and finished on the melodious waltz time number ‘Love’s a Game of Chance’ all accompanied by Klein at the piano.

In the autumn of 1922, she stepped into the new, spectacular and ambitious cabaret show at Murray’s nightclub in Beak Street. With eight numbers staged at dinner and supper, Josephine starred with the American dancer Hazel Shelley, Ernest Marini and a chorus of ten. Josephine sang several songs and danced with Marini, with specialty dancing from Shelley. It was a huge hit and rivaled the success of other shows at the Hotel Metropole and the Queens Hall Roof.

Her successes in cabaret and vaudeville prompted a visit to Paris and she joined forces with the famous Trix Sisters. In early February The Trix Sisters Blues Room opened on the first floor of the legendary establishment of the Abbaye de Theleme in the Place Pigalle and Josephine appeared with the Trix Sisters, Flora Lea and Simonne Mirat.

Josephine Earle (on the right) with Betty Compson (on the left) in Woman to Woman (1923)

Back in London she signed a two-picture deal with G.B. Samuelson and appeared with Lillian Hall-Davis, Rex Davis, Tom Reynolds, Julian Royce and Mickey Brantford in Alexander Butler’s The Knockout (June 1923) and Fred Paul’s The Hotel Mouse (July 1923) with Lillian Hall-Davis, Campbell Gullan, Warwick Ward and Morgan Wallace. But her piece de resistance was filmed in the summer of 1923. Graham Cutts’ Woman to Woman (November 1923) has been regarded as one of the most important movies from the British silent era but sadly lost. Based on the Michael Morton play and starring the American star Betty Compson in the lead it became a smash hit with Josephine in a supporting role as Mrs. Anson-Pond along with Clive Brook, Henry Vibart and Marie Ault.

In October 1923 Josephine was added to the cast of the successful C.B. Cochran musical Little Nellie Kelly. George M. Cohan’s song and dance show had been premiered at the New Oxford Theatre on 2nd July 1923 and starred Sonnie Hale, June, Maidie Hope and Anita Elson with specialty dances from The Forde Sisters, Terri Storey and Santry and Norton, with dances by Edward Dolly.

Given that Josephine had been described as being one of Britain’s best-dressed movie stars it is no surprise that she opened her own couture establishment in Savile row in October 1923. ‘What pluck to invade the quarter sacred to tailors’ exclaimed The Era before describing her collection as ‘being suitable for the average woman and I noticed many new ideas on them.’  The walls of her rooms were painted white and had vivid wooden silhouettes hung with tassels instead of pictures and glowing incense burners. Her first mannequin display was accompanied by a Hawaiian musician hung with garlands playing the ukele. Marion Forde (one of the actresses from Little Nellie Kelly) acted as one of her mannequins.

Her success was confirmed when the costume designer Dolly Tree (who had dressed her in Woman to Woman) used her services to create all her modern gowns in the stage productions of Leap Year at the London Hippodrome in the spring of 1924 and The Punch Bowl at the Duke of Yorks Theatre also in 1924.

Her next known credit was in the Grafton Galleries cabaret called Hello Grafton that then became Dolly’s Revels staged by Edward Dolly and dressed by Dolly Tree that ran from the summer through the autumn of 1924. She was one of the principals along with the dancer and singer Edna May, Fayette Perry, Doris Bransgove and Tom O’Connor and her song ‘What’ll I do? Was greatly admired.

In the early part of 1925, Josephine was cast in William J. Wilson’s production of Sometime at the Vaudeville. A musical comedy in two acts and 7 scenes she played Phyllis Grey and sang more songs in support of the leading lady Desiree Ellinger and the comedian Frank Tinney.

With no more film roles and fewer stage and cabaret roles over the next few years she slipped form view with the exception of a stint at the Mirador nightspot in Paris (35 Rue Pigalle) in January 1926 opening and the Imperial cabaret also in Paris in November 1926. At some point she also returned to America because she arrived in Southampton aboard Tuscania from New York on 18th October 1927.

A year later in October 1928, the Stage was curious about her absence from London ‘on many occasions during this last two or three years I have been asked ‘Where is Jo Earle?’ and I have always been unable to answer. I have asked the same question myself and have had a variety of replies from which I have gathered that she was playing in America, running a cabaret in Paris, a nightclub in Berlin or something or other in Vienna. But she is now back in London and has been spending the greater part of the last years back in America and has not been running nightclubs in any city.’

It was noted that ‘with neither her voice nor her appearance impaired’ she was about to reappear in London both in theatre and cabaret and perhaps a projected film production after seasons in New York, Berlin and Paris. The cabaret turned out to be at Nunky’s, a club at 177 Regent Street that had opened at the end of 1928, where she was the leading player from December 1928 for several months. She was described as ‘an artist of exceptional experience for cabaret’ who had run a West end dressmaking establishment, a beauty parlour and was an expert cocktail maker.

Although a theatre engagement did not materialize two film parts did. She played the rich mother of a young man (Harry Lorraine) in A.E. Coleby’s war time drama Unto Each Other (International Cinema January 1930) ‘a part requiring little but sitting either in smiles or tears and wearing smart clothes and jewellery.’  It was thought to have a hackneyed theme, showed little imagination and had poor continuity. She fared better in the cast of the Walter Summers Raise the Roof (BIP February 1930) with Betty Balfour that was a big success and regarded as the first sound British movie musical.

There were no more stage or screen appearances. In September 1932 she married John T. Matthews in Hanover Square, London and at some point moved to Stratford Upon Avon where, with her husband (Mr Matthews or a new husband) she bred Alsatians and opened a flower shop in Sheep Street and Henley Street. But after her husband died she could not cope and became an alcoholic. On 23rd April 1961 she had finished arranging the flower orders for Shakespeare’s birthday but became ill and died 26th April 1961.

Murray’s Night Club in Beak Street, London was opened in late 1913 by Jack Mays, an American and Ernest A. Cordell, an Englishman. It was part of the cabaret boom inspired by the tango craze that had been sweeping Europe and the USA and emerged at the same time as other venues such as the 400 Club the Lotus and slightly later the Cosmopolitan, the Tabarin, Macfarlane’s and The Cave of the Golden Calf.

Sketch of the interior of Murray's nightclub, London

Not much is known about Jack Mays other than he came from Chicago and had been involved in the nightclub business there but why he moved to London is anyone’s guess. Although he became an influential figure in London nightlife, he seemingly kept himself to himself. For some he was unpalatable. He was described by one person as ‘a very bad fellow’ and ‘for vice or money or both he induces girls to smoke opium in some foul place. He….. does a good deal of harm.’ To others he was a godsend, a pioneer of night-time entertainment in London, ‘a restless genius’ and ‘a popular and amusing character.’

Murray’s club stood on the site of the old Blanchard’s restaurant, formerly a famous coaching house constructed in the 1860s or early 70s. The entrance on Beak Street described as having a ‘severe frontage reminiscent of a bank or an office’ opened onto a hall out of which was a restaurant and thereafter a stairway led down to the main ballroom and dance floor below. This was a vast impressive room with a high ceiling; large chandeliers and the walls featured wood panels up half the walls. On one side was the dance area and on the other pillars to one side interspersed with tables and chairs. There was a great kitchen that catered for in excess of 400 diners, and behind the stage where the band played were dressing rooms for the entertainers.

At the outset Murray’s like so many of the other ‘nightclubs’ was predominately a members only club where people could meet, mingle, eat, drink and dance. There were always dancing acts as entertainment, and in 1914 for example, Marquis and Miss Clayton were appearing regularly at the Savoy, Murray’s, the 400 and the Lotus where they mostly demonstrated the Tango. By 1915 Arthur Mirador was the featured dancer at Murray’s.

The entrance to Murray's nightclub

Jack Mays set the tone for the growth of the ‘thé dansant’, which became a very fashionable accompaniment to the vogue of the Tango and staged successfully at Murray’s for a while. But as the novelty began to wear a little thin he introduced the idea of the ‘Super Tango Tea’ in April 1914. It was nothing more than a re-branding exercise but with the added bonus of a mini show. Firstly there were a series of tableaux featuring Chinese ladies in ‘Precious Pearl’ and ‘the Earthly Paradise’ with dances and music, followed by a series of Venetian Furlana dances. Next, an exhibition of the Hesitation, Valse, Maxixe and the Tango and finally a mannequin parade showing the latest Paris fashions. His strategy certainly succeeded and enthralled and re-vitalised London’s jaded seekers of amusement.

Despite the outbreak of war most of the nightclubs carried on, although many closed. Murray’s endured and opened every afternoon for dancing from 4.30-7pm and in the evening, from 11pm. Jack May also opened a summer venue at Maidenhead that became hugely popular.

The interior of Murray's nightclub

After the war Murray’s continued to be one of London’s major venues and was regarded as ‘the hub of the English dancing world where new dances and new steps are tested by the best dancers in town…. It is a most pleasing place, artistic decorations, good things to eat and drink, a song or two, pleasing music and good dancing on an excellent floor.’

Not only was it a favoured place for dancing in the evening but also it was always busy in the afternoon for the thé dansant. A new Ozonair system had been installed throughout the building keeping the air fresh and pure and perfect for the dancers especially in the heat of the summer, which enabled summer opening (in the past the venue closed in the summer).

Then in late 1920 Mays imitated New York’s roof garden cabarets and introduced a cabaret show (it was not the first since the American Jack Haskell had staged a cabaret show at Ciro’s in 1917). The show was called Murray’s Frolics, featured the dancers Marjorie Moss and George Fontana and a young Gertrude Lawrence was one of the girls in the chorus.

By the spring of 1921 the show starred the dancers Ivy Collette and Marcel Breton with the Broadway Sextette band. Breton had studied dancing with Mde Astafieva and Collette was making her debut as a professional dancer but had been a prominent member of the Gaiety Company. George Fontana coached both.

The stars of the cabaret show at Murray's in 1922

In September 1922 a bigger and more ambitious show with eight numbers was staged at dinner and supper featuring the American actress Josephine Earle, the American dancer Hazel Shelley, Ernest Marini and a chorus of ten. Earle sang several songs and danced with Marini, with specialty dancing from Shelley. The chorus in one scene was dressed in costumes representing powder boxes with abundant fluffy underthings and in another they wore Hawaiian costume. These Hawaiian dresses bear an uncanny resemblance to the dresses designed by Dolly Tree and worn by the chorus accompanying Dorothy Dickson in her Hawaiian ‘Ka-Lu-a’ song from The Cabaret Girl, which was running at the time.

Sheridan Morley in his autobiography of Gertrude Lawrence described how Murray’s club provided ‘its upper-crust customers with the best floorshow in town, a carefully choreographed all-singing, all dancing extravaganza, a miniaturized version of one of the Cochran or Chariot revues. Its overriding attraction was that you could eat and drink, maybe even talk during the entertainment.’ In the autumn of 1922, Murray’s had become the talk of London with its sparkling song and dance show, which The Tatler described as ‘a very excellent revue-cum-cabaret entertainment.’

During the winter of 1922-1923, the club was closed and renovated and re-opened with its old name Blanchard’s. A new floor was installed and placed in the middle of the room not to the side as before. Once again the venue was to be open for tea and theatre dinners but dancing would not commence until 11pm and a new cabaret called The Midnight Revue was staged at midnight. This show, launched in the spring of 1923, featured Edith Baird’s Snapshots in two scenes, the first a gypsy camp with a chorus dressed as gypsies and the second featuring a range of dances including the Tarantelle and Pas de Valse.

In April 1923 it was announced that Harry Day, who controlled the revue productions at the Palladium, would be responsible for all the entertainments to be staged at Murray’s Club for the next 2 years. Seemingly, Day used condensed versions of his Palladium revues such as Rockets, Crystals and Radio’s for the cabaret. His first show titled Harry Day’s Crystal Cabaret was launched in mid April 1923. This was thought to be the first time that a full company of 50 performers had been seen in a dance club. The cast included the Royal North Octette, the Crystal dancing Belles and Douglas Byng. Day’s designer for his revues had been George Criscudo and in all probability he was also engaged to design the costumes at Murray’s. At the time Criscudo had designed the costumes for Pierre Lander’s cabaret show Brighter London Silver Cabaret, which was first staged at the Bedford Music Hall in March 1923, before appearing at leading vaudeville houses on the various circuits.

By May 1923 the show had become Rockets with Hilda Newsome, Levoi and Moran and the rocket dancers and thereafter in the summer a range of exhibition dancers featured. By October Murray’s was featuring the sensational exhibition dancers Quentin Todd and Vera Dent. The latter wore some delicious frocks including a panniered affair of shot gold and orange tinsel in which she did a Spanish dance and a jolly little long waisted, full skirted yellow georgette with flat velvet flowers.

Tw of the showgirls from the 1922 cabaret show at Murray's nightclub

In April 1924 it was announced that Jack May had sold Blanchard’s to London Restaurants Ltd, who already owned the popular Florence and Romano restaurants but retained his interest in Murray’s River Club Maidenhead. The place closed for a short while and was completely re-decorated and new, comfortable, well-padded settees surrounding the tables were added. Concealed lighting in attractive tabular shades of rainbow hues shone out from wide panels set against the walls like pictures in the palest pink with touches of green and yellow. The new cabaret show was called The Midnight Revue and the chorus girls in one number wore abbreviated frocks of silver tissue adorned with diamonds of black velvet with silver wigs. The stars of the show were the British dancing team of Claire Divina and Lawrence Charles who demonstrated their clever slow motion acrobatic dancing.

Murray’s or Blanchard’s continued to be popular and regularly staged new cabaret acts. In October 1924 the dancers Haroun and Yasmin featured and in March 1925 a new show was staged by Albert de Courville called Faites Vos Jeux direct from the Capitol Restaurant, Monte Carlo. In late 1925 acts were seemingly changed weekly, and for example, one week there was the juggler Harry Adams with the acrobatic balancing of Austel and Arthur followed the next week by the dance music of Sissle and Blake and dancers Carr and Parr.

The delightful surroundings were described as congenial with the wide and spacious staircase richly carpeted, the long and elegantly appointed dining and dance hall attractively decorated in brown, silver and grey and charmingly illuminated by scores of lights concealed beneath pink shades of tasteful design and long variegated coloured glass tubes. Mirrored panels were inset into the walls whilst mirrored columns supported the lofty ceiling.

By early 1926 the management of Murray’s appear to have expanded their activities and controlled the Cabaret Club and all cabaret artists appeared at both venues. In March the show was called the Midnight Merriments and included the dancers Renee and Godfrey, Iris Whyte, the juggler Eddie Gray and the singing and dancing of Edwin Henderson. By June the management also opened the Palermo Club with a show starring the hugely popular black singers Layton and Johnston and at some point they also took on the Cosmo Club. The cabaret at Murray’s was described as ‘…one of the best often reminiscent of a good music hall bill’ with acrobats, jugglers, ventriloquists, whistlers, mimics and dancers. Since at the time Jack May was described as Managing Director of the Cosmo Club, one wonders if he had bought back his interest in Murray’s.

Through 1927 and 1928, the short-lived cabaret scene was dipping through a slump, perhaps because after five years of fun and frolics the novelty value was fading. Some cabarets closed like the famous Midnight Follies at the Hotel Metropole, while others removed the ornate productions and chorus girls and simply staged one or two acts.

Programme cover for Murray's Cabaret Club, date uncertain but possibly from 40s or 50s

Murray’s continued its activities with a simpler format and in late 1927 the dancing duo of Graham and Barbara drew crowds, as did Deslys and Clark in April 1928. By early 1928 the entertainment was ‘very near variety as can be found and almost a high class modern twice nightly music hall bill’ and featured the Mizuni Trio of jugglers and equilibrists, the Roy Sisters in song and dance and the trio of speciality dancers Tom Fagen, Metrini and Leslie.

By March 1928 Murray’s was featuring Vladimir Zaaloff’s Russian Strolling Players in Balagantschina which was a sort of miniature Chauve Souris but without the announcer. Strikingly original, there were various musical numbers such as Outside a Russian Tavern, Nightingale and In Old Russia, along with the Roxana sisters in a comic polka and marionette dance.

Then in late 1928, Murray’s decided to return to full production with other venues promising to follow suit. At first Douglas Lyle and Ernest Cordell staged a mini-revue for the motor show week at midnight with Les Germains, Rallis Duo, Mai and Dorina, Faun and Fell and Whispering Band playing dance music until 2am. Then in early November Martin Adeson Junior launched Murray’s Frolics, a new show to be staged twice nightly at 10 and midnight with no American or Contintental stars and no-one with a big name. It did have the eight Duncan girls, Adeson, Cecily Compton, Quennie Pickford and Bruce Carfax in half a dozen musical numbers including a big number which was a revival of old time songs. The programme of acts changed weekly and the Frolics continued through the early part of 1929.

Al Tabor and his band (following a season of over 3 years at the Hammersmith Palais de Danse) with a supporting cabaret of the Honolulu Trio, Zelda and John Juan (Australian dancers) and the dancer Alma Mackie opened for a season in March 1928.

However, the cabaret scene was still not good and by the spring of 1929 there were only six nightclubs and three ‘bohemian’ clubs left in the whole of London. Despite this Murray’s kept going. Sadly, in February 1930 it was reported that Jack May (one of the oldest nightclub operators in London) was being deported by the home office to America. This was seen as rather drastic action given that he had operated his establishments circumspectly. Why this action was taken, where Mays ended up and what happened to him is not known. By October 1932, ownership of Murray’s had passed to Beaumont Alexander, who had previous run the New Princes Hotel and Cabaret.

One presumes that Murray’s Club endured and was the same Murray’s that flourished under Percival Murray and his son David through the 30s, 40s, 50s and 60s finally closing its doors in 1975.

One of the earliest ground breaking British silent films from Herbert Wilcox and Graham Cutts was The Flames of Passion starring the American actress Mae Marsh and a solid British cast.

Herbert Wilcox formed the production company of Graham-Wilcox with the director Graham Cutts in late 1921 or early 1922.  Cutts had already made Cocaine, which, because of its rather provocative and sensational title and thus censorship issues, was re-titled While London Sleeps and was given a trade show in July 1922. His next film, The Wonderful Story, was trade shown in May 1922 under the new company.

Eva Morre (left) and Mae Marsh (right) in a scene from The Flames of Passion

For their next project  – Flames of Passion – Graham-Wilcox productions took a lease on the whole of the huge and vacant Famous Players Lasky studio at Islington and agreed to import the American actress Mae Marsh as the lead. Mae Marsh (in real life Mrs Mary Arms) was a D.W. Griffith star of such films as Intolerance and The White Rose and arrived in Southampon with her husband Louis and child Mary aboard Mauretania from New York 3rd July 1922. At Waterloo she was greeted with huge crowds estimated to be in the region of 100,000. Filming began in earnest thereafter at the height of the summer.

Cutts said he was going to make Flames of Passion as lavish as The Wonderful Story was simple with a budget of £45,000. He made it clear that the all star cast had been chosen after a lot of consideration and only when they felt sure that the artists were entirely suited to the parts selected for them. ‘Cutts is a firm believer in the policy that it pays to engage artistes first and foremost for their suitability to portray a given role. Should they possess names which are of value to the box office in addition so much the better. A name alone would not induce Cutts to engage an artist.’

Needless to say Mae Marsh’s name was a huge asset and Pictures and Picturegoer observed that ‘the cast consists of both British and American artistes which is in pursuance of the new idea of blending the talent of both countries in order to arouse international interest in the picture.’

The film was based on an original story especially written for the screen by Herbert Wilcox and his wife and was described as powerful, dramatic and with a universal appeal. However, it was a lurid tale in essence about baby murder reflecting high and low life.

Dorothy Forbes  (Mae Marsh) was the daughter of John Forbes (Allan Aynesworth), a wealthy man but was neglected. When she arrived home from school she found herself left to her own resources. She became friendly with her father’s chauffeur Henry Watson (Herbert Langley). But things go too far and they became far too intimately connected and eventually she found out that she was pregnant. She confided in her practical and worldy wise aunt (Eva Moore) who managed to make arrangements to keep the birth of the baby secret. Dorothy retires to the country for the birth of the child. It is put out to nurse and she returns home. She pines for the baby and it is brought from its original foster parents.

Henry Watson, the chauffeur (Herbert Langley) bullying his wife Kate (Hilda Bayley) in The Flames of Passion

Meantime, the chauffeur is still besotted with Dorothy. He sinks considerably lower and spent his spare time bullying his wife Kate (Hilda Bayley) and getting drunk and he is dismissed as the chauffeur. His wife begs that he be reinstated but the request is refused. However, the aunt gives her the child to look after saying it belongs to some friends of hers who have gone to India. Meanwhile, Richard Hawke (C. Aubrey Smith), a famous barrister falls in love with Dorothy Forbes and marries her. She keeps her secret to herself. In a drunken fit the chauffeur kills the child not knowing that it was his. The barrister, Richard Hawke, is counsel for the prosecution and his wife in an agony of fear that he will find out or that the murderer will escape, confesses all. He then calls her as a witness to prove the motive for the murder. He forgives his wife but gives up his career. The last scene shows the couple in a rural retreat, happy in their love and family.

Other cast members included George K. Arthur (Arthur Watson),  G. Henry Vibart (Lord Chief Justice), A.G. Poulton (Council for the Defence) plus, Alban Atwood, Harry J. Worth and Tony Fraser. Cutts was assisted by Robert Cullen, Norman Arnold was the art director and C. Macdonnell the photographer.

Exterior shots took place at Goodwood, Henley, Maidenhead, Cowes and other society rendezvous, and the two major interior scenes took place in a ballroom and the Old Bailey. At the finale and the ballroom scene, the film burst into colour – described as Prizma colour – similar to the other films made in the same year by John Stuart Blackton.

All the gowns for Mae Marsh, and possibly the other leading ladies, were created especially by Lucile, the world famous couturier. Mae Marsh explained  ‘I always have my clothes made at Lucile’s in New York, they understand my personality and now they are just as charming here.’  She had between 20-25 costume changes and had to endure countless hours in dress fitting operations at Lucile’s establishment.

Eva Moore (left) and Mae Marsh (right) in The Flames of Passion

Overall, it was highly regarded by the trade press for staging, direction and acting. Motion Picture Studio described it as an ‘excellent production’, Kineweekly thought it ‘was undoubtedly the most ambitious and successful British picture attempted and is quite comparable with any foreign standard’ and Variety ‘a capital entertainment’ that would become ‘exceedingly popular.’ Although Variety thought that the production was masterly and the photography brilliant, it did not approach ‘the art or value of the same producers The Wonderful Story.’

Pictures and Picturegoer  wrote ‘although one realizes that the film is only holding up a mirror to the shadier side of life, it has much of the gripping power that is inspired by a real murder trail…There are lighter moment in the film which help forget the somewhat gloomy nature of the story.’

There was severe criticism of the story that was regarded as slight and thin, not particular strong and rather unpleasant. Kineweekly thought it crude and sordid with more than a touch of melodrama and full of improbabilities and implausible plotlines. ‘It has so many unconvincing turns to the plot that it loses interest as a story and only holds the attention by the excellence of the acting’ and added ‘it is a pity that the skill and care bestowed on the picture could not have been given a worthier object that the story chosen.’  Variety thought it an ‘ordinary story and by no means strong enough but the subject is well and carefully handled.’

The exteriors and interiors were highly praised especially the replica of the Old Bailey which Kineweekly thought was  ‘outstanding’ and  Picturegoer thought that it reflected ‘a wealth of grim realism.’ But the fancy dress ball in the ballroom scene was criticized by the attempt to colourise it as it distorted the beauty of the scene that contained a slightly incongruent ballet sequence staged by Miss Purcell, a celebrated terpsichorean instructress,

There were glowing comments about the acting with one or two slight reservations. Mae Marsh was admired for acting with feeling and a real sense of what was required. In her ingenue scenes as a light, frivolous girl she was unapproachable but there were doubts about her keeping up to the standard in the heavier scenes. Hilda Bayley had an exceedingly difficult part but acquited herself admirably. She evidenced sympathetic insight into the character and her performance had finesse which made it a pleasure to behold.  Herbert Langley was a little too heavy in his bad man part but his performance was polished and Eva Moore played the aunt with all her usual grace and charm.

The Old Bailey scene in The Flames of Passion

Toward the end of August 1922, a farewell dinner was held at the Criterion Restaurant where Mae Marsh was the guest of honour. During the evening Herbert Wilcox announced that he had purchased the film rights of Paddy the Next Best Thing and everyone agreed that Mae Marsh would be ideal as Paddy.  She left Southampton aboard Olympic and arrived in back in New York 30th August 1922.

Flames of Passion was given a premiere at the New Oxford Theatre on10^th November 1922 and was a big success, making a substantial profit especially after it was sold to America.  Wilcox thought that it was the first British film to be sold to the USA after World War 1.

The debut revue from the Julian Wylie and Jas W. Tate organization at the London Hippodrome was The Peepshow launched 14th April 1921. Described as a tropical fantasia it proved to be a runaway success partly because several of the main scenes had already been tried and tested in previous Wylie–Tate productions, and so from the outset, the production was viewed as being polished and well produced.

Programme for The Peepshow

Wylie-Tate had a huge reputation for touring excellent productions in the regions and were already old hands at this popular game before they presented their first West End revue at the Hippodrome. ‘They have only to take some of the most successful items from their touring productions add to them a few novel features, engage some well known artists and lo and behold they have an entertainment ready which is almost certain to be successful.’ These scenes, especially the two big spectacular scenes of the Song Shop and Down Dickens Street, possessed none of the rough edges which most revue scenes had at the beginning since they had already been worked up, elaborated and improved upon after many months of touring.

The company was headed by Mona Vivian, Stanley Lupino, Annie Croft, Reginald Sharland and Fred Allandale and the sixteen original scenes were arranged charmingly as “peeps”. They were all loosely interlinked to form a more cohesive story than was usual in a revue, peppered with all kinds of topical interludes and nostalgic reminiscences of times past that enlivened proceedings. After a short while two scenes were dropped and many of the peeps were change around.

At the start (scene designed by Tom Webster) two American gentlemen George Cricklewood (Stanley Lupino) and Lord Harry Coe (Reginald Sharland) were guests of Professor Duddard (Albert Darnley) and Eslie (Mona Vivian). The professor is carrying out experiments for reaching the moon and the two gentlemen like the idea of chipping off a piece of the moon so agree to fly off in the professor’s newly invented ‘Jules Verne’ giant sky rocket.

On the Moon the two explorers discover it is inhabited by Pierrots and Pierrettes. They are met by the chief Pierrot (Fred Allandale) and his daughter Light O’The Moon (Annie Croft) who explains some of their lunar ways and customs. This was described as ‘a wonderous scene, beautifully and brilliantly devised’ and featured two songs ‘Hello Little Girlie’ and ‘I do Like Being in Love’.

In On the Way Home, Light O’the Moon (Annie Croft) decides to visit earth with the two travelers and is shown some of the interesting sights from the past and the present and finally falls in love with one of the young men. However, on the downward trip the rocket meets with a mishap and the party are plunged in the sea off Scotland where they find themselves in the Fourth Peep in the Castle McBluff The Castle is occupied by a wealthy and practical American played by Fred Allandale who is wanting to collect the mountain dew at its source and with a gathering of the clans there is a Pageant of Bonnie Scotland with a number of nice girls in kilts and the visible romance of Scotland. Mona Vivian sang ‘The Kiltie Brigade’ and Annie Croft sang her Flora Macdonald song ‘Prince of my Heart” with the background changing from baronial hall to ocean shore.

After Captain Speckleton’s Lecture, a comic interlude given by Fred Allandale about Arctic exploration was the Song Shop, one of the big spectacular scenes of the show with reminiscences of old time songs. Described as ‘the real scintillating gem’, the Song Shop had been a much favoured scene in Wylie-Tate’s touring revue The Passing Show of 1920 and cleverly conjured up the atmosphere of the music halls of the nineties.

The Song Shop scene from The Peepshow

This scene depicted the window of the publishing house of Francis, Day and Hunter and the principals impersonated former old music hall favourites and sang songs that made each character famous. There was Charles Godfrey singing Hi-tiddly-hi-ti, Charles Coborn with ‘The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte carlo’, Eugene Stratton’s ‘Little Dolly Daydream’, Stanley Lupino as Dan Leno singing ‘Mary Ann’s Refused Me’ and Mona Vivian’s amusing impression of Maggie Duggan singing ‘In Her Hair She Wore a White Camelia’ and another wonderful take on Lottie Collins. The conclusion was a good old time minstrel show with costumes of orange and purple.

One of the costume sketches by Dolly Tree for the Dutch Garden number in The Peepshow

Other scenes included The Strand, Ministry of Waste, Pre-War Land (a nostalgic look at funny pre-war life) and Curing a Cold, Stanley Lupino’s funny scene about all the fussy people who are usually on hand on at these times.

Another big number was My Lady’s Dressing Table, a ballet (taken from the regional revue The Whirl of Today), with the dancing of Ruth French, the Hippodrome Eight (as powder puffs), Annie Croft as My Lady and other representatives of a ladies boudoir including the hand mirror, hairbrush, scent spray, Lip salve, the patch and manicure.

In Holland and A Dutch Garden was Desiree Ellinger singing ‘The Voice’ a fairy-tale legend about a frog turned into a prince when a fair lady kissed it along with the Hippodrome eight as assistants to Mona Vivian in a clog dance and a series of Dutch Festival costumes with inspiration derived from old Dutch prints to get the right effect.

Undoubtedly the most spectacular scene was Down Dickens Street (taken from the regional revue The Follies of 1920) described as ‘one of the most ably conceived items which have been seen in a revue for years.’ 

The Down Dickens Street scene in The Peepshow

A long procession of the best known characters and scenes from the Dickens novels were introduced all in appropriate Victorian costume with the White Hart Inn, Bleak House, Scrooge’s Front Door, the Old Curiosity Shop and Fezziwig’s Store. Notably, Stanley Lupino played Scrooge, Sam Weller and Uriah Heep, Mona Vivian played Oliver Twist, Little Nell and Poor Jo and Annie Croft played Dolly Varden and Nancy.

There was also a Persian Carpet Ballet with Desiree Ellinger as the singer with narghili and turban, Ruth French as the dancer and the Arabian rag sung by Mona Vivian, J. Phillips and Leslie Sarony. The scene was made to look like a vast carpet emporium and the chorus had to look like a huge Persian carpet.

The finale was a simple scene where the two lovers, Annie Croft and Reginald Sharland, make up their minds in the song ‘Find Me Two Dear Eyes’ to go back to the moon.

The reviews were laudatory: The Tatler said ‘unquestionably one of the most remarkable productions of its kind’; The Era ‘brimful and running over with tastefulness, fun and a fancifulness seldom exceeded in the annals of English entertainment’ and The Bystander ‘there are flashes of genius in this revue with its beautiful mounting and agreeably refreshing fun.’

One of the costume sketches by Dolly Tree for the Persian Carpet scene in The Peepshow

Of the costumes and gowns, which were all designed by Dolly Tree, The Stage observed ‘it is staged and dressed with an originality of design and colouring that cannot fail to please those who delight in beautiful things.’

There was equal praise for all the principals but Annie Croft in particular was admired for her charming personality and was regarded as ‘beautiful, dainty and charming of voice.’

By July 1921 there were various changes in the programme with two new features introduced both from America and Renee Reel replaced Mona Vivian. The Weaver Brothers presented a novel musical act appearing in the guise of ‘hayseeds’ and after opening with a typical Southern melody to the accompaniment of the banjo they proceed to extract ‘music’ from a range of artifcacts such as a stable fork adapted as a one string fiddle and then carpenter saws. But the spectacular ‘turn’ was Karyl Norman presenting ‘The Creole Fashion Plate’. This act had already performed in variety elsewhere in England for a short time before landing this plum spot in a London revue. Norman, as a charmingly gowned lady sang an introductory number in a mezzo soprano and then followed with a spirited Spanish number. The audience were hardly prepared for the surprise when Norman took of his wig to reveal ‘a young man with a baritone voice and an ingratiating smile.’ He was in fact one of America’s leading female impersonators following in the delicate footsteps of Julian Eltinge. Further songs followed and Norman’s act was well received and described as ‘finely staged and dressed.’ Indeed, the dressing was so admired that his mother gave a press conference and allowed journalists to inspect the gowns and explained the technicalities of how they were made. But sadly according to a later story ‘he didn’t set the Thames on fire.’

To make way for these additional acts the scenes The Castle of MacBluff, Down Dickens Street and Carpets were deleted but to freshen things up a bit two new scenes – Chickweed’s Garden and The Valley of the Echoes – were added. For the latter, magical changes of costumes, makeup and properties and scenery invented and designed by Adrian V. Samoiloff were introduced. Somewhere within the show was also the Pogo parade with the chorus girls dressed in weird costumes using pogo sticks.

After 421 performances, The Peepshow closed at the Hippodrome on 15th December 1921 to make way for the Christmas pantomime. For the regional run which began in spring 1922 and continued through 1923, the production was completely revised and only comprised 10 peeps many of which did not appear in the original or revised production.

A few years ago a batch of rather delightful costume designs were sold on ebay all drawn, and many signed, by the rather enigmatic Gertrude A. Johnson. But who was she? Since the drawings come from America one can deduce that she was American and the distinctive style of her work, reflecting the prevailing 20s eccentricities, clearly places them in the 1920s.

A sketch by Gertrude A. Johnson

She first surfaces working for Behren’s theatrical costumiers in New York (163 West 48th Street) from 1919 through the early 1920s with another house designer called Marie Breivogel. By 1923 (and at 120 West 48th Street) only Gertrude featured in their advertisements. One show that Behrens helped to costume during this period, along with several other costume houses like Brooks, was Frivolities of 1920 at the 44th Theatre in early 1920, which presumably featured Gertrude Johnson’s designs.

Confirmed theatre credits are sparse but it does appear that she dressed the Lew Leslie Plantation Revue that ran during July and August 1922 starring Florence Mills at the 48th Street Theatre, New York. A little later she was also credited with dressing Talk About Girls, a musical comedy produced by Harry and Sam Grisman which had an out of town run in May including the Garrick, Philadelphia and then in June 1927 at the Waldorf Theatre, New York, although the review in Variety says the costumes were by Nestor.

One of my drawings (undated) comes from the Nesor Costume Company and one credit for Nesor in the 1920s was costuming the musical comedy Oh Ernest! at the Royale and Earl Carroll Theatres in mid 1927, although there is no mention of the designer. Perhaps Gertrude Johnson moved from Behrens to Nesor, run by Bam Balvin, in the mid 1920s.
In April 1927 it was announced that Baroness Marie Vorn Bronchilch had been signed by Nesor as exclusive designer but interestingly, in August 1927, Nesor merged with Booth-Willoughby to form the Nesor-Booth-Willoughby Costume Company. It is not known if Gertrude Johnson continued working for them through this period.

A sketch by Gertrude A. Johnson

Some of the designs in George Glazer’s collection are allegedly from a production called Waltz Ho / American Beauty, but all attempts to trace this show have failed. Perhaps it is the title of a segment within a show or a cabaret or a vaudeville number.

Since Gertrude Johnson gained so few legitimate theatrical credits for mainstream Broadway productions one can only assume that she worked on shows where she did not get credit and perhaps she was more productive dressing regional shows, cabarets and vaudeville.

At special events throughout history there has always been the desire to augment festivities with novelties of all kinds, especially at special occasions like New Year and weddings. Toward the end of the 19th century as dances, balls, galas and the new concept of the smart restaurant proliferated on both sides of the Atlantic, special nights were introduced where a wide range of gifts or carnival novelties were given away as souvenirs to make the night special and stand out. Later, these ‘favours’ became indicative of the madcap nocturnal fun and frolics of the Jazz Age and the 1920s.

Pigall's nightclub in Paris, 1920s

Apart from the obvious things like balloons, streamers and party hats, special gifts increasingly became a necessary part of any special affair. For example, in New York, at Delmonico’s restaurant in February 1909, a private party used the theme of American beauty roses for décor and all the ladies received a bouquet of flowers; at the first Cinderella dance at Sherry’s restaurant in late 1911 favours were cigarette cases for the men and boudoir caps for the women; in late 1913 at a charity event at the Astor hotel, all the ladies received a little antimony jewel box and at the Sans Souci nightclub, where Irene and Vernon Castle were the attraction in early 1914, all the women received white gardenias as favours.

Special favours became popular in Europe immediately after the First World War. The fad appears to have gained impetus when Leon Volterra opened Le Perroquet in Paris in the spring of 1921. This restaurant, nightclub, dance hall and cabaret de luxe was situated above the foyer of the Casino de Paris at 16 Rue Clichy and became the most fashionable and elegant night-spot in Paris. One of Volterra’s marketing ploys was to give each lady a beautifully dressed poupee doll as a souvenir on the weekly gala nights. These became highly sought after and much talked about.

As the 1920s progressed special gala nights and themed fetes were being staged constantly and as a result they provided great inspiration for unique and novel gifts. A keen rivalry also developed between proprietors over these gifts and in many cases quite expensive presents were presented such as dainty silk cushions, cigarette cases, silver vases, bath crystals, feathery fans and porcelain bells.

When the Piccadilly Hotel began to stage themed balls during the summer of 1922, it was announced that ‘Fete de Fleurs’ on Friday 5th May would be ‘the first of a novel and brilliant series of fascinating festivities introducing the very latest Parisian novelties quite new to London.’ The famous ballroom would be transformed for each themed event, so for the ‘Fete Espagnole’ (Friday 12th May) there was dancing in the enchanted atmosphere of old Madrid with Spanish decorations and novelties ‘everything to capture the spirit of old world city of music and colourful romance.’ For the ‘Fete des Oiseau’ (Friday 19th May) everyone was given a bird hat from Paris and for the Venetian Fete (11th July) coveted Venetian shawls were given away to the ladies.

An advert for 'Favours'

The ‘favour fad’ was described succinctly: ‘The value or the novelty of the presents distributed among guests appear to be the principal attractions which induce dancers of the fair sex to visit certain dance rendezvous ‘I simply must go to so-and-so hotel tonight: they’re giving away the duckiest little vanity bags I hear’ But apart from the paper hats, coloured balloons, tinsel novelties and absurd baubles which are common gifts at dances, presents of real use and intrinsic worth are nowadays lavished as souvenirs of happy dancing hours. This apparent something for nothing offer has an extraordinary lure for the feminine visitor even if they cannot understand the price of the tickets (which presumably they do not pay for). It shows a keen understanding of the feminine psychology on the part of the dance promoters who show such ostensible generosity.’

Derby night in early June became one of the many popular themed events and a focus of fun and festivities. At the Hotel Metropole cabaret in 1923 The Follies Derby was an attractive innovation where you could enjoy the excitement of Newmarket in miniature. The girls in the guise of bookies gave out coloured discs representing racing colours. When the odds were called, four steeds made of papier-mâché and mounted on tiny wheels concealed in their hoofs appeared and they were raced by the girls, albeit slowly with the winner snapping the tape. Thereafter, all London cabarets had big annual Derby nights with favours and gifts for all. At Dolly’s Revels in 1924, the souvenirs were appropriately horses and jockeys heads on the end of long wands but enough and to spare to go round and at the Summer-time Frolics as the Café de Paris all the ladies had souvenirs of powder boxes containing a dainty little dancing figure.

During 1924 the Restaurant des Ambassadeurs at the Hotel Metropole introduced its novel Sunday evening dinner dances with a special theme and setting – a concept that had been tried and tested earlier in the year at Monte Carlo. ‘Un Soir a Nagasaki’ (May 1924) was held in a bower of Japanese lanterns with table decorations of real almond, plum and peach blossom and souvenirs of dainty almond trees, flower hair ornaments and quaint Japanese figures. ‘En Chine’ (October 1924) featured masses of Chinese favours that were showered on the guests including caps, hats, fans, dolls, mandarins, pipes, lanterns, whistles and even lacquered powder boxes.

At the Café de Paris in late 1924, the ‘favours’ showered on the visitors were most original – surmounting slender sticks are posies of coloured flowers, black cats with arched backs and glowing eyes and grotesque faces all of which were be lit up by a tiny electric bulb. At midnight the lights were lowered and the effect of the dancers moving around the room with these illuminated favours was most charming.

At the same time there was anther innovation. When Parysis, the famous Parisian artist made her first appearance at the Hotel Metropole cabaret, lifelike statuettes of her modelled in wax were given away as a memento.

An advert for 'Favours'

‘I know several dancing enthusiasts who are making collections of these jolly mementoes of gay evenings at London clubs and restaurants. The trade in them must be immense and much ingenuity is shown by someone in devising new ideas.’

When Roger Wolfe Kahn’s fashionable new cabaret called Le Perroquet de Paris, opened in New York in November 1926 with a mirrored dance floor and aquariums beneath the individual tables, he made a point of following the Parisian example of giving expensive souvenirs to the women – in this instance a bottle of premier perfume. Back in Paris the legendary American dancer Harry Pilcer took over the dansants at Claridge’s in early 1927 and once again returned to the favoured dolls gift for the ladies that had become such a feature of Le Perroquet five years earlier.

The social season was a well established pattern of behavior where the elite, rich and famous members of society moved with the seasons like a flock of migratory birds from one nesting place to another enjoying a range of activities and events.

Fashionable society has always lived by a routine largely defined by the seasons hence perhaps the term ‘social season’. The roots of the concept, certainly in the UK, were linked to the movements of the royal family and certainly, by the 18th Century, they were in residence in London from April to July and from October until Christmas along with members of the aristocracy and the ruling classes. The Season traditionally began after Easter with the custom of returning to London at the end of the hunting season and ended with the ‘Glorious Twelfth’ (12th August), which was the start of the shooting season for red grouse.

The period was marked by high profile balls, galas, parties, sporting events, horse racing, debutante balls, dances, concerts and charity and other special events. One of the first social significant event was staged by George III, for example, who staged a May ball, to raise money for a new maternity hospital, named after his wife Queen Charlotte. It became an annual event, and the fulcrum of the social season at the time.

As a result a social calendar and ritual of events was established whereby the elite knew where they should be and what they needed to do. The season also became known for when well-bred girls were launched into society and the marriage market at the age of 17 or 18 with a formal introduction to the monarch and a debut at the high-profile ball.

Similar activities were followed all over Europe and America and, with the advent of the 20th century and foreign travel becoming more prevalent and fashionable, many of the elite established new patterns of engagement particularly with accepted sojourns on the Riviera in early spring and Deauville and other Normandy resorts in August.

However, the traditional season was interrupted by the First World War and thereafter it more became difficult to maintain social exclusivity. As a result, a slightly more flexible, more open, and more European model emerged and in the 1920s the social season was a far more complex and varied affair.

London’s season followed a set pattern with racing at Ascot in June, racing at Goodwood in July and the Cowes regatta in August. These events along with the more usual court functions, debutante balls, the craze for dancing, the growth of nightclubs and the evolution of smart cocktail parties spawned an ever increasing demand for luxurious garments, which gave rise to the growth of many new fashion houses in the 1920s and a set pattern emerged with each house giving two seasonal collections each year in March or April and in September or October. Equally, the new cabaret craze also followed a set season with openings and new shows in the spring and autumn with summer closings in town but dedicated venues for summer entertainment out of town.

In Europe, especially France, the season began with a visit to Saint-Moritz in January and then Cannes, Nice and Monte Carlo in February and March, Le Touquet at Easter, Paris in June for the horse racing, Deauville in August and Biarritz in September.

Paris, always a social magnet like London, had a busy summer season and throughout June there were numerous race meetings, which culminated in the Grand Steeplechase at Auteuil (21st June) and the Grand Prix at Longchamps (28th June). Both race courses were located within ten minutes of Paris in the Bois de Boulogne about a mile from each other, and become an institution. The races themselves were often eclipsed by the kaleidoscopic pictures of colourful fashions that paraded around the green lawns giving a sneak preview of the distinctive features that would dictate the autumn couture shows.

One of the most important events of the social season was the Bal du Grand Prix at the Opera on the night before the Grand Prix. After the races everyone trouped back to Paris, but many stopped for tea and dancing at one of the popular summer hot spots in the Bois de Bologne: l’Hermitage, Chateau de Madrid, the Pre Catalan or the Café d’Armenonville.

But things were not the same and the changes were more visible on the Riviera in the early part of the year. Many of the old breed of visitors had vanished. The Russian aristocracy, once the heaviest gamblers in Europe and lovers of Monte Carlo and its Casino, and the rich members of the German and Austro-Hungarian empires had been largely wiped out by war and revolution. Their places were taken by a new type of visitor, one that the old guard clearly despised – Americans! The growing numbers of freshly minted American millionaires, and others with lighter fortunes, flocked to Europe to avoid Prohibition and avail the benefits of an exceedingly good exchange rate. They particularly loved the horse racing in Paris and, although they tended to avoid Monte Carlo, with its more exotic atmosphere and its eccentric inhabitants dedicated to gambling, gravitated to the newer casinos at Nice and Cannes.

One disgruntled commentator said in 1921 ‘the Riviera is not what it was. It is different and it is not better. I am not concerned to maintain that is less attractive than the Spring of 1914, say, but it is certainly a very much less attractive, less amusing and less intimate place than it used to be 20 or more years ago. It has become democratic, for one thing and is has become much more moral.’

Americans also had a marked effect on changing the dictates of the season as Vogue observed ‘no longer is the American an innocent abroad, he not only follows but frequently sets the style… We always think of going to Europe in the summer, of Paris and London in May and June, but very shortly, there will be no ‘season’ for Europe, as there has always been before, because the sophisticated American had now discovered that the most charming time in Europe, especially for those who have friends there, is the off season.’

August was the height of the season for Deauville on the Normandy coast followed by Biarritz in September. Deauville was seen as act one and Biarritz as act two in a ‘comedy of extravagant pleasure.’ But, equally changes were afoot and other resorts like Ostend and Venice were gaining ground.

Although Ostende was a place to visit most of the spring and summer it was at the height of the season during June to August when it became a cosmopolitan assemblage of rank, fashion and beauty. Deauville, long the champion of society throughout August, soon learned that a visit to Ostend was needed before or after its season.

At the same time some felt that Deauville was losing its exclusivity and even becoming vulgar. It was felt that Deauville’s reputation was attracting too many sightseers and that Americans in particular crossed the Atlantic because they simply had to see Deauville or the ‘City of Spectacular Sin.’ As a result many of the social elite transferred their affections to the Lido in Venice described as ‘the Deauville of Italy.’ As Vogue said ‘even with the terrific popularity that Biarritz and Le Touquet have had, Venice can not be touched, for there is no such setting in the world.’

Of course another innovation had a major impact on the season – sunbathing and this was also largely due to American’s. In the early 1920s a group of Americans began to spend the summer on the Riviera. This was considered daring and very strange at the time since the Riviera season was a winter one and all the hotels closed from late spring all through the summer. Cole Porter decided to rent the Chateau de la Garoupe in Antibes for the summer of 1921 and invited friends to visit and had a grand time. The next the summer (in 1922) Gerald and Sara Murphy rented a whole floor in the Grand Hotel at Cap d’Antibes. Outside they created a beach by removing the seaweed to reveal the sand and dowsed themselves in banana oil and sunbathed. Within a few years the fad of sunbathing engulfed society and the Riviera became an all year round destination. By the late 1920s it was de rigeur to spend the summer not on the Normandy Coast or the Lido but the new elite Cote d’Azur beaches .

After World War II, society had become more egalitarian and the social season of the past gradually changed and, significantly, in recent years it has been largely eroded although some of the more high profile events still endure.

In the early 1920s a series of rather simple, yet wonderful adverts appeared in theatre programmes for the fashion house of Ninette. With two outlets in London at 47 Cranbourne Street and 79 Shaftesbury Avenue, Ninette was rather well placed, but seemingly only flourished for a few years.

An advert for Ninette, early 1920s

In the spring of 1923 Flora Le Breton (wearing a Ninette gown) and Vincent Davies were the dancing act at the opening of Revelle’s club and in Paris, Joan Pickering at the Club Daunou, wore another Ninette creation of ecru lace on a little dance frock of powder blue faille over flesh pink georgette. The absence of adornment was its greatest charm and caused great admiration as it lent its wearer that coveted ‘jeaune fille’ appearance.

But, all attempts to locate any further information have been elusive, so who was behind this rather wonderful British fashion house now completely forgotten?

In a London street, not known for its smartness, shone a beacon of culinary delight, providing dinners, suppers and dancing all for half a crown in 1914.

Advert for Maxim's, early 1920s

When the Imperial Austrian Exhibition was staged in Earls Court in 1906 the organisers established an Austrian restaurant providing admirable Austrian food as part of the experience. They brought over the son-in-law of the proprietor of the famous Rubezahl Café in the Austrian Highlands called Maximilan Lurion to become the manager and when Earls Court closed for the winter Lurion stay on.

Lurion decided to open a restaurant in central London and with a British syndicate bought a site on the corner of Wardour and Gerrard Streets. A small public house carrying a license was included in the sale and the entire plot was re-developed incorporating the saloon. The name of the restaurant was deemed to be a shortened version of Lorion’s Christian name and so Restaurant Maxim was born at 30 Wardour Street. The fact that it had the same name as the famous restaurant in Paris must have been a coincidence!

Although the area was not exactly fashionable the new restaurant was described as ‘a bright and cheerful place, in a neighbourhood where brightness is not the rule.’ The white exterior had touches of gilding on the wreaths that embellish the outer walls and there was a domed turret on the roof. Compact, yet elegant, the interior was handsomely appointed on three floors with a stunning balcony.

On entry there was a smart Commissionaire in a well fitting coat who welcomed you to the ground floor restaurant which was panelled in white with red-shaded lamps on the tables and some potted palms adding colour. The chairs were of white wood upholstered in green leather and the carpets a deep rose colour. The upper floor comprised a balcony looking down into the lower restaurant and there were rows of white curtained narrow windows and a brass ornamental rail surrounding the balcony. The walls were papered in deep red with white woodwork and classic white ornamentation and had large mirrors and panels showing the arms of the house displayed in proper heraldic colours (three stag’s heads on a shield with a boar’s head as a crest and two stags as supporters). There were two circular lines of tables one close to the railings and one against the walls and a string band played on this level which could also be heard below. Cut glass electroliers, some hanging some fixed to the ceiling, gave light both to the upper and lower restaurants. In the basement was a grill-room.

Maxim’s was of course in the land of bohemia and so the ambiance was relaxed and unrestricted with no pre-requisite about wearing clothes of ceremony.

An interior view of Maxim's from the ground floor looking up to the balcony

A view of a table setting in Maxim's

The restaurant under Lorion, for whatever reason, did not succeed and it soon changed hands. By 1914, M. Ducker was the manager and there had been a struggle to bring it to its present state of prosperity. Oddly, some believed that the reputation of Maxim’s was far from spotless, that English society allegedly gave it a wide berth and it was regarded as ‘the meeting place of clandestine lovers.’ Most likely, after Lorion’s departure it had been regarded as a dubious place but the new

A view of the balcony level (first floor) of Maxim's

The menu in 1914 included Hors d’oeuvre a la Russe, Consomme Chiffonnette, Crème Gentilhomme (thick green soup flavoured most likely with spinach), Supreme de Barbue Nicoise (fish with pink accompaniment of tomatoes and shrimp), Carre de Pre-Sale Bourguignonne, Pommes Fondantes, Poulet en Casserole, Salade and Glace Chantilly or Fraises Melba. What a feast.

During the early 20s the growth and popularity of dinner and dancing prompted a change and a new, much improved parquet floor was added and dances were orchestrated in the central part of the main room. Eventually, the restaurant must have been bought by a new owners who turned into a dancing hall and café called Revelle’s Club that opened Thursday 1st March 1923. Dinners and suppers were still a feature but dancing to Hugh Mayo’s Reverie Revels was the main attraction. Opening hours were 7.-12.30am, with special gala nights twice a week until 2.30am and on Sundays the club opened 7pm to midnight. As an added treat a cabaret show was provided by the dancing of Flora Le Breton and Vincent Davies. Le Breton would have been a big draw. She had started off in the chorus of Murray’s cabaret and was then snapped up by film producers scoring a big success with the boxer Georges Carpentier in The Gypsy Chavalier in 1922 and was a hugely popular and well-known figure.

Advert for Revelle's Club (formerly Maxim's)

The third Ambassadeurs show presented by Edmund Sayag in the summer of 1928 was simply called ‘Vingt-huit’ and once again featured a largely American cast in what was called a ‘record monster programme.’

Fred Waring's Pennyslyvanians

Sayag spent sometime in New York during the spring of 1928 securing ‘the finest American troupe yet introduced into the French capital’ under the supervision of Connolly-Morrison and William Morris. The show described as ‘a combination of variety hall and cabaret, a series of turns by some of the most astonishing acrobatic dancers and comedians that have ever appeared on a Parisian stage’ was in fact staged by Bob Connolly and George Hale and the twenty-four song score was specially written by Cole Porter.

It was George Hale that persuaded Sayag to get Porter to write the score for the show. They had in fact all met the previous year when Porter allowed the English actress June to sing ‘Let’s Misbehave’. Porter attended the rehearsals and got involved in the intricacies of the staging and the monumental success of the show marked the end of Cole’s professional stagnation. Later in the run, Porter wrote a number specifically for Clifton Webb and Dorothy Dickson called ‘Looking at You’ which was an immediate success and was eventually used again in C.B. Cochran’s production of Wake up and Dream in London and New York.

Buster West

The troupe of ‘Vingt-Huit’ numbered fifty and included Buster and John West (humorous dancers), Evelyn Hoey (singer), Florence Gerswin (singer), Morton Downey (singer), Myrio, Desha and Barte (acrobatic dancers), the Three Eddies (black dancers), the Nesbit brothers (comic singers and dancers), Bud and Jack Pearson (clever parodists and masters of rhythm), Joan Carter Waddell (dancer and beauty), Mary Leigh and Basil Howes (the only British act), Fred Waring‘s Pennsylvanians jazz orchestra and George Hale’s eighteen girls.

The true star of the troupe was recognised as Buster West partnered by his father John West – who provide what was called humorous dancing. Buster was regarded as a genius and a superlative comedian, full of original ideas and exquisitely funny.

Starting at 8.30 the show began with a skit on a touring car filled with tourists riding up the Champs Elysees with Eleanor Shaler as the uniformed guide and Jack Pearson the chief tourist surrounded by American sightseers. The same chorus girls appeared later as Highland soldiers in the Stuart tartan scene (finale of first part) with Buster West impersonating the Prince of Wales and Evelyn Hoey as solo vocalist and a band of real pipers in kilts. Francis Gershwin sang a number by her famous brother, Morton Downey sang Blue Hour, Joan Carter Wadell was a stunning beauty clothed in white feathers against a black velvet background and the British couple Mary Leigh and Basil Howes featured in the Old Fashioned Girl number.

Desha and Myrio

Although the revue was all American, Variety observed that the costumes were to be designed and executed in Paris. Sayag said ‘French producers have not followed the American vogue of dressing the feminine assemble to conform with certain constabulary edicts.’ In other words costuming for the French music hall was far more minimal and less conservative that its American counterpart. However, Billboard reported that once again Dolly Tree of the Brooks Costume Company was designing the costumes and, since she had already designed for the French music hall and had worked on two previous editions of Sayag’s shows, she would have been well aware of the difference in approach. The programme mentions that costumes for the tableau Les Heures Bleus was designed by Louis Curti and executed by Gaston Zanel and that other costumes were by Max Weldy. One can only presume that Dolly Tree did design most of the costumes and simply did not get credit. The décor for the production was designed by Andre Boll except for Les Heures Bleues and Jardin du Maroc by Louis Curti and executed by Emile Bertin.

The 1928 Ambassadors show was launched on 10th May 1928 and the audience were charged the extraordinary amount of $70 entry fee (dinner and show but no champagne). Small wonder it was regarded so highly with such an entrance fee! There were two orchestras for general dancing before, between and after the show besides the star orchestra of Waring’s Pennsylvanians.

Ted Lewis and his orchestra

Once again it was smash hit and described as ‘one of the best this hall has hitherto shown and about the best in Paris.’ After a few weeks the show was broken into three segments and there were changes including the addition of the famous dancer Clifton Webb and Dorothy Dickson singing ‘Looking for You’.

However, all was not going to plan and by June there was dissatisfaction with Sayag from American performers when it was learned that many contracts would not be renewed. Sayag had issued eight-week contracts with additional four and eight week renewal options. He decided to retain Buster and John West, Joan Carter Waddell and Clifton Webb but did not extend the chorus of 18, the Pearson duo, the three Eddies, Evelyn Hoey and Waring’s Pennyslyvanians. The latter were replaced with Ted Lewis and his orchestra and Lewis himself was hailed as ‘an incomparable animator, singer, reciter, announcer, mimic and virtuoso of the clarinet and saxophone.’

Variety commented that there had been previous complaints that Sayag was too much of a stickler for contractual detail and that nothing not expressly provided for in writing is binding with him. ‘Sayag made promises in order to make the large display he did at the premiere of the show in Paris. When the show went over and big, he probably figured to cut down the overhead at the expense of the very Americans receiving his promises.’

The second Ambassadeur’s show presented by Edmund Sayag in the summer of 1927 was described as ‘not a revue but a series of acts to entertain the classy diners’ and primarily featured a range of top American acts headed by Georgie Hale.

Miss June, one of the leading ladies in the Ambassadeur's 1927 show

In the Spring of 1927 Sayag visited New York and with William Morris Jr, the son of the theatrical manager, made plans for his summer spectacular show. American talent comprising forty principals and twenty chorus girls were booked and the troupe began rehearsals in New York before sailing for France on 20th April.

The Ambassadors show of 1927 (variously entitled Broadway – New York, Broadway in Paris, ‘Revue America’) opened on 1st June with an impressive line-up headed by Georgie Hale (the dapper American light comedy singer and dancer who also staged the dances), Margie Finley, Cyril and Ethel D’Ath, Cal and Ethel Norris (acrobatic dancing), the Four Admirals (musicians, singers and dancers), the jazz band of the Aaronsons Commanders, Johnny Hudgins (black performer who was the star comedian and dancer in the previous season), Robert Stickney (the Charleston dancer on stilts, who had already made a big hit at the Piccadilly Hotel cabaret the previous summer), Helen Morgan (famous New York cabaret singer), Mabel Hill (Hawaian dancer), Gus Muleahy (eccentric dancer), Christine Matson, Viva Regor and Jean Marini. Another of the key principals was the famous British actress June with her dancing companion Billy Reardon.

The cuisine at the Ambassadeurs was top-rate and Sayag’s Chef Fabre became rather legendary especially for his chicken dishes and Sayag was quoted as saying he paid Fabre more money that he did his most expensive prima donna. William Morris Jr contributed a lot of energy in rehearsing and preparing each piece and helped as stage hand, curtain raiser, interpreter and major domo.

Johnny Hudgins who had made such an impression the previous season continued to astonish and delight Parisians with his tremendous energetic Charleston dancing cries of ‘Ooah ooah’.

Helen Morgan

June was described as being ‘very pretty’ and was a ‘perfect exponent of old French and modern dances.’ Rather pompously, in her autobiography June thought that she was the star of the show, and according to her Sayag ‘refused none of my somewhat exorbitant demands.’ He paid her £250 per week, selected her own dancing partner, couturier and showmaker, supplied two dozen pairs of silk stockings a week, six gowns to begin with from Worth and a new one every week and in addition she could have two supper parties per week free. ‘This is like having life served to you on an emerald-and-diamond tray!’ she squawked. June ‘s dancing partner was the Irish-American Billie Reardon who she had seen dancing with Irene Castle at the Embassy in London in the summer of 1923. She said ‘Billy was not a great dancer but he had chic and a large following among the international set and he was fun.’ June claimed she was feted by the beaux of Paris and found herself the toast of Paris.

The English designer Dolly Tree, who had re-located to New York from London and had worked with Sayag before, (it was reported that she had created costumes the second edition of the 1926 show) was commissioned to design the costumes and sets with the costumes being executed by Brooks Costume Company who had dressed the Blackbirds show the previous summer. Although Dolly Tree created the bulk of the costumes ‘the dancing was lavishly embellished with the most gorgeous costuming’ some of the other performers were dressed by other couturiers of their choice.

Such was the importance of the reopening of the smartest Parisian venue that in the inaugural audience everyone who was anyone was there including the Royal Princes’ George and Henry and many leading figures of French stage and public life such as Sacha Guiltry, Yvonne Printemps, Jane Marnac, Jane Renouardt, Georges Carpenter, Josephine Baker, Mistinguett, Earl Leslie, the Dolly Sisters, the Maharajah of Kapurthala and Damia.

Robert Stickney

Dancing Times observed ‘Paris is coming more and more under the influence of English and American taste, especially the latter for its theatre and music hall shows. First came their dances, then their artistes in ever increasing numbers to show how they should be done and now the whole style of the entertainment tends to become purely American. The transformation is complete at the Ambassadeurs. The title of the show is no misnomer. You dine luxuriously amid pergolas of flowers, luminous cascades and thousands of coloured lights where you dance between courses and watch tabloid turns between the dances.’

As usual, Sayag made changes to the show, and in August the American comedian Lester Allen joined the cast, (a comedian of varied effects, at one moment he appeared in the role of young dandy dressed up to the nines and in another his style was that of Little Tich) followed in September by the ballroom dancing of Jack Holland and Joan Barry. At the end of the Paris engagement it was muted that the show would be taken to Berlin and then perhaps Broadway but this did not happen.

During rehearsals the atmosphere was chaotic and the noise and confusion were unbelievable as the interior of the Ambassadeurs was being re-decorated with the ceiling and walls being trellised and festooned with life-like wisteria and lilacs. June was due to do a song with Georgie Hale, the dapper American light comedy singer and dancer. She thought it was banal and Sayag refused to provide her with another. She was furious and tracked Sayag down for a discussion with two other men in a garden room. She tried to retreat but Sayag said ‘Mes amis, this is my charming but temperamental English star’. One of the other men introduced himself as the great Russian opera star Chaliapin. They asked what was the matter and she said that Sayag had given her a stupid song and she refused to sing it ‘what I need is something with a lilt and, if possible, with a point to it’.

The other man said that he had written a few songs and asked if she’d liked to hear one or two. She reluctantly led him to a piano where he sat and played and sang ‘Let’s Misbehave.’ She thought it was good but ‘too risqué for London, but perfect for Paris.’ As the lyrics got naughtier and naughtier, the chorus girls and musicians gathered smiling and chuckling and when finished burst into applause.

June exclaimed ‘I must have it…. Sayag must buy it for me.’
The man kissed her hand and said ‘I give it to you.’
She turned to Billy Reardon and said ‘I guarantee it will make his name’ Billy gaped ‘Make his name! My god, don’t you know who he is? Cole Porter! One of America’s top song-writers.’

One presumes that June sang the song in the show….

Roseray and Capella were one of the most famous French dancing acts of the 1920s. 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.

Roseray and Capella in a typical pose

Simone Roseray and Jacques Capella rose to prominence shortly after the First World War and were described as a Franco-Russian pair. In the summer of 1919, a photograph of Roseray appeared in the Tatler describing her as ‘a young newcomer to the Parisian stage who studied with the famous professor Stilson’ and by late 1923 the pair were clearly an established dancing team ‘applauded in turn at Folies Bergere, the Marigny and La Gaite-Rochechouart.’

However, it was not until the Spring of 1924 that they really came to prominence. After making a splash on the Riviera in early 1924, especially in Nice, they became one of the main attractions (along with Rose Amy, Gaby Montbreuse and Rene Thano) in the Concert Mayol show Toute Neu from March 1924. Here they gave ‘a number of acrobatic dances which show off the beauty of physical form of both partners’ in such exotic numbers as Nuit de Sheherazade, La Favourite and L’Amant (the lover), La Boite de Jeux – Le Jeu des Dames (play of the ladies) and La Javaise des Roses – L’Ame des Roses (the heart of the roses). At the same time they doubled at the fashionable Canari nightclub in the Rue Faubourg.

Roseray and Capella in Paris En Fleurs, Casino de Paris, Paris, 1925

Later in 1924, along with Maurice Chevalier, Yvonne Vallee and the Irvin Sisters, Roseray and Capella starred in Vive Les Femmes at the Palace Theatre. A photo caption of them at the time suggested that they had already performed to great success in Berlin and Vienna, so perhaps they had made a trip to both cities in the summer of 1924. The next big production that they entered was Paris En Fleurs at the Casino de Paris launched in November 1925 starring the Dolly Sisters, Maurice Chevalier and Yvonne Vallee. Their dances in a Grecian number, India of a thousand and one nights and Versailles in the autumn were greatly admired.

Roseray and Capella taken at the time of The Great Temptations, New York, 1926. Photo courtesy of the Shubert Archive.

Their elegance and allure clearly made an impression with the Shubert brothers, New York theatrical producers, and they snapped them up to headline in their new musical revue called The Great Temptations that was launched at the Winter Garden Theatre, New York on 18th May 1926. Dancing was a big feature and there were other notable dancing acts including Pat and Terry Kendall, the Guy Sisters (also from Paris) and the 15 Foster Girls. Variety particularly enthused about Roseray and Capella by saying ‘the real sensation of the show is an almost naked duo.’

Roseray and Capella taken at the time of The Great Temptations, New York, 1926. Photo courtesy of the Shubert Archive.

Roseray and Capella appeared midway in the first half (scene 12 On the Veranda) ‘to a very fancy dance with very few clothes and lots of thrills. Capella is a well built fellow who wears a tiny beaded loincloth, skillfully adjusted and open at the sides to allow for a great flesh display. Roseray wears some beads on a head-dress and a rhinestone thingamajig judiciously spotted. Otherwise she has freedom of the body and with her partner does the dance that will keep this show in town for a good run. Roseray’s body is whitened to make us believe she is a statue being adored by a worshipper. The much discussed undressed dance done by Roseray and Capella is handled so delicately it is art in all its dancing glory. Miss Roseray’s perfect form sports a rhinestone girdle as well as a tiny bodice. In another number she has a well-marcelled wig of gray with an accordian pleated little skirt held in place by a wreath of rosebuds and a white chiffon simple throw trimmed in these buds.’ The show carried on to packed audiences until early November 1926 when the dancers presumably returned to Europe.

In April 1927 the pair were invited to London by Albert de Courville, who had started to produce the cabaret shows at the prestigious Embassy Club in Bond Street. Their performance was nothing less than sensational and guests climbed on chairs and tables to see them and cheered and clapped. However, something happened after a visit of a police inspector and their performance suspended. There was allegedly a complaint about the brevity of their rather scant costumes and concern over the danger to the audience if Roseray should slip from her partner when they were conducting one of their acrobatic turns. In one dance Roseray spun horizontally her only grip being with her toes behind Capella’s neck. Roseray, aghast, exclaimed in her piquant French way ‘do they want me to dance in a fur coat?’

They re-appeared the following night and Capella wore an extra green singlet, Roseray was also less exposed and the tables were set further back from the dance floor than normal to give more space for their spectacular swing that was the final of the dance. Luigi, the manager of the Embassy said ‘I have been assured that there is no objection to the act now.’ Needless to say the press coverage certainly helped attendance.

From the Embassy, the dancers were due to appear at the Carlton Hotel, London, also under de Courville’s management but they had an argument and they returned to Paris just as de Courville married Edith Kelly, suffered a nervous collapse and seemingly went bankrupt. They were lured back to London almost immediately by the management of the Savoy who offered them $1,750 per week, Their debut in early June was called ‘a miracle of grace and strength’ and was once again a huge success.

‘Capella wore, if anything, rather less than a prizefighter while Roseray was clad in diamond bracelets. She also wore a snow white wig and when she came down into the ballroom she wore an opera cloak of Prince of Wales feathers over her shoulders. This she soon discarded.They began with plastic posing and very gracefully and artistically went through into a dance. A little later they came back and repeated their terrific dance that so shocked the Bond Street police, They wore rather more clothes, but the acrobatics were just as unrestrained and in the climax Capella swung Roseray around like a whirlwind with his foot somehow fastened to her neck. There was no sign of the police.’

As they packed them into the Savoy (capacity 1300 nightly) the critics raved about them. The Stage said they are ‘far above other acts of the same type in both their grace and acrobatic daring’ and Variety said they gave a ‘breathless and daring performance.’

By the end of June they were back in Paris and swiftly added to the Casino de Paris revue Paris-New York (launched at the end of May) that starred the Dolly Sisters and doubled in cabaret including the Florida club in November 1927.

By early 1928 Roseray and Capella were back in the USA to headline at the Casa Lopez nightclub. Casa Lopez (at West 54th Street) had been one of New York’s hottest nightspots since opening in October 1925 under the auspices of the famous band-leader Vincent Lopez and his business partner Gene Geiger. But for many months business had been slack and the booking of Roseray and Capella was the last stand as a make or break for the venue. After one week at the Casa Lopez in mid-February, business was still slow an over zealous PR man Irwin S. Strouse conceived various publicity ruses to stimulate interest. Roseray called off the suggestion of her accidentally losing an abdominal tunic which would have left her nude but agreed to another plan which was ‘… one of the best framed publicity stunts of this nature ever put over.’

Strouse planted stories in the gossip columns that Roseray was madly in love with Lopez and miserable because he was spending his time with two Ziegfeld girls. Roseray then allegedly attempted suicide early one Sunday morning by jumping into a rather cold Central Park lake due to the unrequited love of Lopez. She was ‘saved’ by Thomas Moore (25) a security company investigator.

The press fell for the story that was leaked immediately and it was printed everywhere in their Monday editions. It helped that Roseray was ill from exposure contracted as a result of her overlong immersion in the park lake and had spent the night in hospital. However, two reporters Mark Hellinger and Walter Winchell smelt a rat, uncovered the con and condemned the ‘suicide’ as a publicity hoax. It was also swiftly exposed that Thomas Moore, Roseray’s rescuer, was the brother of Joe Moore, the amateur ice skating champion who was Vincent Lopez’s most intimate pal and buddy. Lopez and Geiger were vilified and the word was that Lopez was finished and would not be mentioned in the papers for a least a year. On March 18, 1928, after a stormy disagreement with Geiger, the Casa Lopez closed permanently. Vincent was penniless and mired in debt and said ‘Broadway ain’t what it used to be.’

One significant story to come out of the subsequent coverage was that Roseray was in fact the mother of her dance partner Capella – an idea which an international showman who had known the team for many years emphatically denied. Clearly if such a story had been confirmed at the time it would have ruined their act and thus the denial not surprising. In later years Vincent Lopez confirmed the story in his autobiography.

The pair appear to have stayed in America for most of 1928 and kept themselves busy in vaudeville and in Publix stage shows through to November when they returned to Europe opening in a new edition of Playtime at the Piccadilly, the cabaret show at the Piccadilly Hotel, London in mid November 1928.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s big appearances seemingly slowed down. They were on the Riviera and performed in a Mimosa ball at the Hotel Bellevue, Menton in February 1929, then the Café de Paris in London (June 1929), the Chateau Madrid in Paris (July 1929), the Palladium, London with a third partner Sylvio (October 1929), the Olympia Cinema de Luxe in a stage show called The Altar of Love (October 1930) and the London Pavilion with Debelle in John Southern’s non-Stop variety show (October 1932). Thereafter, it is not known what happened to them.

Capella and Patricia, 1940s

Capella and Patricia, 1940s

However, much later, with the advent of the 1940s, Capella was dancing in New York in cabaret and while he was at the Rainbow Room, Walter Winchell was gossiping about his alleged romance with Anne Blanet, the Toledo heiress in February 1941. Shortly afterward Capella met Patricia Reynolds born in Detroit Mitchigan and a former New Yorker. She became his dancing partner and wife and for the next decade they became one of America’s most sought after ballroom dancing acts appearing as Capella and Patricia all over the country in cabaret and vaudeville such as the Bamboo Room of the Royal Palm, Miami (May 1942), the Smash Laff Variety Revue of 1943, Nixon Café, Pittsburgh (April 1943), Belmont Plaza, New York ‘Glass Hat ‘ show (August 1944), William Penn Hotel (March 1945), the Swank Brook Club, Miami (December 1945) and Chez Paree, Chicago (April 1946). They also made an appearance in the Universal film Moon Over Vegas released in April 1944.

By the 1960s they had retired and led a wonderful life based in New York, wintering in Palm Beach and returning to France regularly spending the summer in Monte Carlo.

Part of a two-picture deal starring the American actress Betty Compson, The White Shadow (1924) was the second picture from British director Graham Cutts, following in the footsteps of the highly successful Woman to Woman (1923).

Betty Compson in The White Shadow

Betty Compson had accepted the role in Woman to Woman through the newly formed Balcon-Savile-Freedman team on condition that her contract should be for two films. She arrived in London 10th May 1923 and filming on Woman to Woman was complete within 3 months. The two picture deal proved to be a costly mistake because seemingly Graham Cutts and his team were so engrossed in the first production they had made few preparations for the second picture and had no other property ready to exploit for their expensive American star. As a result, shortly after completing Woman to Woman in the summer of 1923, they rushed into production with what must have been, a rather hasty adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock of another Michael Morton novel called Children of Chance.

The White Shadow, which had originally been called The Awakening and then The Eternal Survivor, was billed as the same star and same production team as Woman to Woman. Thus, besides being directed by Graham Cutts (assisted by C.N. Russell), the photography was by Claude McDonnell, scenario by Alfred Hitchcock and Dolly Tree designed the gowns.

The plot was extremely convoluted and was built around the tale of twin sisters (Nancy and Georgina Brent played by Betty Compson) who differed in temperament, character and disposition and suffer tragedy. Georgina was wistfully charming and self-sacrificing while the unrestrained Nancy was the devilishly fascinating idol of the Paris underworld. The story followed a man who falls in love with a girl who is then deceived by her twin sister into loving her so that her sister’s reputation may not suffer and then sacrifices the love she feels so that her now repentant twin may be happy. The implausible storyline featured mysterious disappearances, mistaken identity, steamy cabarets, romance, chance meetings, madness, and even the transmigration of souls.

Robin Field (Clive Brook) falls in love with Nancy Brent coming over on the boat from Paris. She is strong willed and intemperate, like her father, but she has a twin., Georgina who is entirely opposite. The existence of the sister is unknown to Field. One day Nancy runs away from home to Paris before her love from Robin matures, where she leads a wild life in the Paris. Her drunken father (A.B. Imeson) beside himself with grief at the disappearance of his daughter follows her to Paris. No news comes through of either of them and the mother (Daisy Campbell) prostrated with grief dies. Georgina inherits the estate, moves to London and presumably at this point has dealings with Herbert Barnes
(Olaf Hytton) who plays a lawyer in a conventional stage villain manner. To save her sister’s reputation she pretends to Robin that she is Nancy and finally falls in love with him.

One of Robin’s friends, Paris Art student Louis Chadwick (Henry Victor) sees Nancy in Paris and Robin begins to believe that Georgina is leading a double life. Georgina hearing of this goes to Paris and finds Nancy in a Paris cabaret and explains what has happened to her family. After this, thinking she has taken Robin’s love under false pretences, Georgina breaks down and goes to a sanatorium in Switzerland. Finally, she persuades Nancy to take her place there and so when Robin follows he finds the woman he first loved. Georgina dies and her soul passes into the body of her twin, this altering Nancy’s entire nature. Eventually, all ends happily after the deception is explained and Nancy’s father is rediscovered and restored to sanity.

Cutts started work on the preliminaries of The White Shadow in late June 1923 and by July was filming exterior scenes in rural Devon, London, Paris and Switzerland, before the bulk of the film was shot once again in the old Famous Players Lasky Studio at Poole Street, Islington.

In mid August, with Michael Morton as an absorbed spectator, filming of the Montmartre cabaret scene took place that was described as a big part of the picture. The set was apparently impressive and striking but far from gorgeous, implying that the cabaret was not meant to be one of the more salubrious Parisian venues but most definitely one that was off the beaten track.

It was a long gallery, opening onto a boulevards, with plain stairs descending to the main floor with a couple of refreshments bars in big alcoves beneath the gallery, unadorned boards on the floor and very ordinary furniture and fittings and mirrors, plate glass and marble featuring in the décor.

Crowds of various types (including Tom Waters as an ultra old bohemian artist, Harry Ashton in the guise of corpulent Frenchman and Dorine Beresford in a piquant dancing dress pirouetted by the piano for the delectation of the clients) occupied chairs around many small tables. The entire atmosphere was carefree and reckless with everyone chatting and sipping various drinks. It presented a wonderful picture ‘the Gallic irresponsible happy-go-lucky atmosphere had been wonderful caught’ and the scene was regarded as being more Parisian than anything seen in Paris!

Cutts with the energetic assistance of C.N. Russell directed some full-length shots. A harmless stranger – played by Bert Darley – entered from the street and descended the stairs, he shook off a woman sat on the stairs who gripped his foot, then a man stood up and noticed him, soon all the crowd rose and yelled ‘get out’. The intruder fled and then another visitor Louis Chadwick (played by Henry Victor) arrived and the same thing happened except this character treated everything as a joke and shouted back something rude and was welcomed by the throng. This was a precursor for several close up shots of Betty Compson in the cabaret.

When the film was given its trade show preview in February 1924, the three main reviews were all in accord criticising the story and the lack of continuity but praising the productions values.

Motion Picture Studio thought that although the central idea was a good one, there was a lack of excellence, an unconvincing theme without any real plausibility and that haste had something to do with the picture’s shortcomings in terms of the essential qualities of story and sincerity. As a whole the treatment was careless to the extent that the interest in the story practically ceased after the first two reels.

‘When a production is made in this country with the pick of British stars and the added commercial and artistic presence of a pretty and clever American screen actress of great box office repute one is entitled to expect a better result than The White Shadow…. If the picture had been the first effort of a modest little firm one could understand more readily some of the shortcomings and their causes’.

Further, they thought that the picture had been indifferently edited and titled with stilted sentimentality and bad phraseology. However, they also observed that there was plenty of evidence in the picture of expenditure and Claude McDonnell’s photography was deemed to be even better than in Woman to Woman and the technique of double photography splendidly done.

Kineweekly thought that opportunities had been missed and the action instead of bringing character into play was mechanical and jerky. ‘There is a complete lack of conviction in the way in which the sisters are mistaken for each other, and no attempt at a coherent and well-proportioned sequence of events. Everything happened in a haphazard sort of way as though the plot had been evolved as the production progressed’.

They believed that although Cutts started the story well as soon as Nancy ran away to Paris the action proceeded in a disjointed way by being transported in rapid succession to Paris, back to England, to Paris again, then to Switzerland and finally back to England. There was no attempt to lead gradually to these changes – the changes in scene were too abrupt and happened too fast. They also thought that Betty Compson suffered from the lack of dramatic unity and since she was hardly allowed off the screen for a minute this gave little chance to develop the other characters.

Kineweekly also took issue with the credibility of certain themes. They did not like the idea of the twins being mistaken for each other by Robin Field since so many characters had seen them together and they are so frequently in the same place, that his ignorance becomes unconvincing. The father’s madness was also affected in this quick-change manner. He disappears for the major part of the story and reappears by being knocked down by a car driven by his daughter and Robin; this occurs in a back slum so that the long arm of coincidence is palpably made to over reach itself.

However, they thought that the technical qualities were excellent and the scenic backgrounds both in England and Switzerland very picturesque and artistically used. To conclude Kineweekly added ‘owing to the star’s popularity, the producers former successes and the excellence of the technical qualities, this picture will prove a stronger attraction than the story and construction warrant’.

Bioscope thought that no expense has been spared to make the production an entertainment on a lavish scale but also took issue with the story. Instead of taking advantage of the possibilities for realism and making an attempt at convincing characterisation the plot was ‘so confusing as to be at times bewildering’. As a result they thought that Cutts was happier when dealing with effective scenic backgrounds rather than in the handling of his artists.

They thought that the perpetual double photography depicting the twin sisters was ingeniously contrived but created a situation where it became tiresome trying to distinguish between the two characters and as a consequence there was in fact too much of Betty Compson on the screen. They also thought that this monopoly by one artist gave the other actors little chance to shine. For example, Clive Brook as Robin Field has little to do except shake hands. Equally, they found the rapid transition of the father (A.B. Imeson) from proud country squire to street scavenger far too swift and melodramatic to allow the actor an opportunity to make the character convincing.

In conclusion Bioscope thought that ‘the best part of the production is the magnificent settings, photography and lighting which are worthy of a better plot. As a whole the White Shadow makes fair entertainment as a conventional melodrama, admirably staged (both in the lavish interiors and unusual continental exteriors) and featuring a well-known American star.’

Seemingly The White Shadow was released in America as White Shadows via Selznick
In May 1924 but it did not come out in the UK until October 1924. Although there was plenty of evidence of expenditure in the picture as it was staged effectively with first class sets and costumes which included a big Montmarte cabaret scene it was regarded as a rather ordinary production which fell drastically short of the essential qualities of good story, sincerity and continuity and had a rather unconvincing theme which was indifferently edited and confusing to follow. The White Shadow became a box office disaster and wiped out the profit from Woman to Woman, which basically spelt the end of Balcon, Freedman and Savile.

Edmund Sayag’s first show at the newly renovated Café des Amabassadeurs was Lew Leslie’s all-black production Blackbirds of 1926. Direct from New York, Blackbirds capitalised on the success of The Revue Negre, featuring Josephine Baker, staged earlier in 1925 and was an instant hit.

A sketch of the Blackbirds show in the Ambassadeurs

The inauguration of the new Café des Ambassaseurs with the Blackbirds show was at a private midnight VIP party on 27th May 1926 and was the most fashionable function of the season. The restaurant was packed with an audience of smart Paris society along with American and French stage celebrities. Taking advantage of the champagne, fois-gras sandwiches and petits fours were amongst many others Josephine Baker, Dora Duby, Marion Forde, Sacha Guitry, Yvonne Printemps, Maurice Chevalier, Yvonne Valle, Jane Marnac, the Rowe Sisters, Argentina, Nikitina, Irene Wells, Antonia Adison and the Dolly Sisters.

The show, imported through Lew Leslie, who had made it such a success in New York at the Plantation club, starred Florence Mills and her troupe including the sensational dancer Johnny Hudgins, the Three Eddies and the Plantation Jazz Orchestra conducted by Shrimp Jones with Johnny Dunn, the crack trumpeter and ran for two and a half hours. From the outset all Paris was talking about the show, the performers and the music and it was being called ‘the fastest show in Paris.’

Florence Mills

The legendary Florence Mills made her first appearance by emerging out of a birthday cake carried onstage and sang her first song ‘Silver Rose’. She was regarded as a bewitching little figure, her dancing always graceful and her singing voice clear and high. She went on to sing ‘I’m a Little Blackbird’, ‘I Want Nobody But You’, ‘Dinah’ and toward the end she sang ‘Blackbird.’ The song ‘You Won’t Go to Heaven When You Die by the chorus was also greatly lauded. The Three Eddies were adored for their eccentric dancing, Jones and Jones were highly amusing in their ‘Weerie Willie’ sketch and Johnny Hudgins, the silent pantomime clown, entranced everyone with his whimsical steps.

The staging and costumes were highly admired especially in the Jungle Land, Jazz Came From the South, and the Pirate Den scenes. Dancing was also a big features with an exhibition of the Charleston by several dusky maids in seven different ways, a display of clog dancing and the negro parade of wooden soldiers with the effect of the drums given by the beating of the feet. The initial costumes were  all created in New York by the Brooks Costume Company. However, according to an interview in the Daily Mirror in early August 1926, the English designer based in London, Dolly Tree said she had completed 150 sketches ‘for the new cabaret show at the Ambassadeurs in Paris.’ Perhaps these sketches were for the revised edition staged in August.

One of Edmund Sayag’s innovative tactics was to continually change the programme to maintain interest and encourage repeat visits. Thus, in Early July, Paul Whiteman and his orchestra arrived with a supporting troupe that included Harland Dixon. They were to replace the Blackbirds show, but Blackbirds was far too popular. So, Sayag alternated their performances between the Ambassadeurs and the Champs Elysees Music hall for two weeks. On 16th July Sayag replaced Whiteman’s band with Irving Aronson’s Commanders, added the magnificent ballroom dancing team of Moss and Fontana at the Ambassadeurs and from the end of July included a ballet performance of La Vengeance Des Dieux at the Champs Elyees Music Hall. Later, in August, Florence Mills and her troupe, Paul Whiteman and Irving Aronson’s Commanders all played the Kursaal, Ostend. The troupe returned to the Ambassadeurs at the end of August for a final week with a revised show that was a try-out for the debut of the show in London at C.B. Cochran’s Pavilion Theatre in early September.

Shortly after the opening of Blackbirds at the Ambassadeurs in early June, there was a rather extraordinary altercation with American protests at a negro dancing with a white woman. A group of Americans objected to a coloured charleston dancer professionally called Frisco, dancing with a white woman and a general row was the result. The disturbance started during the imtermission of the Blackbirds show when Frisco, a supposed American but actually a British subject, made his way to the dance floor and danced with the white woman. The management requested he refrained from dancing. His refusal was countered by an order to the tango orchestra to cease playing. When this happened the Negro Jazz band with the show started to play and Frisco resumed upon the suggestion of the white woman’s husband. The Americans again protested causing a further disturbance. The husband complained to the police about the matter saying that Frisco was his guest and dancing with his wife at his personal request. The nationality of the husband and the wife was not determined but it was presumed they were French. Variety finished their report with ‘on the continent the coloured race is not discriminated against as a rule.’

The Lorraine Sisters (Edna and Della) were a glamorous American sister act who were vaudeville entertainers but found fame in Europe in the mid 1920s.

Lorraine Sisters in Paris

They were born Edna and Della Oits in about 1900 and by 1918 were appearing in a vaudeville act that was noted for being similar to the already famous Dolly Sisters. In mid 1921 Edna and Della were appearing on the Orpheum Circuit, and were then signed for Geroge M. Cohan’s show Little Nelly Kelly staged at the Liberty Theatre, New York from November 1922. After vaudeville engagements they appeared in the musical show Moonlight at the Longacre Theatre from January – June 1924 Further vaudeville tours followed including an appearance at Keith’s Royal Theatre in November 1924 assisted by Roy Sheldon and Billy Taylor.

Then in the summer of 1925 they were secured by the management of the Piccadilly Hotel in London for a new edition of the famous Piccadilly Revels cabaret doubling at the Kit Kat Club. They arrived in Liverpool on 26th July aboard Adriatic in time for the launch of the show on 7th August 1925. The cabaret featured Emile Boreo, formerly of the Chauve Souris company and the acrobatic dancing team of Nattova and Myrio. The Lorraine Sisters were described as ‘tall, slim and attractive dark haired girls’, they gave ‘simultaneaous whirls amid white feathers and frills’ and their graceful and clever dancing introduced ‘some of the best body bending and kicking, twists and twirls.’ Their stay was successful but brief and they returned to America in October.

They must have returned to vaudeville and began to feature in stage presentations at movie theatres, including a unit with the Castilian Serenaders at the Capitol Theatre, New York in the summer of 1926. Then, in early 1927 they were booked to appear in the new show at the Casino de Paris, Paris simply entitled Paris that had been launched in late November 1926 and starred Edmonde Guy and Van Duren. Whilst in the Casino de Paris show they also doubled in the adjacent Le Perroquet cabaret above the foyer of the Casino de Paris and one of the most fashionable nightclubs in Paris.

When the show came to a close in June after a six month run they departed for Deauville and a month appearing at the famous Casino, before opening at the Chez Nous cabaret at the Excelsior Hotel in the Lido, Venice from 25th July. They then moved to Berlin and were featured in Herman Haller’s spectacular revue Wann und Wo launched at the Admirals Palast on 2nd September 1927. The other stars of the show were Marcella Rahna (Parisian star), and the dancing of Helen Wehrle, June and John Roper and Earle Franklin plus the Lawrence Tiller girls. When the show closed in mid March 1928 it was transferred to the Apollo Vienna for a month.

For the rest of 1928, the Lorraine Sisters were back in the USA but seemingly returned to Europe in December 1928 but what they did at this time has proved elusive. For the rest of the 1920s and 1930s they continued touring in vaudeville shows in the USA.

It would appear that several reels of the 1924 silent movie The White Shadow, starring Betty Compson have been found in New Zealand.

Story in the Daily Telegraph

Story in The Guardian

It is a shame that so many have heralded this discovery as a ‘lost Hitchcock’ movie. Although Alfred Hitchcock did work on the film and wrote the screenplay it was directed by Graham Cutts and should be reported as such. I am also disappointed at the negative comments about Graham Cutts, for example “There were also stories [that] the named director – Graham Cutts – of the film wasn’t the greatest.‘ He was in fact at the time one of the leading and most successful film directors in the UK.

On my post about Woman to Woman and The White Shadow I wrote ‘The director, Graham (Jack) Cutts had already made his mark directing two films starring Mae Marsh in The Flames of Passion (1922) and Paddy the Next Best Thing (1922) for Herbert Wilcox at the Islington film studios. He was a colourful character, pushing forty, with energy and stamina, and had quite the reputation as a womaniser. He was also the best director in London at the time with a great attention to detail and vision.’

It is also interested to make clear the The White Shadow was a box office flop and although praised for its production qualities (for example all the gowns in the film were designed by Dolly Tree who had costumed the previous film Woman to Woman) there were serious questions about the story-line and what was called ‘a woeful lack of excellence.’

Read more about Graham Cutts and the films Woman to Woman and The White Shadow

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.

The café concerts of the Champs-Elysées were constructed in a very rudimentary way: a few yards from their frontage, planks were placed on trestles to form improvised stages on which perambulating singers took their stand. By 1840 the Champs-Elysées was lit up with gas lamps and the Cafe des Ambassadeurs became a more elegant place with a small stage. The following year the boards made way for the charming rococo edifice that was a centre of fashion during the Second Empire. A roofed bandstand was installed to protect the artists in 1848 but customers still sat in the open air. Every evening from 5-11pm a vocal an instrumental concert was held and every half-hour one of the artists would pass the hat around to gather payment. Some of the more famous singers included Fleury, a comic singer; Jules Moulin; Magne, the baritone; the Casirola family; the Piccolo family and Madame Piquet Wild who had a great reputation for delivering light songs. In 1846, the singer Darcier gained great popularity by singing Pierre Dupont’s famous song ‘Bread’.

In 1848 the Café Concerts in the Champs-Elysées were reconstructed and little pretty kiosks replaced the trestles. By 1861, the city of Paris decided to make the Champs Elysees a unique walk and endowed the café concerts (there were others nearby including the Pavilion d’Horloge, Folies Marigny and Café Morel) with delightful English gardens.

In 1867, Pierre Ducarre, who had made a name for himself by opening a magnificent restaurant at the Universal Exhibition, bought the Ambassadeurs. Under his leadership it became a centre of entertainment for the aristocracy and continued to flourish as one of centre of singing in Paris enduring to the beginning of the 1914 war. In the 1870s it was a regular destination of some of the best-known figures of art and the demi-monde. Edgar Degas and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec portrayed numerous scenes of the nocturnal acitvities, Aristide Bruant performed there and Cheret designed a series of 26 famous posters.

A galaxy of songsters performed at the Ambassadeurs from 1870-1914: Fagette whose bolero jacket was embroidered with real diamonds; Kam Hill, who sang ‘L’Omnibus de la Prefecture and La Garde-Champetre Rose ; Bouligard who sang all his dongs with his trombone; Theresa who rose to prominence singing ‘Rien n’est pas sacre pour un sapeur and La Femme a Barbe; Yvonne Guilbert noted for her Chat Noir black gloves who for several season drew capacity crowds; a talented youngster wearing a straw hat called Maurice Chevalier and Mistinguett who sang about apaches.

In 1903 the trio of Pinard-Cornuche-Chauveau took charge of the Ambassadeurs. The pivotal partner, Eugene Cornuche, was one of the most influential businessmen in France and had just sold the world famous Maxim’s restaurant to an English syndicate and was looking for new business interests. To make the Ambassadeurs an even greater attraction he added an open air theatre and dance hall to the existing restaurant. Later, he would buy the Folies Marigny and build the Municipal Casinos in Trouville and Deauville. The new management hosted all the major stars: Polin, Felix Mayol, Max Dearly, Boucot and Dranem and staged a series of revues with Gaby Deslys (from 1909) and Maurice Chevalier (1910).

After a short period under the direction of Eugene Heros and then under Raphael Beretta and Leon Volterra the venue was taken over by Oscar Dufrenne and Henri Varna sometime in 1917. Oscar Dufrenne was also the director of the Concert Mayol, du Theatre Moncey, des Bouffes-Du-Nord-Concert and the Casino Municipal of Trouville. Under Dufrenne’s direction the Ambassadeurs staged a series of elaborate summer revues that included: Revue Schoking, (1919); La Revue Legere (1920); Paris En S’himmy’s (1921); Revue de la Femme (1922, with Edmonde Guy and Van Duren); Paris Sans Voiles (1923, starring the Dolly Sisters) and C’est d’un Chic (1924).

In early 1926 Edmund Sayag bought the lease from Dufrenne. Sayag was clearly intent on replicating his success at the Kursall, Ostend in Paris to reap an even great financial reward from the huge American contingent that regularly flocked to the Paris each night in growing numbers.

Sayag completely renovated the venue and turned it into more of a superior dining resort than a music hall. Before, the restaurant of the Ambassadeurs was run separately and there were only a few tables on the balcony at the back from which diners could see the show below. Sayag swept away all the stalls and boxes and converted the space into a cool and airy mix of an extravagant nightclub and sophisticated restaurant that had the advantage of being open air in the summer. Shallow steps connected the small stage to the dance floor in the centre of the auditorium for general public dancing and for performers who could interchange between the two surrounded by a myriad arrangement of little round tables with comfortable wicker armchairs.

On either side of the stage were silvery fountains in niches covered by a transparent screen and the orchestra’s (“tango alternating with jazz”) were also on either side of the dance floor. Trellis work covered the walls, columns and ceiling with a massed display of rose hydrangeas, yellow aburnam and wisteria. The décor and rosy lights created a perfectly luxurious ambiance.

Sayag produced four annual shows from 1926 to 1929 each summer. The inauguration of the new Ambassadeurs featured Lew Leslie’s Blackbirds staring Florence Mills, imported directly from New York. It was the most fashionable function of the 1926 summer season and firmly established the Ambassadeurs as the most important theatre-restaurant in the world. For the 1929 season Sayag created a new gambling room to accentuate his takings from his rich and famous clientele.

After the closure of the 1929 show, Sayag announced that the Ambassadeurs would be demolished. In its place was built two completely separate structures – a restaurant and theatre as the Parisian authorities ordered a thick wall, both fire and sound proof, to be built between them. The Theatre de Concorde was intended to be the home of smart revues and the adjacent Ambassadeurs restaurant was designed to be a duplicate of the Central Park Casino in New York.

Clement Hobson (who was part of the Englsh syndicate that owned and ran the Ciro’s restaurant chain) took the restaurant under a 27 year lease from Sayag who was the ground lessee from the city of Paris. The restaurant was a fine room that could hold 600, though this was far above the dining capacity. The stage was small with few possibilities for lighting effects and the dressing facitlities for the performers were slight and far from adequate. Nevertheless, Hobson carried on the tradition that Sayag had started and even though his floor shows were more modest still maintained the Ambassadeurs as the most prestigious venue in Paris.

After five years, Clifford Fischer took over the Ambassadeurs in late 1935 and staged his first show in the summer of 1936. Fischer had worked for the booking agency of William Morris and had helped Sayag book most of the talent for his shows in the late 1920s so was well placed to run the venue. He was also in the midst of expanding his activities with the French Casino project and venues and shows in Chicago, New York, Miami and London. Sadly, the management overreached themselves and the venues eventually failed and with the onset of World War 2, Fischer lost control of Les Ambassadeurs.

Clearly inspired by the growing status of the Lido in Venice as a fashionable haunt of high society,the Lido on the Champs Elysees, Paris, opened its doors on 18th February 1928 and was a novelty being a unique combination of a swimming pool, cabaret and restaurant and was described as ‘the seaside resort of Paris.’

The Swimming Pool at the Lido, Paris

The location of the Lido mirrored the rise of the Champs Elysees in the 1920s that succeeded the boulevards and the Rue de la Paix as the centre of Parisian elegance. On opening it was regarded as the most luxurious and fashionable establishment that Paris had on offer.

The Lido was in the Lido Arcade building and a block long. Electric signs illustrated the way to an entrance, then to an elevator that descended to the basement and opened upon a magical underworld. Multi-coloured lights illuminated a vast hall that contained a bar, a tea-room, a ballroom and a restaurant. Along one side of this immense establishment was its main feature: the biggest and gaudiest swimming pool in Europe, which was about 150 feet long. Built of pink and blue marble, the water had a faint hyacinthine perfume. Skirted with impressive marble pillars the pool was meant to be a miniature lagoon, imitating that of Venice. There were also steam rooms, a Turkish bath and a beauty parlour.

The main ballroom - restaurant / cabaret / dancing

Many of the walls were decorated with paintings in the Venetian manner by an Italian painter featuring blonde venetian beauties after the fashion of Tiepolo figuring in the Venetian carnival. There were also portraits of Parisians in the groups of gay dancers in his friezes and it was reported that the artist scoured Paris to find models for the golden haired goddess who led the revels on the walls. For some the décor gave the impression of being in a lovely Moorish palace while others said it was possibly ‘even more Venetian than the original’ and even ever-so Romanesque.

The Lido was open from about 11pm to 3am for swimming, relaxing, supping, eating and dancing until dawn and a rather high entry fee separated the wheat from the chaff. It was not necessary to take a bathing suit as suits were on offer to hire and there were dressing rooms. A comfortable array of tables and chairs surround the pool where you could eat, drink, converse with friends and watch proceedings and there were couches for those who wished to doze. The first rate restaurant supplied dinner, supper, tea and cocktails and this could be taken in the restaurant, by the pool, in the tea room or in the luxurious bar that situated at one end of the pool.

The marble bridge over the swimming pool

On the other side of the pool was a dance hall or ballroom that was like a doge’s palace draped in heavy scarlet velvets and brocades relieved by gold and silver cords and tassels. The floor was of glass lit from underneath with a reddish light and an orchestra invited you to tango or foxtrot. When the moment arises you could slip on a pair of silk pajamas over your bathing suit and a pair of sandals and go dance.

Special fetes or gala nights with a cabaret were frequently staged and in July 1928 the Guy Sisters were the headlining act. In November 1929 the pool area was transformed into a set for a spectacular Venetian gondoliera aquatic tableaux and the cabaret featured the fabulous dancing of the Americans Fowler and Tamara with Don Parker’s jazz band.

There were also numerous private and exclusive parties staged at the Lido and one night in November 1929, for example, the daughter of an English baronet, married to a Russian prince, gathered all her friends around her for a soiree and all ‘the guests arrived in gorgeous fur coats covering bathing suits.’

In the summer of 1930, the Lido was waking up to the possibility of it’s unique combination of a swimming bath with cabaret and restaurant. At the time there was a ballet pantomime by Maurice Rostand entitled Casanova Chez la Doge which had a dreamlike quality in the appropriate setting reminiscent of Venice and an aquatic performance of a Loie Fuller ballet was staged thereafter.

By the summer of 1931, the Lido decided to invent its own sun and installed special electric lamps arranged along the marble strand of the emerald green water of the swimming pool.

In 1946, Joseph and Louis Clerico took over the Lido and transformed it from top to bottom to create a very special cabaret-restaurant that is still running today.

A sketch of people enjoying the Lido, 1929

In the 1920s, acrobatic dance routines became extremely fashionable and the dances were either described as ‘whirlwind’ or ‘adagio’. But what does adagio mean?

It is in fact a rather ambiguous word and as far as I can see it means many different things to many different people. It is applied to both music and dance and so interpretations are varied and have also changed over time. Certainly in the 1920s, adagio dancing was slow, leisurely and graceful whereas Allegro (or whirlwind) was quick and lively. It was a sequence of well-controlled, graceful movements that was usually preformed by a man and women but sometimes in groups and demonstrated great control, poise and technical precision. Often a romantic type of dance, when done properly it was breath-taking, moving and beautiful to watch.

In 1925, Fred (Frederick) Easter and Ruth Hazelton, a self-proclaimed ‘adagio team’, who were also a ‘whirlwind acrobatic act’ gave an illuminating interview about ‘How to thrill an Audience’ and told a few professional secrets about adagio.

‘People usually think that dancers – and particularly dancers who do any form of acrobatic work – have been studying and training their bodies since they were little tiny tots. I have only been doing adagio work for less than 5 years’ said Easter.

Easter was a country boy who began his dance training by winning several prizes in ballroom dancing competitions in Springfield, Massachusetts, where he came from. He was strong because he was bought up in the country, was always athletic and did a lot of outdoor sports. He enjoyed dancing so much he went to New York to study and at Kosloff’s school met Ruth Hazelton who had been on the stage for many years and had started her career at the age of 5. They got on well and he was delighted to find that her tastes were similar to his. They also discussed a team doing adagio work and made some criticism. He asked rather audaciously ‘why couldn’t we be partners and do that sort of thing as we believe it should be done?’ She surprised him by agreeing.

They began to practice. He tried to pick her up but found himself exceedingly clumsy. So she climbed up on the bar and stepped into his arms. He balanced her for a second or two but the strain was so great he let her fall. They were determined to improve and so practiced for two hours every day for about a year ‘trying to achieve that perfect control and balance that would enable us to do the difficult and precise work of adagio.’

During this time he did not pick her up on the stage. When they got their first engagement their act opened with her in his arms and they arranged things so that they would dance into the wings when it was necessary for him to lift her.

Eventually, after much hard work, he was able to pick her up and hold her in any position and do the most intricate turns when lifting her. Her balance and muscle control became remarkable (and essential) so that eventually she could dive from an 18ft platform right into his arms. ‘She always lands in the same position, for if it should vary even a fraction of an inch and she were not properly balanced in my arms I could not hold her while we dance.’

Fred added ‘the secret of successful adagio is of course exact balance. To do this sort of work your muscle control must be perfect. You must be able to move slowly, for contrary to the popular notion, it takes greater control to move with extreme slowness than to do very quick work. To be more than a mere exhibition of strength, a dance of this type must be beautiful and interesting. Both dancers must remember that the same sense of proportion and beautiful flowing line must be preserved as in ordinary dancing. The lines of the two bodies must be in perfect harmony. There must never be the slightest indication of strain or effort, for the minute a dance of this sort loses its ease and spontaneity it loses all beauty.’

Since Fred was good at sport it is not surprising that he thought sport did provide good training for the male dancer. ‘Strength, of course is an important requisite of good adagio work. In addition to strength, balance and muscle power there must be a tie of sympathy and mutual interests holding the partners together. Unless they really like each other they cannot work together successfully.’

Ruth Hazelton said ‘you have to have a healthy nervous system to do adagio work.’ Once when they were over worked and tired they had an accident when they were doing one of the first appearances – a series of 20 ballets for Graumann’s Metropolitan Theatre in Los Angeles. Each Monday they put on a new dance – they supervised the costumes, planned the dances and arranged the music. One Monday they did a ‘snowflake’ number. The costumes were white and silver. The set was pure white. All delicate and lovely. The act started with a dive. She had to jump from a high platform into Fred’s arms. But instead of landing correctly she brushed against Fred and fell to the floor. Although she was not hurt she had broken Fred’s nose. The audience were oblivious to the accident because they improvised and carried on swiftly moving to the wings to bandaged himself up before continuing.

For Easter and Hazelton it was their mutual tastes in dance that first interested them in each other. Then a friendly understanding developed between them and this along with continued practise was the secret of their success. ‘Unless there is perfect understanding between partners they cannot do perfect adagio work.’

There were numerous dancing duos that performed and excelled at acrobatic whirlwind and adagio work but the most notable acts were: Mitty and Tillio (French), Roseray and Capella (French) and Baliol and Merton (British).

I was rather excited to find this book and needless to say the wonderful cover did its trick in attracting my attention!

Divided into the rather predictable subject sections but with catchy titles such as ‘The Cat’s Whiskers’ all about the BBC (how else do you do it?) the contents far from disappoint. Well written and readable it is a highly entertaining collection of facts, anecdotes, gossip and stories covering a vast array of subjects that include dancing, drugs, cocktails, hotels, department stores, horse racing, night-clubs, boxing, jazz, tennis, fashion, film, stage, books, magazines, suburbia and scandal and murder. All the usual suspects feature (such as Valentino, Cole Porter, Gershwin and Noel Coward) but there are some rather marvellous sketches of other interesting characters like the infamous night-club hostess Kate Merrick and black performers Florence Mills and Leslie Hutchinson.

I was particularly taken with the fascinating sporting sections and the intriguing sections on painting, books and literature and the origins and development of the BBC.

As ever there are a few disappointments. Firstly it is annoying that there is no index and secondly I am intrigued as to why there were no mentions of rather iconic moments in London’s history in the 1920s like the wedding of Elizabeth Bowes Lyon to Prince Albert in 1922 and the Empire exhibition of 1924.

Although the illustrative content was good sometimes it was not quite good enough. Just one example, there was a wonderful piece about Hannah Gluckstien but no images of her or her paintings which if included would have made a much better impression. Presumably picture fees were too high.

The film section was the weakest as it was totally American-centric. There was after all a thriving film industry in the UK and it would have been better to have seen more information about British Film and British film stars. For example, there was no mention of Britain’s favourite star Betty Balfour and although there were references to Ivor Novello why no detail about his series of superb films like the Rat series or even Hitchcock’s The Lodger ?

However, criticisms aside it is a marvellous, light introduction to the thriving goings-on in one of the major capital cities in the Jazz Age.

www.bookguild.co.uk

The Cafe de Paris was one of the most fashionable dining haunts in London in 1920s. Intimate and elegant it was described by Vogue magazine as ‘delightfully comfortable’ and by Dancing Times as ‘the smartest dance restaurant in London…’

A sketch of the interior of the Cafe de Paris showing the famous double staircase

There were several venues that were named the Cafe de Paris. The most famous was the restaurant in Paris that had a long history; there was a short-lived restaurant and cabaret in New York in the 1920s; the Cafe de Paris in Monte Carlo flourished for many years and the rather sumptuous Cafe de Paris in London became an iconic representation of Jazz Age London.

The Cafe de Paris in London opened in 1924 taking over the premises of the Elysee Restaurant, at 3 Coventry Street. It was situated in the basement of the West End Cinema (Rialto) and opposite the Prince of Wales Theatre. The Elysee was probably created at the turn of the century and had been a fashionable restaurant and dancing venue. Even during World War I its popularity was unabated and a range of dancers entertained guests including Givre and Paulette (mid 1915), Oliver and Olivette (late 1915) and a young Noel Coward and his partner Eileen Denis. It was especially favoured by visiting American servicemen.

In the spring of 1924 a syndicate comprising George and Harry Foster, Major Robin Humphreys (sometimes called a Captain) and Edward Dolly took over the Elysee Restaurant and began alterations and re-decoration to open as a cabaret – restaurant providing lunches, dances, teas, dinners and a dance supper until 2am. Harry Foster was a booking agent and manager who furnished the show at the Piccadilly Hotel and was a director of the newly formed Princes Restaurant cabaret that also staged a cabaret. Edward Dolly was the brother of the famous Dolly Sisters and a choreographer and cabaret producer. With Foster he had already successfully launched the first cabaret at the Piccadilly Hotel called Dolly’s Revels (February 1924) and undoubtedly was brought in to stage the cabaret show. They also recruited the headwaiter from the Embassy Club who was called Martin Poulson to add further panache to proceedings.

The original Elysee Restaurant, renamed the Cafe de Paris

One descended a flight of stairs into a little lounge that led onto the balcony and below the dance floor. The main floor was reached by the famous double staircase that did enable a rather grand entrance. It was not too large or too small and a perfect size for a cafe or restaurant of its kind and seated 400. The whole place except the dance floor was carpeted in blue green and decor that was meant to be a replica of the Palm Court of the Luisitania.

The grand opening was on Wednesday 28th May 1924 and every table was occupied and dance, dinner and cabaret cost 15s 6d. Poulsen excelled himself with a dance-supper which began with caviars and green turtle and ended with a delicious ‘Coeur Flottant. At 11.45pm a ‘frothy, bubbly cabaret’ called Summer Time Frolics was staged that had five days for rehearsals.

Martin Broones with Velma Deane (on the piano) and Winnie Collins in the Summer Time Frolics show, 1924

Charles Brooks and Velma Deane gave a delightful exhibition of singing and dancing, Winnie Collins captured many with her solo work, and there was clever dancing by an artistic couple called Ginos and Lolette with their apache dance being an intense little reality drama in itself. However, the star of the show was Martin Broones (an American composer and singer who also composed all the music used in the show) and the Frolic girls. Since Dolly Tree worked with both Edward Dolly and Harry Foster at the Piccadilly Hotel it is most likely that she designed all the costumes. The Crichton Lyricals played from the gallery level and gave the dancers a full measure of well-balanced harmony.

By mid June the excellent dancing due of Ted Trevor and Dina Harris were added to the bill, followed in July by the ballroom dancing of Ronald Greene and Miss Florence Banister who without employing exaggerated or acrobatic steps showed the boundless possibilities of foxtrot, waltz and tango on a modern dance floor during the dinner hour. During August most of London’s nightclubs and dance restaurants closed but theSummer Time Frolics show was so successful that the Cafe de Paris remained open. ‘The nightly ‘House Full’ fortunes of the Cafe de Paris are not surprising. The cabaret public had got what it wanted at the cafe: dancing and a rollicking show amid cheerful surroundings.’

Martin Broones and the Frolic girls from the Summer Time Frolics Show, 1924

The show with Martin Broones carried on but the chief attraction became the legendary American coloured singers Layton and Johnstone. They had originally appeared in early 1924 at the Quadrant Club and were seen by Major Humphries who quickly secured them, spotting their unique singing talent. The duo found the atmosphere and surroundings of the Cafe de Paris ideal for their work, scored a big hit with London’s clubland clientele and were described by Max Wall as ‘one of the most charming singing duos the world has seen.’

The Cafe was the first cabaret venue in London to drop the elaborate show and dispense with the chorus girls in favour of just a few carefully chosen acts. The new show was changed to include the dancing of the American Forde Sisters and Doreen Read and Frank Leveson followed by Joan Pickering and Danny Fer (September) and then the Viennese dancers Andre and Denise (October).

Enthusiasm for the Cafe, as the ideal rendezvous, continued and in one night in early September there was a record in its annals when 250 dancers thronged the splendid new maple wood floor. Within one week as many as 2,000 diners and suppers were served. Layton and Johnson ‘masters of the rhythmical harmony and syncopation sang many new drolleries’ and there was some new dancing from Nancy Jackson. By late October, the popularity of the Cafe and the entertainers was so great that many people were turned away and large numbers were compelled to sit on the stairs leading to the ballroom.

Front of programme for Cafe de Paris, 1930s

Following the French fashion, little ‘Favours’ were created and showered on the visitors. They were most original and comprised slender sticks on which were posies of coloured flowers, black cats with arched backs and glowing eyes and grotesque faces all of which can be lit up by a tiny electric bulb. At midnight the lights were lowered and the effect of the dancers moving around the room with these illuminated favours was by all accounts charming.

Since Poulson had been headwaiter at the salubrious Embassy Club he knew everyone and one guest he made sure to invite was the Prince of Wales who danced for 45 minutes and commenting on the wonderful dance floor. From then on the Prince of Wales became a regular visitor and the Cafe gained its royal seal of approval. Sometimes he would dine there as much as three times a week. The Cafe was also frequented by other European royals and many of society’s leading lights, film stars, politicians, stage celebrities and professional beauties was regularly called upon to cover up their indiscretions as the Café boasted a secret staircase from the balcony to Rupert Street which proved useful for admitting Royalty and evicting undesirables.

Sketch of gala night at the Cafe de Paris, 1926

By Late November 1924, the Cafe de Paris was staging a brief cabaret entertainment during the afternoon dances each day with Doreen Read and Frank Leveson (who also featured in the evening) and Elliot a juggler who did a hundred and one dexterous feats with a pile of silk hats. The Crichton Lyricals played during tea and at night-time the tantalising dance music of the Mayfair Four took hold.

In early 1925 Louise Brooks (later to become the well-known silent screen actress) gained a featured part in the cabaret at the Cafe De Paris. Bewitching the crowds with her shimmy and criss cross knees she helped popularise the new Charleston dance, although she was not the first to introduce it to London. Louise did not stay long and returned to New York in mid February. Meanwhile Frankie Leveson and Doreen Read continued dancing through the spring of 1925 and were followed by Mr and Mrs David Leslie.

At some point, presumably in 1925, ownership of the Cafe changed. According to Variety the original combine did not quite meet expenses during their management and Harry and George Foster sold out their shares to Humphreys and Martin Poulsen. Directly Humphreys and Poulsen took it over it began to be sensationally successful. But Harry Foster did not leave the syndicate entirely. Since he was a booking agent and manager and was in charge of the acts introduced into the Piccadilly Hotel cabaret, he continued doing the same for the café.

Humphreys and Poulsen expanded their activities and first of all decided to establish a summer rendezvous at Bray following the example of Jack May’s successful Murray’s River Club at Maidenhead. It would later become known as the Hotel de Paris and, on opening in the summer of 1925 had attractions in the open air with fairy lamps twinkling in an old world garden, a dancing platform built around a walnut tree and the addition of midnight bathing! Also, in late 1925 the new syndicate – called Hotels de Paris – took over the Cavour restaurant in Leicester Square, which was, renamed the Cafe Anglais.

Advert for the cafe de Paris, late 1920s

In the autumn of 1925 the main attraction at the Café was the London debut of the American dancers Billie Shaw and Barrie Oliver (he later danced with Beryl Evetts). They had achieved a big Charleston reputation in America and gave Londoners their unique take on the Charleston that had been gaining rapid popularity. Also featured in the show was the singing and antics of Norah Blaney and Gwen Farrar, along with rope tricks and stories from the American Tex MacLeod. Later, in November the American singer Nick Lucas performed and was admired for his marvellous timing, syncopation and attractive voice and personality.

At the same time the larger than life figure of Teddy Brown settled down to a long stay. The 24-stone, American xylophonist had arrived in Britain with the Joseph C. Smith band, but made a name for himself at the Cafe eclipsing his own excellent orchestra in more senses than one.

As a rule three or four high class acts, including a pair of exhibition dancers and a singer were presented twice during the evening, first at dinner and then at supper and there were several excellent bands: the Lyricals continued to perform along with Teddy Brown and his band and the Ledor Tango band. The charge of £1 1s for dinner and 15s 6d for supper, inclusive of the cabaret was all well in keeping with other venues.

Theatre World took stock of the success the Cafe de Paris was having by saying ‘they have relied on expensive single turns and have had to turn people away.’ It also observed that the girls who went there were by far the most attractive and the best dressed ever seen in any ballroom in the country. ‘The clientele of some cabarets give the impression that they have emerged from a dingy suburb. They look self conscious and uncomfortable and their clothes lack taste or distinction.’

At the end of 1926, the Kit Cat Club in the Haymarket was raided by police and closed down. By mid May 1927 Humpreys and Poulson had bought the lease and finally it was re-opened as a restaurant in October 1927. The new Hotels de Paris syndicate effectively controlled three of the major nightspots in London – the Kit Cat Restaurant, the Cafe de Paris and the Cafe Anglais. But at the same time as this latest acquisition they were having problems with the landlord of the Cafe who seeing their success increased their rent. A clause in the lease gave them the privilege of terminating the tenancy with 6 months notice. So they announced that the Cafe de Paris outfit would move completely to the Kit Cat restaurant. Needless to say this did not happen and the landlord must have moderated his demands.

Advert for Cafe de Paris, late 1920s

Through 1927 Barrie Oliver was retained as MOC (he was also appearing at Uncles Club and doubling club to club was seen as a first and a novelty). He was not just a wonderful dancer but also talked to people and he fooled about with the Lyricals, the dance band. During September the featured dancers were Ernest and Yvonne, followed by the Americans Miller and Farrell and then the glamorous Tosh Twins.

The Cafe continued to feature some of the top dancing acts in the world: in April 1929 the American duo Fowler and Tamara; in June 1929 the French act of Roseray and Capella; in July 1929 the American act of Rosita and Roman and in December 1929 the British duo Robert Sielle and Annette Mills. In the summer of 1930 the café featured the first appearance in Europe of the American Emil Coleman and his band and the cabaret featured Jack Smith, the whispering baritone, the exceptional dancing of Jean Barry and Dave Fitzgibbon (an American dancing act) and the acrobatic dancer Mary Lee.

Cafe de Paris’ reputation was enhanced by providing the backdrop for A.E. Dupont’s classic silent film Piccadilly (1929). Providing a stylish evocation of Jazz Age London, this sumptuous show business melodrama seething with sexual and racial tension starred the Chinese-American Anna May Wong as a scullery maid in a fashionable London nightclub (Café de Paris) whose risque routines catch the eye of club owner Valentine Wilmot prompting bitter jealousy from his former lover and star dancer played by Gilda Gray.

During the war the Cafe was allowed to stay open and was advertised by the management as being safe since it was in a basement; a claim which was tragically proven to be untrue when a bomb fell on the building on 8th March 1941 and 80 People were killed including Martin Poulson.

After the war the Cafe was reconstructed and refurbished and endured though many decades and many British, American and European artists launched and established their careers at the Cafe, including Marlene Dietrich who made her London concert debut there 1954. Today it is probably the only cabaret in London from the 1920s to survive and is owned and run by Brian Stein as a high profile events venue.

Yvonne was an original musical comedy staged by George Edwardes at Dalys Theatre, London in mid 1926. It followed the huge success of Katja the Dancer, which had run for many months, and was a hard act to follow.

The Programme for Yvonne

Like many musical comedies, Yvonne followed the usual set format of the time – boy meets girl with complications, music and dance. Theatre World thought the story, written by Percy Greenbank, was sufficient and mattered no more than any other musical comedy. Yvonne was the daughter of an old professor with a taste for riotous gaiety. She saved a rather badly contrived ‘situation’ by impersonating a music hall artist during her absence from the stage. At the same time a young man disguised himself as a servant in the professor’s house so he could be close to Yvonne. There are temperamental fireworks from the music hall star and other sundry plots and counter plots before love is allowed to run its course.

The three acts featured the Garden of Professor Savigny’s House outside Paris (1), the lounge of the Scala Music Hall (2) and the morning room at Professor Savigny’s house (3). The show was peppered with 21 light, tuneful and often witty musical numbers with lyrics by Percy Greenbank and music by Jean Gilbert and by a young Russian called Dukelsky (Vernon Duke.)

The cast was described as being a strong one. The attractive Ivy Tresmand was in the named part and thus the leading lady and by all accounts gave her best performance to date. The part perfectly suited her and she was a delightful surprise in the role. Previously her dancing and her unassuming charm had been her main assets and for this role she made her character a pretty appealing heroine. Mark Lester, an excellent comedian with a very fruity style ‘as ripe as a prime Stilton’, was professor Savigny. His engaging, almost confidential manner enabled him to extract a great deal of humour. The part of Lolotte, the music hall star was originally slated for Jeanne Aubert, the French actress but the part went to Maria Minetti who gave a conventionally flamboyant performance. Horace Percival originally played Yvonne’s ‘silly ass’ fiancée (Victor Dulac) but after a few weeks his place was taken by Gene Gerrard who had an easier, more natural manner and was an enormous asset. Arthur Pusey made an attractive ‘hero’ as Maurice de Fremond or Max, Yvonne’s servant-suitor, a young man who masquerades as a butler in the house of the girl he loves.

Ivy Tresmand in Yvonne

Hal Sherman in Yvonne

A novel experiment was the introduction of the American comic dancer Hal Sherman who had previously been a headliner in cabaret. He played the part of a comic waiter cum gardener giving full scope for his astonishingly funny footwork. His inclusion was soon called inspirational and his extraordinary legs were thought to be animated by an entirely separate volition.

The dances and musical numbers were staged by Fred A. Leslie and one number, Teach me to Dance, was lauded above all others. This was Gene Gerrard’s dancing duet with Hal Sherman that was thought to be ‘one of the most riotously comical things to be seen on the stage’. It was an amazingly funny burlesque of dance fads and fashions and Gerrard and Sherman’s new version of that perennial favourite the Apache dance was a sight to behold. Ivy Tresmand’s dancing was also greatly admired ‘one of the few remaining actresses who dance with a natural grace, which charms because it is natural and not the result of determined efforts to beat American ‘board beaters’ at their won game.’

Produced by Herbert Mason, who had been responsible for many of Andre Charlot’s revues, Yvonne met with considerable success during its provincial run before its debut in London in mid May 1926. Theatre World thought that it had a ‘considerably lighter texture than is usually found at Dalys – possible influenced by the modern trend of musical comedies to be like this. Jean Gilbert’s music is melodious and often witty but contains no sensational song hits. All is well played, well produced and staged with a lavishness unusual even for Daly’s.’

A scene from Yvonne

Part of this lavishness was due to the dressing of the show and all the gowns for the principals were designed by Reggie De Veuille, who had also dressed the previous Daly’s show Katja the Dancer. De Veuille had been at the centre of the infamous drug scandal and death of the musical comedy star Billie Carleton in November 1918. He had come out of the subsequent court case badly, became the main scapegoat, implicated as the main culprit and jailed. He had presumably just resurfaced and had certainly not lost his sparkle for designing exquisite gowns that had made him such a well known name 8 years previously. Of these gowns Miss Tresmand’s dresses in acts 1 and 2 were by Worth Ltd and act 3 by Elspeth Fox Pitt. Elspeth Fox Pitt made all other dresses for the production.

Despite the fact that Yvonne had been a success during its regional run, at Daly’s during the first few weeks it was thought that it had certain glaring faults and for some it was regarded as a bad failure. The reason appears to be that it was different ‘the outcome of one of those readjustments to the prevailing fashion in amusements’ and had a ‘slight indecision’ whatever that might mean. Changes were swiftly made and the flaws eradicated. The essentials for an excellent show were all there and it only took a little time for revision and improvement. It compared favourably with Katja the Dancer, its famous predecessor but in many ways was more in keeping with modern tastes and was funny with an abundance of humour. Katja was more of the romantic type while Yvonne was lighter, and altogether more akin to the irresponsible song and dance shows of the time.

Daly’s was regarded as an institution ‘it stands for something peculiarly British. It is also the living embodiment of the value of a tradition and a policy. With Daly’s you always know that you are safe. A certain clearly defined type of show, clean, healthy, full of fun, with a story that does not disdain a soupcon of romance with music that does not scorn melody, with an abiding air of cheerfulness that is as a tonic as a bottle of champagne.’ Yvonne made the grade and became another glittering success.

Nowadays, despite health scares, most of us yearn to lounge on a beach in the summer, wear skimpy beachwear, dowse ourselves in delicious smelling oils and sprays and acquire a gorgeous dark tan designed to become the envy of our friends. But it is strange to think that sunbathing is a relatively recent pastime, so when did it really become fashionable and why?

Suntanning in the late 1920s

For over two thousand years, pale skin has been something that the elite of many societies such as the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans desired. In European society through Elizabethan to Victorian times having fair skin was a measure of status and wealth whereas being tanned was indicative of the working class who laboured outdoors. The rich and privileged stayed indoors and even whitened their skin with cosmetics to accentuate their appearance. With the industrial revolution the lines became a little blurred and many ordinary folk left the fields for working indoors in factories; they too did not bask in the sun and became pale.

However, it was in the mid to late 19th century that bathing in the sea, seaside resorts and the concept of the holiday blossomed to improve the quality of life of these workers and the population at large. Although the fashion was to cover up and bathing attire revealed little, it was an outdoor summer activity that relished the sunshine and the warmth.

By the turn of the 20th century, the benefits of sunlight and air that had been a central part of Hippocrates’ theories were being rediscovered. The connection between exposure to the sun and vitamin D had been discovered and sunshine was being advocated to help avoid diseases such as rickets and numerous skin conditions. For the first time there were social and medical reasons to be in out in the sun.

Old style cover up to avoid the sun

One early advocate of the benefits of sunlight was John Harvey Kellogg (1852-1943), of Corn Flake fame who was also a renowned surgeon, an early advocate of holistic medicine, and the inventor of the electric blanket and the sun bed. His first ‘Incandescent Light Bath’ was constructed in 1891 and helped relieve many medical conditions including gout, eczema, rheumatism and certain forms of tuberculosis. Kellogg was a firm believer in the tonic effects of the general exposure to the sun, and prescribed sunbaths broadly as part of his holistic health regime at his own Sanatorium.

Another pioneer in the emergent disciplines of helio and phototherapy was the Danish physician Niels R. Finsen who was awarded the Nobel Prize for his use of ultra-violet light to cure lupus vulgaris (tuberculosis of the skin) in 1903. At the same time Dr Auguste Rollier opened the world’s first dedicated sun clinic in the Swiss Alps in 1903 with the firm belief and proof that the pure air and bright sunlight cured diseases, most particularly forms of external tuberculosis.

Of course there was also the naturist and nudist movement in Scandinavia and Germany that thrived before the First World War and also extolled the virtues of fitness, the great outdoors and the sun.

The debate over the health benefits of sunshine has never been more intense than in recent times with scares about overexposure causing cancer and some even suggesting that the health benefits are a myth. However, careful sunbathing does allow your body to generate vitamin D that is crucial to a healthy immune system and sunlight has other beneficial effects that sufferers from SAD will confirm.

By the mid 1920s sunbathing had become the new cult. Sun tanning became a health fad and the phrase a ‘healthy tan’ caught on as being tanned became associated with being healthy. Soon instead of pale skin being indicative of status and wealth, the reverse was the case and a tan became a defining factor. Being able to sunbathe became a luxury that only the well-off could afford. And further, the rich could escape the wintry, sunless months and vacation in warmer climes returning with a tan out of season.

Legend maintains that it was Coco Chanel who made a tan the “must-have” fashion accessory. One summer day in 1923 it is claimed she stunned and enchanted French society by stepping off the Duke of Westminster’s yacht with a definite tan. Chanel may have indeed sported a suntan but she certainly was not the first to do so and many others in society had already unveiled their dark side.

Sporting celebrities were some of the first to show off a tan and none more so that the French tennis star Suzanne Lenglen. In 1919, she caused a sensation by playing in short sleeves and hatless, revealing her deep tan. She always wore a white ermine coat for her warm-ups before matches as it looked great against her bronzed physique. By the summer of 1921 getting ready for a trip to America, she was described as having dark hair and dark complexion tanned by exposure to sun and wind on the tennis courts. ‘With deeply tanned skin, bobbed brown hair, vivacious eyes and an ever-ready smile, she gives the impression of free, unfettered joyous youth.’

That summer of 1921 a strange colony was observed on the beach at Deauville. A group of over a dozen women including a Russian princess and several Americans formed a colony on the beach where they devoted themselves to rhythmical dancing patterned after the rites of the Temple of Isis. Wearing very little they lounged on the sand near their tents where they read and wrote poetry and coveted an all over tan.

Elsewhere another phenomena arose. In the early 1920s a group of Americans began to spend the summer on the Riviera. This was considered daring and very strange at the time since the Riviera season was a winter one and all the hotels on the Cote d’Azur closed from late spring all through the summer. Cole Porter decided to rent the Chateau de la Garoupe in Antibes for the summer of 1921 and invited friends to visit and had a grand time. The next the summer (in 1922) Gerald and Sara Murphy rented a whole floor in the Grand Hotel at Cap d’Antibes. Outside they created a beach by removing the seaweed to reveal the sand and dowsed themselves in banana oil and sunbathed. The Murphy’s enjoyed themselves so much they bought a villa at Antibes and numerous visitors dropped by, and in 1925 for example, guests included the famous novelist Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, the film star Rudolf Valentino and Mistinguett. Within a few years the whole character of the Riviera had changed and it became an all year round destination.

The opera singer Mary Garden was also fond of spending the summer on the Riviera at the same time and was considered something of an eccentric for doing so. Mary was almost the sole occupant of the Park Palace Hotel in Monte Carlo for several seasons and spent a lot of time swimming to places ‘where bathing costumes are not necessary’. Needless to say she also developed a rather nice tan as a result.

Bathing beauties at Deauville, mid 1920s

At the height of the Deauville season in 1923, one male journalist solved the mystery of how women manage to get sunburnt all over as revealed at night through their lavish décolleté gowns seen in the Casino. Prowling the beach to uncover the secret he stumbled across ‘a dozen charmers’ tanning themselves in a secluded spot half a mile from the bathing place, presumably wearing very little. Amidst screams of surprise there was a great scurry to button up shoulder straps on the bathing suits and don bathrobes.

An advert for Patou's suntan product, 1930

By the summer of 1925 sunbathing was perfectly acceptable on the Lido, Venice a location described as being the seventh heaven of the followers of the sun cults. ‘You lie on the velvety yellow sand bronzing in the sunshine. Nothing matters except to remember when you have bronzed nicely and evenly on one side to turn over and give the other side a chance.’ It was also noted that bathing wear was becoming increasingly scanty as the idea was to get as much sun as possible ‘for current thinking is that the direct rays of the sun are the greatest cure-all in the world.’

Like the concept of the flapper and the wild Charleston dance, the suntan can be seen as another icon representing the new freedoms following the restrictions of the Victorian era. From the mid 1920s magazines featured women with glorious suntans. The concept of undressing instead of overdressing became favoured. Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubenstein, rivals in the beauty business, introduced tanning oils and lotions to help people tan faster and to sooth the skin. Beauty salons assisted the sun-tanning process because some smart women deemed it necessary to be bronzed before a vacation. Couture gowns were unveiled designed to reveal the tanned body. Swimwear started decreasing in coverage and by the summer of 1924, for example, new bathing suits were introduced that were backless and had the arms and legs exposed.

A new age had arrived where being as brown as a berry was an attractive virtue.

Described variously as ‘The Countess of Monte Cristo’, ‘The Queen of Diamonds’ and ‘Madame Aladdin’, Mrs Smith-Wilkinson can be seen as a society con-artist and one of the first wannabe celebrities who made a rather big splash in Paris in the summer of 1921 causing much debate and gossip in the press thereafter. Whatever was all the fuss about?

A sketch of Mrs Smith Wilkinson

Mrs Smith-Wilkinson (who was affectionately called ‘Peggy’) burst onto the social scene completely out of the blue like a thunderbolt about a year after allegedly marrying her third husband, although no marriage details can be found. The youthful Edward Henry Smith in his early twenties of the Crescent, Matlock (Derby) adopted the name of Smith-Wilkinson at the end of January 1920 prior to marrying Margaret who must have been at least 54 and at least 25 years his senior. Since he was tall and thin and she was short and dumpy and given the age gap they must have made a rather startling match. The fact that Peggy was a constant wearer of horned glasses and also talked exactly like a Bayswater cook must have made them a very odd pair indeed.

Their debut in society occurred in the summer of 1921 when they occupied the Royal suite at the Claridge Hotel in Paris. They then immersed themselves in Parisian society and because of their appearance and extravagance were noticed immediately. The press, of course, were particularly intrigued, especially when it was revealed that in three weeks Peggy had spent a sum variously estimated between £40,000 – £150,000 ($200,000 to $750,000) and was promptly dubbed as Mrs Monte Cristo and with reason. As Basil Woon commented, ‘it is no easy thing to spend $750,000 in three weeks.’ This did not include the items of finery that she had bought with her from London.

Her first extravagance was to order the entire re-decoration of her suite at Claridge’s even though she was only staying for a few weeks. She hired five limousines each with different coloured upholstery so that her car would always harmonize with what she was wearing. She then ordered hundreds of gowns from the most expensive dressmakers on the Rue de la Paix to match the limousines, which she wore with a range of glittering jewellery that she had brought from London. One report claimed Peggy had spent at least £16,000 on hats, £32 000 in gowns and £100,000 for loose diamonds. The figures quoted do not match other accounts and the account of Basil Woon and ones wonders if Chinese whispers simply exaggerated these amounts. Later Peggy did say  ‘I am credited with having paid a fabulous price for a jeweled headdress. It is true that I bought one from a lady who was compelled to sell… but I mentioned to no-one the price I gave….’

Basil Woon first saw her at a Saturday night gala at the Pre-Catalan, the prestigious outdoor restaurant and cabaret in the Bois de Bologne. She was wearing on her head a crown composed of more than a thousand pearls and rhinestones. Peggy claimed she had bought it for £160,000 ($800,000) and had been owned by the Grand Duchess Xenia of Russia. Suspended beneath her chin was a cluster pearls that Peggy claimed was called the ‘famous Shrewsbury pearls’ that were more than 300 years old and bought from the British museum so she could wear them in Paris. These were worth £100,000 although another report said it was a £1 million. Peggy also said her gown was interwoven with more than 300 genuine diamonds and other gems were set in her stockings and shoes. Altogether she estimated her entire outfit to be worth £300,000 ($1,500,000). Basil also noted that Peggy had been giving jewelry as gifts to her new friends and this included a diamond bracelet that she gave the American dancer Harry Pilcer who had given her dancing lessons.

It became known that apart from just making a big splash with her ostentatious display of wealth she was determined to set a style at Longchamps. She said ‘French women have been the style setters long enough. I made up my mind I would show them what real sensations meant. I have a different gown for every day in the year. I never wear one twice.’ Thus, her new husband, who apparently was an aspiring dressmaker, went back to London to supervise the construction of gowns that he was hoping would be the triumph of Regent Street over the Rue De La Paix. The unveiling of his creation was set for the day of the Longchamps racing on 28th June 1921. He arrived from London by plane and brought with him six shapely mannequins wearing gowns to match Peggy’s. All the gowns were in black and white.

Peggy’s gown was white with huge black stripes and she looked like a zebra. She wore a black hat with an immense ostrich feather, her gloves were white with black fingers and one of her stockings was black the other white. Her shoes were studded with diamonds and she also had a necklace of black and white pearls. In one hand she carried an enormous 6 foot sunshade and in another a black and white poodle that had been especially dyed for the occasion. The other mannequins followed in similar attire. She certainly caused a sensation but not one to her liking. Crowds gathered, loud remarks were made and many women were indignant with the common phrase ‘Quelle horreur!.’ One woman said bitterly ‘And the foreigners will think this is French art!’

As the attitude of the crowd became quite threatening, Peggy and her entourage had to take refuge in the ladies retiring room from which she did not dare emerge until after the races. As Basil Woon observed ‘If there is one thing Paris cannot stand, it is an exhibition of wanton bad taste.’ Black and white was definitely out of fashion that year.

Despite her faux pas at Longchamps, for some members of the press she had made Paris sit back and gasp at her ‘carnival of flamboyant extravagance’ and she became known as the ‘Best Dressed women in the World.’ Needless to say because of the press coverage one night there was a daring attempted robbery to steal Peggy’s jewels in her hotel, but the thieves entered the wrong room and left with nothing. Peggy said ‘at the time they came I was in bed with the million pound pearl necklace around my waist.’

Peggy was in fact born Margaret Wilkinson in Warwick, Birmingham in about 1866 (although later her place of birth was listed as Handsworth, Staffordshire). She was the eldest daughter of John and Catherine Margaret Wilkinson who lived at 50 Baker Street in Birmingham and had strange occupations as sword and match-makers and was one of at least nine children and the eldest daughter. By 1891 and, at the age of about 23, she was married to Frank Dunk (aged 46 and born in Kent), a hotel or pub proprietor and was living at 1 Station Street, Victoria Hotel, Nottingham. A son, Henry was born in 1896.

Frank Dunk derived his income from successful hotels in Nottingham and Matlock and allegedly made a fortune by building the first temperance hotel in England. However, sometime after 1901 Frank died and by 1911, Margaret aged 45 had re-married a much young man called Thomas Harold Southerns (aged 29 in 1911, born 1882 in Sherwood, Nottingham) who was a hotel valuer and they lived at 6 the Poultry Nottingham (a public house with 16 rooms) with several servants. Sadly, Thomas Harold died in 1914. It was noted that in various press reports that Peggy had made her fortune in the hotel business in and around Nottingham and had been the proprietress of the Chesterfield House Hydro, Matlock. She had bought shares in one hotel for 3s 6d and sold at 33s 6d.

After her extravagance in Paris, in mid July 1921, Peggy re-appeared in her native town but a press report stated that few people in Nottingham knew anything about her, although some remember her as having been the landlady of the Poultney Hotel, which is a good sized public house. It was revealed that her new husband called her madam and was believed to be a dress designer. Further, it was suggested that she and her husband had masterminded a novel plan to advance their mutual interests by him designing dresses, which various dressmaking firms made and she wore them.

A little later the Nottingham correspondent of the Daily Mail met Peggy at home for an interview. She had already made several shopping excursions to London and was about to go on another one prior to her debut in London society. ‘Most of my best things have already gone to London’ Peggy said ‘what I have here does not include my latest purchases; besides I shall be buying more tomorrow.’ She explained that for her three week ‘society’ appearances she would need to appear daily in at least four different gowns, all of them unique, and many worth hundreds of pounds. She had estimated that she required at least 300 gowns, 200 hats, and 100 pairs of shoes besides opera cloaks and other necessities.

Some of the more notable models included: a velvet coat trimmed with a mysterious white fur from China that is like nothing else in the world; a real Russian sable cloak (costing £15,000) cascaded so that a definite pattern is formed by the furs; a coat of moleskin, the furs actually arranged in a flower pattern; a Peruvian Chinchilla fur insured for £8,000; a bird of paradise hat valued at £2,000; a cloak of Imperial yellow silk, hand embroidered, said to have belonged to an Empress of China and a gown, consisting of mother-of-pearl sequins, over silver cloth with platinum lace at the bottom. ‘If I am the best –dressed women in the world I have a reputation to keep up haven’t I? She exclaimed.

For their three-week visit to London in late 1921, they took the imperial suite at Claridges Hotel and later went to the Ritz. All day long at these hotels Peggy spent her time showing people her dresses and jewels and dancing. They attended to Victory Ball at the Albert Hall in November and also gained access to a charity ball at Devonshire House where she claimed she was wearing a £500,000 gown. Her ostentatious display resulted in much criticism but Peggy excused her vanity on the grounds that it provided work for women and girls.

In early 1922 it was announced that Peggy had decided to dazzle America but seemingly her plans did not materialize. By the following year, things were not good and her marriage came to an end when Edward her husband advertised for work. Peggy was on a trip to South Africa without him. He stated that he had left his wife, had decided to ‘let daylight’ into her supposed extravagances and wanted to reveal the true nature of their extraordinary life together. He claimed that after spending £150 a week at the Ritz Hotel they returned to a meal of bread and dripping at their Nottingham bungalow. He did all the housekeeping duties that included scrubbing floors, cooking meals, washing clothes and working in the garden as they only had only one servant who came in daily. He said that Peggy had promised him £1,000 and a cheque book when they were married, which he never got, and their wedding breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee at Derby station! He borrowed money both for the ring and license, and still owed it.

Despite her frugality with everyday living, Edward insisted she did spend £30,000 on clothes in London and Paris. However the story of the jewelry was another matter and he said that the wonderful necklace supposed to have cost a million was bought for £80, and her Russian headdress supposed to have been bought for £346,000 cost £50. Edward complained that his wife never gave him any money, and that he only had an Army pension of 8s a week.

What made Peggy embark on such a curious adventure? She was a simple working class woman and not attractive to look at but she had amassed a rather large fortune through two enterprising and successful husbands. After the First World War and turning 50 she may well have gone through a mid life crisis. She must have always aspired to seeing life in high society and with money behind her she was intent on having the experience. One must assume that her third marriage was one of convenience rather than love and that Edward married her due to her position and money. She married him for obvious reasons and do not forget her second husband was also much younger than she. Perhaps Edward was indeed a frustrated dress designer and they did, rather foolishly, conspire to make his name in London and Paris society. She clearly conned everyone with regard to the true value and provenance of her jewelry, which must be seen as a means to attract attention and perhaps acceptance. Whatever the reasons, her flirtation with society did not last long and her fame and notoriety over in a flash.

In early December 1924 Peggy was in London, she had sold all her possessions in Nottingham and following an operation died in St Thomas’s nursing home. It was claimed she was 49 years old – she was in fact at least a decade older. It is not known what happened to Edward.

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.

Charles Gesmar

Charles Geismar was born in Nancy on May 21 1900 to a Jewish family. He attended the drawing School of Applied Arts of Auguste Vallin, and at the outbreak of the Great War, the Geismar family sought refuge in Paris. Here in early 1915, Charles met Mlle Spinelly, the famous actress-dancer who was enthusiastic about his work and asked him to design her costumes previous created by the couturier Paul Poiret. Gesmar also designed for L’Arciduc, a show at the Folies Bergere in October 1916 and provided illustrations for La Baionette, La Vie Parisienne, and Fantasio and Le Rire.

Allegedely, effeminate and neurotic, one day in early 1917 in Spinelly’s house, he tried to shoot himself after an altercation with the actress but the bullet went into the lavatory cistern and flooded the house instead. Spinelly was not amused and their relationship ended. Mistinguett, often called the “Queen of the Paris Music Hall” was impressed by his unique talent and took him under her wing as her costume designer describing him as ‘one of those gentle, ultra-sensitive lads, so feminine that you felt one harsh word would have shattered him.’

Over the next decade, although he designed mostly for Mistinguett, he was in great demand by all the main music halls in Paris. His first work for Mistinguett were the costumes for Grand Revue at Folies Bergère (March 1917) He then worked on several Mme Rasimi’s shows starring Mistinguett, at the Ba-ta-Clan including Celle à Miss (1917) and Ca Mord (1917). He also designed costumes for a string of shows at the Casino de Paris including Laisse-les Tomber (1917), Pa-Ri Ki-Ri (1917), La Grand Revue du Casino (1919), Paris en L’Air (1921), En Douce (1922), Y a qu’a Paris (1923), On Dit Ca (1923), Revue Olympique (1924), Bonjour Paris (1924) and Paris en Fete (1925). Gesmar was also busy working for the Theatre Michel (1918-1925), the Palace Theatre (1923-1927), the Theatre de Paris (1923-1924), the Concert Mayol (1923-1927), Music Hall des Champs Elysées (1925-1926) and the Theatre Daunou (1925-1927).

Programme cover for the Moulin Rouge, Paris, 1925

Despite his unique relationship with Mistinguett, Gesmar created costumes and poster designs for most of the stars of the Paris Music hall including Barbette, Maurice Chevalier, Dolly Sisters, Gilda Gray, Earl Leslie, Jane Marnac and Mitty and Tillio, to name but a few.

In late 1923 Gesmar went to New York with Mistinguett, travelling aboard Leviathan from Cherbourg arriving 26th November. Gesmar designed all the costumes for the Shubert revue Innocent Eyes starring Mistinguett that was launched in Atlantic City, January 1924 and having a regional run before being staged at the Winter Garden Theatre, New York on 20th May 1924.

Jacques-Charles who had staged shows at the Casino de Paris, had signed a three-year contract with the Moulin Rouge that had been closed for ten years following a fire. Mistinguett went to the premier of his first show New York – Montmartre on 20th December 1924 and was so impressed that she believed that, if she was going to maintain her position as ‘Queen of the Paris Music Hall’, she had to appear at the Moulin Rouge and nowhere else.

Despite the fact that had had fallen out with Jacques-Charles she managed to gain a contract stating that she would be the leading lady of the next show, would be a co-director of the Moulin Rouge and would have the privilege of her name in the title of the revue. The next show was therefore titled La Revue Mistinguett (1925) and for this and subsequent revues (Montmartre Aux Nues, 1926; Ca C’est Paris, 1926; Paris aux Etoiles, 1927 and Paris qui Tourne, 1928) Gesmar excelled himself.

A costume design by Gesmar

The extravagence of the costumes were crucial to the success of any show and Gesmar, an incredibly precocious genius, had an endless source of new ideas. Mistinguett said that many others pinched his ideas. Gesmar said ‘Let them.. I don’t care. There are plenty more ideas where these came from.’ He was fascinated by bright colours and sequins glittering in the beams of the spotlight and the exuberant atmosphere made of feathers and silks and other sumptuous effects. Gesmar could efficiently condense all these ingredients into his creations, adorned with a profusion of feathers, beads, jewellery, flowers and veils. Once again Mistinguett observed  ‘ideas came pouring out of him… there was no-one like Gesmar for concocting a stage costume out of brilliants and plumes and ospreys.’

No less sensational is Gesmar’s illustrative work for the theatre. He had an amazing and passionate use of colour and a wonderful graphic virtuosity that developed a style that will remain forever associated with the carefree joy and splendour of the golden age of music hall.

Gesmar’s costumes and graphics caused as much excitement at the time that was equal to the that shown a few years earlier by the elegance of Leon Bakst’s Ballets Russes. The seductive and sophisticated elegance of his art influenced generations of graphic designers and he was indisputably a bridge linking the works by other two great artists who worked for the Moulin Rouge, Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) and René Gruau (1909-2004).

Gesmar’s art was equally in demand in other countries – particularly Germany. In 1925 along with Czettel, Montedoro, Erte, Brunelleschi and Aumont, Gesmar created deisgns for the Herman Haller show Achtung! Welle 505! at the Theatre Adrmiral Palast, Berlin. He also provided designs for the Grosses Schauspielhous and the Haller show Schon und Schick (1928) at the Theater des Westens in Berlin. He also worked on the Emile Schwarz show at the Ronacher theatre, Vienna (Der, Die, Das, 1925), the Hubert Marischka show Wien Lacht Wieder with Zamora (1926), and the Emil Schwarz show Sie Werden Lachen both at Vienna Stadttheater (1928).

Gesmar allegedly died of pneumonia in February 1928, before his 28th birthday his short career Gesmar had been amazingly productive and created over 12,000 costumes and about 200 illustrations and graphic works of 60 posters.

Notes

Angelo Luerti is a passionate lover and collector of set and costume designs and theatrical programs and lives in Milan, Italy.

Angelo Luerti’s book Charles Gesmar 1900-1928 contains a biography of the artist, 230 photographs and historical documents, a window on the historical and cultural context of those years, a catalogue of all Gesmar’s graphic art including 60 posters and 50 programs covers each illustrated with analytical cards, a selection of 50 of his costume designs, illustrations from entertainment magazines, and the chronologies of Gesmar’s contributions.

Hardback and case covered in silk, 24x34cm, 192pp, text in Italian and French, 90 Euro.

‘…my admiration for the fantastic work you made so well documented and illustrated! I am sure that this book will be, now, the inevitable reference for everybody who will work about Gesmar…’ Cecile Coutin (Conservateur en chef, Dépt. des Arts du Spectacle, BNF)

Angelo is also the author of Not only Erté – Costume Design for the Paris Music Hall 1918-1940, with the biographies and contributions of 40 great costume designers, made in relation to the history of the main music hall and the shows of those years.

Hardback and case covered in silk, 24x34cm, 288pp, 500 photographs of costume design, text in Italian and English, 90 Euro.

A pdf of sample pages

Both books can be ordered by contacting Angelo Luerti by email:  luerti.angelo@iol.it

A British artist who rose to prominence in the new wave of costume designers and illustrators that emerged after the First World War and made a name for himself in London and Paris before moving to the USA in the mid 1920s.

Hugh Willoughby, 1920

Hugh Willoughby (1891-1973) was born in Croydon on 15th October 1891, the son of Charles William Willoughby and Clara Evelyn (Thompson) and was educated at Reigate and Eastbourne. He was in the regular army during the 1914-18 war and was a prisoner of war in Germany for two years. His first work for the theatre was for a revue in the Hague, Holland (September 1919). But, he was allegedly ‘discovered’ by Albert de Courville, who commissioned him to design the costumes for The Whirligig, (1919). This was where he first attracted attention with The Times asking ‘Who is Willoughby?” He subsequently designed costumes for Jigsaw (1920) staged at the London Hippodrome and The Co-optomists launched at the Royalty (1921). He also designed dresses for productions staged in Paris, including Piff Paff at the Marigny (1920) and Un Soir de Folie at the Folies Bergere (1925) and through the costumier Max Weldy his work may have been seen in other European capitals and other shows in Paris.

His work was characterised by neat, precise drawings full of detail and exquisitely rendered and finished. He might not have been as flamboyant as some of his contemporaries, especially those working in Paris, but he did create some wonderfully well-drawn and intricate designs that were perfectly evocative of specific themes often required by theatre producers in the 1920s. Although he excelled at costume design, he was also equally at home designing sets and in fact perhaps it is for his set designs that he became better known in America.

Programme cover for Aladdin staged at the London Hippodrome, 1920

Costume design by Hugh Willoughby

When he arrived in New York on 22nd May 1923 onboard the President Adams from Cherbourg his first marriage had ended in divorce. He made New York his new home and in late 1923 the Shubert organisation made him an offer to work on their costumes and help with scenic design at $75 per week. He was also allowed do outside work. How long this arrangement lasted is not known but he soon branched out on his own. His first major credits included designing sets and costumes for Ted Lewis’s Frolics (1923), Chocolate Dandies (1924), Mercenary Mary (1925), Castles in the Air (1926), Judy (1927) and Piggy (1927).

At some point in the mid to late 20s he formed the company Booth, Willoughby and Jones, designing and producing costumes and sets for various Broadway productions, cabarets and vaudeville shows including work for Earl Carroll’s Vanities (1927, 1928, 1929 and 1930) and George White’s Scandals. Later credits included Saluta (1934), Tide Rising (1937) and Where Do We Go From Here? (1938) Nothing is known about his later career but he settled with his wife Jill (nee Williams) in Glen Cove, Long Island and brought up two sons. After retiring he worked for the Glen Players a local theatrical group. He died in Glen Cove on 8th November 1973.

All content and images copyright © Gary Chapman/Jazz Age Club and not to be reproduced.

The Hotel Excelsior has always been the focal point of social life on the Venice Lido and is one of the most luxurious and famous hotels in the world. It was made famous during the mid 1920s when it became one of the most fashionable spots in Europe with its very own cabaret called Chez Vous.

The Excelsior Hotel, Lido

The Excelsior was the creation of architect Nicolo’ Spada working with Giuseppe Volpi of the Italian Great Hotel Company (Compagnia Italiana Grandi Alberghi or CIGA) and opened on 21st July 1908 with a festive band, fireworks and over three thousand invited guests from all over the world. Situated on the beach near the Quattro Fontaine it was a vast edifice built according to that unique Venetian style tinged with Byzantine and Moorish influences, intersected with low cupolas and slender colonnades. It had 700 bedrooms, a restaurant, palm court, park, tennis courts, terraces, direct motor-boat connection with the rail station in Venice for guests and its own beach and cabaret.

It was such a success that by 1913, the annual revenue was already exceeding the then astonishing sum of 37 million of Italian Lire. The American financier Pierpont Morgan was able with some justification to quip that ‘In America, those who have visited Europe talk more of the Excelsior Palace than they do of the Doge’s Palace.’

During the summer season from June to September the Excelsior became the playground for the rich and famous and it was here in the early 1920s that the fashion for wearing picturesque summer attire most notably pajamas started. However, it was not the place for the conservative old guard but mostly attracted the younger elements of the ‘smart set’ who found the Lido the perfect place to do little during the day except luxuriate in the sun, swim and startle with trend setting beach wear and then party all night.

Excelsior Hotel, Lido

It was the accepted routine to put on your pajamas when you woke up in the morning but this was ‘not too early, as a rule, for early to bed and early to rise means that you will not meet many prominent people.’ Once in pajamas and reaching the ground floor one stepped across a great and violently airy hall before reaching the beach and the sea via a big terrace. Each guest was given a cabin directly in front of the hotel. The beach was semi-circularised by rows of cabanas or bathing huts intersected by narrow planks and a wider board walk led from the centre of the beach to a majestic flight of steps to the terrace of the hotel. It was noted that even here social selection persisted. ‘The swankiest, richest and most aristrocratic and least dressed occupy the rows nearest the water’s edge. The less prominent socially occupy cabins progressively further from the water and the pajamas and bathing suits they wear become thicker and more extensive the further back they go.’ But everyone did the same thing by lying in the shade or sunbathing with occasional interludes of bathing in the Adriatic, eating green figs and melons and gossiping. Attendants were everywhere at hand to spread beach carpets and red sail cloth awnings for those who find the blaze of the midday sun too intense.

Lunch was taken in what was called the Pajama café and in the afternoons backgammon or bridge was played interspersed with more sunbathing. Gender aside, the entire day was spent in pajamas silk dressing gowns, bathing wear or silk kimonos. There was a tea dance on the terrace in the afternoon from about 5-7 (but this was more for the day trippers from Venice) then cocktails until 7pm when it was time to dress for dinner.

It was only after sunset that any real gayety burst into life. At 8pm the lobbies, reception rooms and bars of the Excelsior took on an air of activity. Healthy looking men and women all tanned by the sun appeared in evening dress. Cocktails appear on every table and then there was an advance to the beautiful pink dining room on the second floor. Dinner was an important function and it was 10pm before coffee and liqueurs were served. Afterward it was time to proceed to Chez Vous which was the part of the hotel devoted to dancing and cabaret. There are few more attractively arranged nightclubs anywhere in the world. The huge room opens onto a special stone floor and beautiful garden lit by hundreds of constantly changing multi-coloured lights displaying glorious floral arrangements and 30 foot fountains.

There was an outdoor and indoor stage where performers appear on gala occasions and two bands usually played. There was no closing hour and the wine lists looks like a bargain sale to Americans. It is attractive, well ventilated and relatively inexpensive. Chez Vous staged gala nights or grand fetes two or three times a week there were additional artistes and decorations and increased entrance fees. However, to many every night was a gala night.

The annual charity gala event staged in the ballroom of the Hotel Excelsior by the American born Princess Jane di San Faustino has in the past been seen as the only event worthy of notice and yet Alfredo Campione, the Managing Director of the CIGA was extremely deft at securing a range of international artists to perform throughout the summer season.

In the summer of 1923, Princess di San Faustino’s gala featured Billy Reardon danced (he had had just completed a tour with Irene Castle and had appeared in London at the Embassy). the Duke of Verdura led of a trio of eccentric dances, Prince Jit of Kapurthola did a lively ukelele number, Count Volpi’s daughter did the black bottom and Lady Diana Cooper served champagne. At another gala in 1925 the film star Mary Corday danced and Gladys Cooper and Miss Florence Ellis gave improvised eccentric shimmy dances to old songs. One of the main acts that Campione presented at Chez Vous was Kadel and Herberi performing an exotic serpent dance.

The 1926 season was packed full of events and Campione staged a series of elaborate galas. On the 17th July was ‘Baccanale et Veglione de Redentore’ (a nautical fete); 24th July saw ‘Fete retrospective de la mode’; 31st July ‘En Dirigeable vers Le Pole sud’ (with performers from the Scala, Milan); 12th August ‘Fete Enfantine’ and 14th August ‘Le Chine a Venice’ (a gala designed by Umberto Brunelleschi reflecting the middle ages). The stars of the Chez Vous cabaret from 25th July were the dancer Mary Corday and the sensational Charleston dancing of the American Dora Duby straight from an 8 month run at the Casino de Paris in Paris.

At the same time Cole Porter, who had rented the Palazzo Rezzonico in Venice had imported a negro jazz orchestra headed by Leslie Hutchinson and persuaded the legendary black singer Bricktop to visit. For the Princess di San Faustino’s charity gala on 14th August, Bricktop organised a mini-jazz revue as the main feature of the entertainment. Her ‘troupe’ comprised some of the top names in society and Elsa Maxwell wore a blond wig and a short dress and sang ‘I’m a little old Lido lady’. Bricktop closed the show dancing the Charleston with the chorus behind her.

The summer of 1927 saw a proliferation of first rate cabaret entertainers at Chez Nous. From 20th-26th June the American dancers Billy Shaw and Bobby Dupree, direct from the Piccadilly Hotel London appeared in various numbers including a tableaux called ‘Ballet Vermal’. They were supported by Circe (an Italian dancer) Sadie Hopkins from the Mascotte Palace, Berlin and the Europa Ramblers Jazz-Band. They were followed by the American ballroom dancing team of Rosita and Ramon, the American Lorraine sisters who opened 25th July direct from Deauville and the Casino de Paris, Charles Sabin and Edwina St Claire and lastly the British team of Claire Divina and Lawrence Charles.

During the 1930 season it was noted that the audience were showing a preference for ballroom dancing instead of the once popular acrobatic work and the world champion British dancing team of Maxwell Stewart and Pat Sykes made a great impression and were filmed by the New York Herald.

Colourful beach-wear, kimonos and pajamas on the Lido beach

The fascination of Venice made the nearby beach resort of the Lido a natural extension of its attractions in the summer. Although it was popular from the turn of the century it suddenly became ultra-fashionable in the mid 1920s and world renowned as the ‘Pajama Beach’.

The Lido is a 12km long (7.5 miles) sandbar that separates the Venetian Lagoon from the Adriatic Sea. Its name comes from “Litus” meaning both shore and entrance harbor. It did not feature much in the history of Venice but was a crucial part of the lagoon system that protected it and was a useful place to anchor ships. As we all know, through history, Venice has always been a magnet for a certain type of cultured and fashionable traveler and in the early 19th century, Byron and Shelley found the flat strip of land that was the Lido and used to ride together along the beach. However, it was not until bathing in the sea became a fashionable pastime in the mid-19th century that the Lido began to be utilised more extensively and in 1857 the first bathing facility was set up and after the turn of the century it became one of the most fashionable beach resorts in the world giving its name to the generic modern term for a beach or bathing place.

Grand Hotel des Bains, Lido

The great hotel building phase on the Lido seemingly started after 1900 with the construction of the Grand Hotel Des Bains followed by the Ausonia (later named the Hungaria Palace Hotel) built in 1905. In March 1906 Count Giuseppe Volpi founded the well-known chain of hotels called Compagnia Italiana Grandi Alberghi or CIGA for short (Italian Grand Hotels Company) by acquiring the Venice Hotel Limited with five hotels in Venice: the Hotel Royal Danieli, the Grand Hotel, the Roma and Suisse, the Vittoria and the Beau Rivage. Volpi decided to exploit the literary myth of the Lido and its position near Venice and with the architect Nicolò Spada, built the extravagant and luxurious Excelsior Hotel that opened in mid 1908 and transformed the Lido into an even more desirable location.

Before the war more Germans than anyone else were attracted to the Lido although all of Europe began to fall in love with it. The growing railway network across Europe enabled easier access and the Rome Express connected Paris with Venice. Cultured, well-to-do members of British society also succumbed to its spell and Diana Cooper and her circle of friends who travelled extensively especially favoured Venice and the Lido as it ‘provided the apotheosis of these festive years.’

Grand Hotel, Lido, Venice

The First World War effectively ended these ‘festive’ years and the CIGA must have suffered considerably. But, after the armistice business resumed and a new era dawned. It was the new Managing Director of CIGA Alfredo Campione who pulled the de luxe chain out of the hole after the War and later, in the early 1920s, managed to pay a 5% dividend when most of the world’s hotels were lucky to pay taxes. By the mid 1920s the chain comprised hotels in Rome (Excelsior and Grand), Naples (Excelsior), Venice (Royal Danieli, Grand, Regina and Vittoria), Lido (Excelsior, Grand Hotel des Bains, Grand Hotel and Villa Regina), Stresa (Grand Hotel and Des Iles Borromees), Genoe (Bristol, Palace and Savoy Majestic), Palermo (Grand Hotel and des Palmes and the Excelsior) and Rhodes (Grand Hotel des Roses).

Of great significance was the opening of the Simplon Orient Express in April 1919 in addition to the Orient Express, using the southerly route from Paris (Gare de Lyon) to Lausanne, Milan, Venice, Trieste, Belgrade, and (from 1920 onwards) Istanbul. The journey time to Venice was 32 hours but in luxurious surroundings and with the benefit of sleeping cars and a restaurant.

Excelsior Hotel

The season was usually from May – September, and although the Excelsior Hotel was the premier location there were many other excellent places to stay. Another first class hotel was the Grand Hotel des Bains also facing the Adriatic with 600 rooms, a restaurant, café, bar, park, terrace and tennis court. Other hotels included the Hungaria Palace Hotel (formerly Ausonia built in 1905 and inland on the main road linking the Venetian lagoon and the Adriatic shore), the Grand Hotel Lido (situated on the Venetian lagoon side), Alb Grande Italia, Hotel Wagner and Parasiso, Hotel Pension Riviera, Hotel Villa Regina, Hotel Eden, Hotel Dardanelli and the Hotel Della Spiaggia.

Although it was easy to walk everywhere along the broad avenues lined with trees that provided good shade, there was a superb tram system with three lines starting at the landing port-stage of Santa Maria Elisabetta. The first to the Grande Stabilimento Bagni and then onto Excelsior Hotel, the second along the side of the lagoon via Malamocco to the Excelsior and the third from Grande Stabilimento Bagni to the Ospizio Marino (marine hospital) and then the Bagni Populari.

One of the main centres of entertainment was the Kurcasino that was connected with the Grande Stabilimento Bagni, the principal bath establishment at the west end of the Gran Viale S. Maria Elisabetta. This contained a large first class restaurant with daily concerts and film presentations in the open air on the terrace. However, the Lido was no public bathing resort. It was a very private bathing resort. Its two miles of beaches were punctuated every hundred yards by fences of barbed wire creating sections of private bathing beaches. Some were attached to Venetian or other Italian clubs and were for use by members only. Others were attached to the hotels and for guests only.

A view of the beach at the Lido, Venice

The Lido quickly found international favour and there were numerous reasons for this. Firstly, it was a superb location, the weather in the summer perfect and Venice was close. It was also part of a huge desire by many to have fun after the war and a general boom in enjoying seaside resorts. With prohibition in operation in the USA and the cost of living much lower in Europe, thousands of Americans crossed the Atlantic to take advantage of all the wonderful sights of Europe. One reason for its popularity among Americans was that Italy was more affordable than any place on the continent and much less than London and Paris. The Lido was not cheap but apparently you got more for your money.

As the years rolled by, many well to do people began to feel that the Northern French resorts such as Deauville were becoming vulgar and as a result the Lido became more palatable. Indeed it was sometimes described as the Deauville of Italy. It also became the new mecca for the Beau Monde – the younger, more fashionable set who loved the fantasy setting where frivolity prevailed and wild hedonism prevailed.

The international press became fascinated with the Lido, particularly because of the unusual trend that emerged there in the early 1920s of wearing pajamas during the day. It became such a hot topic that the Lido became known as the Pajama Beach. Who started this fad is not known but Syrie Maugham, wife of writer Somerset Maugham, the noted interior decorator who popularized the all-white room in the 1920s, was often regarded as setting the new beach fashion with her astonishing pyjamas and high, high heels. Equally, Mrs Lydig Hoyt was hailed as another Pajama Queen.

Fireworks at the Excelsior Hotel

Alfredo Campione of the CIGA clearly promoted the Lido and his individual hotels, particularly the Excelsior, along with help from other local notables. He also staged a range of events through the season and was responsible, for example, for putting the cabaret in the Exclesior hotel (called Chez Vous) on the map and attracting international entertainers. The two women who helped most to turn the Lido into an international summer resort were the red-headed Countess Nina Morosini, the vixenish friend of the Kaiser who ruled the roost of the old Venetian aristocractic society and Princess di San Faustino, American-born Jane Campbell, who held court among the Italians like a Medici at the Lido. She was a described as a perfectly charming woman but when it was called for she could be so nasty that she could frighten people to death. Allegedly, the regal Countess at first loathed the Lido, while the livelier Princess championed it but within time the Countess also came to see its social importance. The Hotel Excelsior was where the Princess, an imposing figure with white hair and a long flowing white dress presided. Each year she organised an annual benefit gala for tubercular children of Italy by staging amateur entertainment in the ballroom of the Excelsior Hotel. The charity event was always one of the highlights of the season and raised considerable sums of money for a good cause.

Lastly, there was the influence of key international figures, namely Cole Porter and the ebullient party organiser Elsa Maxwell, who helped popularise the resort especially to the American and British elite. Sadly, the myth that Elsa Maxwell single-handedly made the Lido still endures. Elsa believed this herself and was fond of making sure other people believed it too. So much so that Fortune magazine in the early 1930s devoted an entire issue to Italy and wrote ‘something happened to the lido that changed it from a pleasantly smart Adriatic Beach to the place – magnet for the celebrities of two continents, perhaps the best known beach in all the world… just what that something was remains an argument. Some say it was nothing more complicated than the world boom, some say Fascism. And some insist it was just plain Elsa Maxwell.’ Elsa also liked to take credit for reconciling the two factions of the Countess and the Princess and suggested that the events she staged in the Lido were so prestigious that the Countess and her entourage felt they could not miss them. One must not forget that it was not just Elsa organising parties, events and galas.

Elsa Maxwell’s first party was staged in the Summer 1921 for Queen Marie of Romania which was an alfresco dinner affair on the beach at the Lido. A grand piano was moved outdoors so that the American classic pianist George Copeland could play Debussy’s Claire de Lune as the moon rose over the Adriatic. In 1922 Elsa and her companion Dorothy Fellowes-Gordon (Dickie) took Noel Coward to the Lido where she arranged a party for His Royal Highness the Duke of Spoleto.

In the Summer of 1923 Cole Porter and his wife rented the 14th century Palazzo Barbaro in Venice and began entertaining on a grand scale in Venice and the Lido. The following summer they rented the Palazzo Papadopolim a 16th century palace and continued their extravagant party-giving. In the summer of 1926 they rented the most majestic of Venetian Palazzi – the Palazzo Rezzonico and if we are to believe press reports the gorgeousness of their entertainments vied with the historical fetes of the Doges. One of their more spectacular balls was the legendary red and white ball where gondolieri in red and white costumes guided tguests into the Palazzo Rezzonico and onto the dance floor. With the help of three titled Italian aristocrats, one of their more bizarre ideas was to take over an ornately domed barge originally owned by the Excelsior Hotel and transform into an evening rendezvous illuminated brightly and moored out in the lagoon. A negro jazz orchestra headed by Leslie Hutchinson was brought from Paris to play. It was designed as an exclusive club for only 150 people but ‘The ‘Arca di Noe’ made only one journey. The band was retained throughout the summer to play at other parties and Porter also asked Bricktop, the legendary black performer to come and join the party.

Noel Coward was a visitor that summer and believed that the sunny sands of the Adriatic close to Venice were peppered with the best people. ‘The wealthy, exclusive nucleus of cosmopolitan self designated ‘sheik set’ migrate with a slightly un-called for air of superiority from Venice to the exclusive Excelsior Hotel on the lido. Here for long days on end the placid shallows of the Adriatic are peppered with bobbing and gesticulating figures.’ Celebrities in evidence included Lady Duff Cooper and her husband, Baroness D’Erlanger, Lady Comebroke, Lady Cunard, Lord Berners, Mrs Harriman Russell, Serge Diaghileff, Serge Lifar, Suzanne Leglen, Prince Frederick Leopold of Prussia, Baroness d’Erlanger, Baroness Gunzburg, Lady Wimborne, Billy Reardon, Lord and Lady Northesk, Peggy Joyce, Florence Walton, Grace Fisher, Mary Corday, Dora Duby, Contessa Frasso and Marchesa Sonuni-Picciardo, Tallulah Bankhead, Oliver Messel and Elsie de Wolfe.

The Lido offered two kinds of bathing – the sea and the sun and people came to unwind and relax. ‘People do not come here for excitement, They come here to wallow in the uneventful – at least by day.’ It is a place to enjoy a lazy carefree life. ‘It is essentially a lazy man’s paradise. And unless you are able to do nothing – and do it very well – there is no reason for remaining here.’

The almost tropical sun came up as regularly as the dawn and shone from a cloudless sky without interruption. The day started late. After some late breakfast everyone headed for the beach where by the mid 1920s sunbathing had become an excepted norm. ‘You lie on the velvety yellow sand bronzing in the sunshine. You rise and walk through a creaming surf into a blue sea.. you come out on to the sand and are dry again almost before you lie down. Nothing matters except to remember when you have bronzed nicely and evenly on one side to turn over and give the other side a chance.’ After a swim, a refreshing drink and a light lunch, some took a walk perhaps to one of the piers for a view of the Lido in panorama to observe the two miles of private beaches, bathing cabins, terraces and tennis courts, the vast hotels and clubs behind them and the open sea in front. Many simply returned to the fun and frolics on the beach followed by playing backgammon or bridg before cocktails, dinner, dancing and cabaret.

Exotic beach wear was essential and all a lady required for a season at the Lido was a collection of brilliantly coloured pajamas or kimonos that replaced the usual sports suits and other afternoon frocks, a few bathing suits and a few evening dresses. It became an accepted fact that ‘The Less You Wore The More Fashionable You Were’ and the fear of appearing in public practically in the nude lost its terror. ‘For at the Lido one can roll out of bed and stroll directly into a fashionable restaurant for breakfast clad only in one’s pajamas with attracting the slightest notice. For the duration of their stay at the lido American and European tourists have reduced clothing to the nothingness of that of South Sea islanders.’

Such was the attraction of the Lido that various nightclubs opened in New York, Miami, London and Paris using the name and trying to capture the allure of the resort. The Lido–Venice club (53rd Street) and the Lido club (52nd Street and 7th avenue) were opened in New York in mid 1924 and a Club Lido in Miami in early 1927. When the Lido Club opened in Newman Street in London in October 1926 its walls had freizes and frescoes representing scenes of the Lido, the Adriatic and Venice plus up to date panels of bathing beauties and sun bathers. A little later the musical play Lido Lady was launched in London which was big success. Finally, another Lido opened in Paris on the Champs Elysees in January 1928, a venue that still retains its name and worldwide fame.

Map of Lido, Venice