One
of the most famous cabarets in all of
Paris, the Rouge has been immortalized
by Hollywood as the epicentre of the “Belle
Époque”. In 1889 the Moulin
Rouge opened its doors and everyone alive
at that time agreed on one thing…
Paris would never be the same again.
Bohemia was in full strength, art and
culture were changing, and society was
deciding that the rules of the past weren’t
as good as their parents had thought they
were. The industrial revolution was in
full swing, and as Europe geared up to
head to the factories for the worlds first
generation of “9 to 5” the
artists and writers of Paris were busy
heading to the cabarets so they could
be “enchanted in a contented disorder
full of joy and vitality”.
Famous
names like Toulouse-Lautrec and Aristide
Bruand were drawn to the sight and it
quickly began take on a reputation for
being more than a dance hall. On the day
it opened the public came in hoards to
see what all the buzz was about; they
arrived to discover a extravagant place
with its huge dance floor, mirrors everywhere,
and galleries that were the last word
in elegance; to mix with the riffraff
and girls of easy virtue, in a garden
decorated with a big elephant with rides
on donkeys for the ladies' pleasure.
Today people from all over the world come
to see the cabarets, which is still in
working order. Dancers still grace the
stage, although as everything in this
modern world, the Rouge is not the hotbed
of revolution at it once was… and
why should it, for the values that it
once embraced have now (for the most part)
become a common facet of today’s
modern world. Many say that if it wasn’t
for places like the Moulin Rouge the world
would be a much more uncomfortable place.
Moulin
Rouge Travel Links |
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