Madame Arthur

Madame Arthur opened in 1946 as the first gender-twist cabaret in France, which took its name from the famous song written in 1860 by Paul de Kock and performed by Yvette Guilbert.

It is located at 75 bis rue des Martyrs, in the heart of Pigalle, in the 18th arrondissement of Paris.

In 2015, Madame Arthur's building was combined with the adjacent Divan du Monde to form a single cabaret club.

History
Before 1868, when the commune of Montmartre became part of Paris, the chaussée des Martyrs was exempt from taxes on alcohol, particularly wine. Today's 75 bis rue des Martyrs is known as the Musette Saint-Flour, popular for its cheap alcohol. When the city became part of Paris, it became the Café de la Chanson. It is also said to have been a coal merchant's ball earlier in the 19th century.

In 1946, Monsieur Marcel, whose real name was Marcel Wutsman, chose the song Madame Arthur as the name of the cabaret he opened beyond the party wall, already called Divan du monde.

In 1961, the same Monsieur Marcel opened another cabaret called Madame Arthur in Amsterdam with two artists, Rita Del Ora and Capucine. It's now the Heineken Music-Hall. Madame Arthur's, Amsterdam. In 1973, a club called Madame Arthur opens in Copenhagen, where drag queens perform. The establishment closed in 1989.

Bambi's description of Madame Arthur:"The entrance is all cramped, and the checkroom below. We find ourselves in a sort of airlock that opens onto the auditorium. At the other end is the stage. Near the entrance, the bar. Between the stage and the bar, three vertical rows of adjoining tables. Each table seats four people. Sometimes five, six or even seven people are crammed in, thanks to the addition of stools that clutter up the aisles and impede service. The atmosphere is all the warmer for it. Beyond the hall, the offices and part of the dressing rooms. And on the upper floors of the building, there are other dressing rooms and the sewing workshops."On its boards performed renowned transgender and drag artists such as Coccinelle, Baddabou, Cricri, Chantaline Erika Keller, Estelle Roederer, Angélique Lagerfeld, Chablie, Yeda Brown, Dominot and Bambi. Joseph Ginsburg, the father of Serge Gainsbourg, was a pianist there. Gainsbourg himself sometimes replaced him, and composed some songs there for the cabaret revue, songs which were his first compositions but were not published until after his death. Some of those songs (Zita la panthère, Meximambo, Tragique cinq à sept), have not been found.

Joseph Ginsbourg, nicknamed Père Jo, has been the pianist since the reopening, and doesn't necessarily like the shows he accompanies, but has to support his family, Russian Jewish émigrés living on rue Chaptal. "Joseph Ginsbourg, nicknamed 'Père Jo' (Father Jo), was very nice, but when he moved around, he looked like a dead bogeyman". In 1954, Lucien, known as Serge Gainsbourg, took over from his father.

In his early years, Serge wrote Antoine le casseur for "a transvestite" who danced for Mistinguett. He is said to have written a song entitled Zita la panthère, as well as others, since lost.

As soon as Madame Arthur opens, the evening's main entertainer is Floridor (after Molière's 17th-century actor). His tenure was short-lived, lasting only a few months. He was succeeded by Bigoudi, who stayed for two or three years before dying. These last two characters pre-date the arrival of Bambi, who arrives in 1950. Maslowa arrived just after. The latter was considered Madame Arthur's best revue leader by Bambi:

"Maslowa would stand in the room as soon as the first customers arrived and acclimatize them to the evening they were about to experience. He was almost always dressed in pink satin pyjamas, didn't wear a wig, and with his naturally blond hair did a hairstyle that had something feminine about it. He always wore make-up, but lightly: little beard. The lips were drawn in a heart shape, as in 1925. What drew the most attention, and even fixed the gaze, were his eyes. Immense green eyes that could take on any expression, from naivety to mischief, from tenderness to indignation, from admiration to mockery. Most often self-mockery. His wit was not the kind of chansonnier of the time, nor of today. His main subject was himself, a character of a giddy, extravagant, good-natured young woman. I thought Loulou and Maslowa's jokes were funny in themselves. And they certainly were. Sometimes they were. But if the biggest puns like "Have you seen Monte Carlo? - No, I haven't seen anyone ride" were infinitely funny, and every day, it was because our hosts, who often repeated the same gags, discovered new ones and lived intensely in front of their audience. A simple routine? No! Every day, every moment, they recreated every expression, every word. Life itself. Twenty years of uninterrupted success, with no vacations.

Today
Having been closed for many years, it was entirely restored and reopened in November 2015 by Divan du Monde, which has the neighbouring venue. Nowadays a troupe of artists offers the public covers of songs in French, classic or more modern, accompanied by piano and accordion.