Paris’ Crazy Horse cabaret club doesn’t seem like an obvious place for former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to take his girlfriend Katy Perry to her birthday.
After all, the evening’s entertainment always begins with a dozen dancers dressed in little more than the tall furry hats of Buckingham Palace’s King’s Guard, giving a whole new meaning to “bearskin.”
But the legendary venue, opened in 1951, has become a favorite spot for celebrities visiting the French capital.
Last week, Kim Kardashian wore a corset dress to celebrate her 45th birthday with a private party there.
Other stars eager to be photographed with exotic dancers in recent years include Scarlett Johanson, Matt Damon, Sharon Stone, Rihanna and Johnny Depp.
And famous names strutting across the 19-foot-wide stage include Pamela Anderson, Blackpink star Lisa and Dita von Teese. Kelly Brook was a guest star on the company’s London tour in 2012.
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Meanwhile, regular burlesque performers include dancers with stage names like Betty Buttocks, Lolita Kiss Curl and Santa Stiletto.
Fans describe the place in online reviews as “elegant” and “tasteful.” But Crazy Horse hasn’t always kept up with the times.
A German dancer once wore only a Nazi swastika to cover her private parts, a naked nun act was banned, female performers were weighed weekly and boyfriends were banned by domineering founder Alain Bernardin.
The pressures of the nightclub trade are believed to be the reason Alain took his own life in 1994, aged 78.
‘Celebrated female form’
Since coming under new management in the mid-2000s, the adult venue’s image has changed.
And it has become a global brand, with a version planned for New York and an earlier incarnation in Las Vegas.
Kelly Brook, who stripped down for Crazy Horse in 2012, said: “I thought it was the most incredible show I had ever seen. It was so beautiful to watch and I loved the way it really celebrated the female form. The girls are naked, but it’s so much more than that. The choreography and lighting are so incredible it’s mesmerizing.”
Alain, the merchant’s son, became engaged to a singer named Juliane after his first wife tragically died of cancer.
Wanting to put his new love on the scene, he bought a group of warehouses on Avenue George V, near the Champs-Elysées, in 1951, and launched Crazy Horse.
The club, named after a Native American warrior chief, had a bouncer dressed as a Canadian mounted policeman on horseback.
The girls are naked, but it’s about much more than that. The choreography and lighting are so incredible that they fascinate.
kelly brook
But when business slumped, Alain switched to putting topless dancers on stage in 1953, and a year later he had fans queuing on the street for an act called Miss Candida, who appeared on stage in a bubble bath.
Surrealist artists Salvador Dalí and Marcel Duchamp helped give the place a modern look. And on stage, images were projected onto the dancers’ bodies, adding another distinctive touch to Crazy Horse.
Another key feature was the bob cut wig that is now the club’s trademark.
Among its visitors were famous names such as Elvis Presley, Hollywood icon Elizabeth Taylor and Rolling Stones singer Mick Jagger.
Only one woman in 10,000 has a body good enough to be seen.
Alain Bernardin
In 1968, a new era of liberal attitudes meant that dancers could go completely naked, eliminating the thongs that had covered the last of their modesty.
Alain was very particular about who he hired.
He once said: “Only one woman in 10,000 has a body good enough to be seen.”
Any woman wishing to join the cast had to have a distance of eight inches between her nipples, five inches from her navel to her private parts, and be between 5 feet 5 inches and 5 feet 7 inches tall.
The only thing left is the height restriction, because the dancers have to fit on a 6-foot-5-inch-tall stage with sky-high stilettos.
Thousands of people applied to join the company, in part because of the generous salaries, and Alain kept a tight lid on that behavior.
At one point, wary men were limited by introducing a rule that only male-female couples could sit in the front row, which was very close to the stage.
blasphemous act
Drink and drugs were a no-no.
The conditions, however, apparently did not apply to Alain, who married dancer Lova Moor, whose real name was Marie-Claude Jourdain, in 1985. She was 30 years younger than him.
That same year, he went too far with a blasphemous act called The Nun, which had to be removed from the posters.
He was a very proud man and looked physically deteriorated.
Andree Deissenberg
The club’s scandalous reputation attracted pop star Madonna, who is said to have appeared before her Blonde Ambition tour in 1990.
That decade proved to be problematic. As lap dancing clubs became increasingly popular, the Crazy Horse faced a lot of competition.
No one knows why Alain shot himself in the local office in September 1994, because he didn’t leave a suicide note. But Andrée Deissenberg, the club director, later said: “My theory is that there were many reasons that collided.
“He was a very proud man and he looked physically deteriorated, the girls who had run after him now saw him as their grandfather, his business was not going so well.”
Alain’s three children, Sophie, Didier and Pascal, took control for the next 12 years, before selling Crazy Horse to Belgian businessman Philippe Lhomme in 2005.
Three years later, Baywatch star Pamela Anderson put some gas in the business’s tank by performing a striptease on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle on Valentine’s Day.
Just keep an open mind. Go see it and fall in love.
Martha Von Krupp
In 2010, a new burlesque troupe was formed to perform the various routines on a world tour.
When word spread again, the Paris venue became a hit night with tourists.
Today, a ticket to the show alone costs £104, while a replica of one of the colorful wigs will set fans back £428.
Neither Katy, who was celebrating her 41st birthday, nor Justin, 53, were wearing wigs when they were photographed leaving the Crazy Horse on Saturday night.
It’s unclear why the couple chose him for the big occasion.
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Maybe you heard what the English dancer Martha Von Krupp once said about Crazy Horse.
She suggested: “Keep an open mind. Go see it and fall in love.”
