Life’s A Real Kick At Paris’ Moulin Rouge

The cabaret is an example of classic French entertainment that dates back to a time when, I assume, French people were very easily entertained. It was the precursor of the lavish Las Vegas show, and just about every lounge lizard who visits Paris feels obliged to pay homage to this historic institution.

I decided to spend an evening (and $50) at one of France’s most famous cabarets, Le Moulin Rouge, which is French for The Red Windmill. This may explain why the front of the theatre looks like a giant bag of Old Dutch potato chips. Except it’s red. And it’s outlined in neon lights.

Now, before you start thinking I’m going to trash an icon of French culture, let me assure you I am not. According to rumors (totally unsubstantiated), the people who run Le Moulin Rouge would not look kindly upon a negative review. Not kindly at all.

And I’m not crazy about the idea of ending up at the bottom of the Seine with little red concrete windmills tied to my feet, if you catch my drift.

So before I tell you what happened, let me just make this totally uninfluenced statement: I LOVED THE MOULIN ROUGE! WHAT A GREAT SHOW! I decided to skip the $60 dinner, opting instead for a $50 budget seat at the bar, which included a drink. Bargain city! The bartender - A GREAT GUY WORKING FOR A GREAT CABARET pointed out a rather interesting policy. He told me that if I wanted an additional drink, he would have to charge me the $50 bar fee again. “So you’re saying,” I tried to clarify, “that if I ordered four beers during the course of this two-hour show, I would be charged $200?” “Oui,” he responded.

Before I could even begin pondering how they hoped to lure people to the bar with this policy, the show started. Understandably, I was distracted from my mathematics when about 30 women, most wearing only large feathers, walked out on stage. It looked like a beauty pageant had collided with a turkey truck. Which may have happened, because in the post-collision confusion, many of the women appeared to have misplaced the top portions of their costumes.

These were the famed Doriss Girls, named after the first Doriss Girl, whose name, I gather, was Doriss. They had exceptional posture and they were very good at kicking. I wasn’t sure about this at first, but over the course of the show I noticed that, in order to keep their kicks in unison, some of the Doriss Girls were making rhythmic, high-pitched squeals. If they took away the music, it would have sounded like Monica Seles playing a tie-breaker against Steffi Graf.

They danced around for a while (seemingly unaware of the feminist movement) until they were replaced by a man and woman in matching circus trapeze costumes. This couple specialized in handstands.

I realize it sounds a bit absurd but they were quite remarkable handstanders. They could do just about everything on their hands, including dancing the can-can for a few seconds. They could also climb stairs on their hands and, during the piece de resistance, the woman did a handstand on the man while he was doing a handstand. The crowd loved it. And who could blame them? IT WAS A GREAT SHOW!

I don’t remember hearing anyone in the Le Moulin Rouge speak French except the people on stage. And most of them were British and Australian. The crowd, I noticed, was mostly Japanese and American. I tried to get an exact head count from one of the large Moulin Rouge men. The conversation went like this.

ME: What percentage would you say…

MOULIN ROUGE MAN: Eighty percent!

ME: …of the audience is American?

MOULIN ROUGE MAN: Eighty percent!

ME: …and Japanese?

MOULIN ROUGE MAN: Eighty percent!

The handstand act was followed by a series of topless acts. The first group of dancers wore yellow and green outfits with fruit baskets mounted on their heads. I couldn’t tell what look they were going for - perhaps a topless fruit basket.

Then came the international dancing routines. There was topless Scottish folk dancing, topless Japanese dancing, topless Spanish flamenco dancing and topless Russian stomp dancing. Most of these ethnic dances (including the topless Japanese) were performed by topless English women.

The audience particularly liked the ballroom dance routine. The men wore tuxedos and the women wore ornate ballroom gowns. Once again, the crowd loved it.

Then, a topless woman rode around on a real white horse, which was also topless.

In between another series of topless acts (one of which involved dancers wearing giant doilies) were three performances that deviated from the topless theme.

There was a samurai sword-fighting act that seemed to have been thrown in for the Japanese visitors, who loved it.

There was a juggling drummer who played the drums, juggled some ping-pong balls with this mouth and sometimes did both at the same time, which generated overwhelming audience appreciation.

The mime-comedian was, in my opinion, the star of the show, largely because he invited Japanese and American tourists up on stage and then embarrassed the camcorders out of them.

The grand finale was another feather act, except that the women wore bigger feathers and more sparkles. And at the last moment, two women (both topless) with miniature, glowing Eiffel Towers on their heads, “floated” out over the audience in automated hanging chairs. Naturally, the audience went wild. I mean how could you not appreciate this?