Maxim's Paris
Encyclopedia
Restaurant
A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...
in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, located at No. 3 of the rue Royale. It is known for its art nouveau
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that were most popular during 1890–1910. The name "Art Nouveau" is French for "new art"...
interior decor.
History
Maxim's was founded as a bistroBistro
A bistro, sometimes spelled bistrot, is, in its original Parisian incarnation, a small restaurant serving moderately priced simple meals in a modest setting. Bistros are defined mostly by the foods they serve. Home cooking with robust earthy dishes, and slow-cooked foods like cassoulet are typical...
in 1893 by Maxime Gaillard, formerly a waiter. It became one of the most popular and fashionable restaurants in Paris under its next owner, Eugene Cornuché. Cornuché gave the dining room its Art Nouveau decor and made sure that it was always filled with beautiful women. Cornuché was accustomed to say : “An empty room… Never ! I always have a beauty sitting by the window, in view from the sidewalk.”
In 1913, Jean Cocteau
Jean Cocteau
Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau was a French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, playwright, artist and filmmaker. His circle of associates, friends and lovers included Kenneth Anger, Pablo Picasso, Jean Hugo, Jean Marais, Henri Bernstein, Marlene Dietrich, Coco Chanel, Erik Satie, María...
said of Maxim's: “It was an accumulation of velvet, lace, ribbons, diamonds and what all else I couldn’t describe. To undress one of these women is like an outing that necessitates three weeks advance notice, it’s like moving house."
In 1932, Octave Vaudable, owner of the restaurant Noel Peters, bought the restaurant. He started selecting his clients, favouring regular clients, preferably famous or rich. Began a new era for more than half a decade of prestigious catering under the famous Vaudable family. Other famous guests of that time period were Edward VII, Marcel Proust
Marcel Proust
Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...
or Jean Cocteau
Jean Cocteau
Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau was a French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, playwright, artist and filmmaker. His circle of associates, friends and lovers included Kenneth Anger, Pablo Picasso, Jean Hugo, Jean Marais, Henri Bernstein, Marlene Dietrich, Coco Chanel, Erik Satie, María...
, close friend of the Vaudables. Playwright Georges Feydeau
Georges Feydeau
Georges Feydeau was a French playwright of the era known as the Belle Époque. He is remembered for his many lively farces.-Biography:Georges Feydeau was born in Paris, the son of novelist Ernest-Aimé Feydeau and Léocadie Bogaslawa Zalewska. At the age of twenty, Feydeau wrote his first comic...
wrote a popular comedy called La dame de chez Maxim ("The Girl From Maxim's").
Maxim's was also immensely popular with the international elite of the 1950s, with guests such as Aristotle Onassis
Aristotle Onassis
Aristotle Sokratis Onassis , commonly called Ari or Aristo Onassis, was a prominent Greek shipping magnate.- Early life :Onassis was born in Karatass, a suburb of Smyrna to Socrates and Penelope Onassis...
, Maria Callas
Maria Callas
Maria Callas was an American-born Greek soprano and one of the most renowned opera singers of the 20th century. She combined an impressive bel canto technique, a wide-ranging voice and great dramatic gifts...
, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Porfirio Rubirosa
Porfirio Rubirosa
Porfirio Rubirosa Ariza was a Dominican diplomat and adherent of Rafael Trujillo. He made his mark as an international playboy, for his jet setting lifestyle, and his legendary prowess with women...
, Max Ophuls
Max Ophüls
Maximillian Oppenheimer — known as Max Ophüls — was an influential German-born film director who worked in Germany , France , the United States , and France again...
, and Barbara Hutton
Barbara Hutton
Barbara Woolworth Hutton was an American socialite dubbed by the media as the "Poor Little Rich Girl" because of her troubled life...
. When the restaurant was renovated at the end of the decade, workmen discovered a treasure trove of lost coins and jewelry that had slipped out of the pockets of the wealthy and been trapped between the cushions of the banquettes.
In the 1970s, Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot is a French former fashion model, actress, singer and animal rights activist. She was one of the best-known sex-symbols of the 1960s.In her early life, Bardot was an aspiring ballet dancer...
caused a scandal when she entered the restaurant barefoot. Other guests of this time period were Sylvie Vartan
Sylvie Vartan
Sylvie Vartan is a French singer. She was one of the first rock girls in France. Vartan was the most productive and active of the yé-yé style artists, considered as the toughest-sounding of those. Her performance often featured elaborate show-dance choreography. She made many appearances on French...
, John Travolta
John Travolta
John Joseph Travolta is an American actor, dancer and singer. Travolta first became known in the 1970s, after appearing on the television series Welcome Back, Kotter and starring in the box office successes Saturday Night Fever and Grease...
, Jeanne Moreau
Jeanne Moreau
Jeanne Moreau is a French actress, singer, screenwriter and director.She made her theatrical debut in 1947, and established herself as one of the leading actresses of the Comédie-Française...
, Barbra Streisand
Barbra Streisand
Barbra Joan Streisand is an American singer, actress, film producer and director. She has won two Academy Awards, eight Grammy Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, a Peabody Award, and is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy,...
, Alan Beale and Kiri te Kanawa
Kiri Te Kanawa
Dame Kiri Jeanette Te Kanawa, ONZ, DBE, AC is a New Zealand / Māori soprano who has had a highly successful international opera career since 1968. Acclaimed as one of the most beloved sopranos in both the United States and Britain she possesses a warm full lyric soprano voice, singing a wide array...
. It was during the fifties, sixties and seventies that Maxim's, under the management of Octave Vaudable's son, Louis Vaudable, became the most famous restaurant in the world but one of the most expensive ones as well. With his wife Magguy, Louis Vaudable assured Maxim's international prestigious reputation.
François Vaudable, who had been directing the restaurant by his father's side for years, pursued the work of his family, who gave to Maxim's its era of glory. In 1981, more attracted by the scientific field than by the jet-set, the Vaudables proposed fashion designer Pierre Cardin
Pierre Cardin
Pierre Cardin Cardin was known for his avant-garde style and his Space Age designs. He prefers geometric shapes and motifs, often ignoring the female form. He advanced into unisex fashions, sometimes experimental, and not always practical...
to buy Maxim's. It seems that a rich Arab had offered to buy the restaurant and they were very upset at the idea of it being held in foreign hands. Cardin eventually accepted the offer. Under his management, an Art Nouveau museum was later created on three floors of the building and installed a cabaret which he filled each night with songs from the turn of the century.
Chefs that worked at Maxim's included a young Wolfgang Puck
Wolfgang Puck
Wolfgang Johannes Puck is an Austrian-American celebrity chef, restaurateur, businessman and occasional actor. Wolfgang Puck restaurants, catering services, cookbooks and licensed products are run by Wolfgang Puck Companies, with three divisions...
.
Today
Today, the restaurant and the Maxim's brandBrand
The American Marketing Association defines a brand as a "Name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller's good or service as distinct from those of other sellers."...
belongs to Pierre Cardin
Pierre Cardin
Pierre Cardin Cardin was known for his avant-garde style and his Space Age designs. He prefers geometric shapes and motifs, often ignoring the female form. He advanced into unisex fashions, sometimes experimental, and not always practical...
. Other Maxim's restaurants have been opened in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Monaco
Monaco
Monaco , officially the Principality of Monaco , is a sovereign city state on the French Riviera. It is bordered on three sides by its neighbour, France, and its centre is about from Italy. Its area is with a population of 35,986 as of 2011 and is the most densely populated country in the...
, Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
, Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
, Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
, Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
, Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
and New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. The Maxim's brand has been extended to a wide range of goods and services.
In popular culture
- Maxim's is featured in both Franz LehárFranz LehárFranz Lehár was an Austrian-Hungarian composer. He is mainly known for his operettas of which the most successful and best known is The Merry Widow .-Biography:...
's operetta The Merry WidowThe Merry WidowThe Merry Widow is an operetta by the Austro–Hungarian composer Franz Lehár. The librettists, Viktor Léon and Leo Stein, based the story – concerning a rich widow, and her countrymen's attempt to keep her money in the principality by finding her the right husband – on an 1861 comedy play,...
(Die Lustige Witwe) and the subsequent The Merry WidowThe Merry Widow (ballet)The Merry Widow ballet is an adaptation of Franz Lehár's romantic operetta The Merry Widow .John Lanchbery and Alan Abbott adapted the score of the operetta for ballet and retained the style of Lehár's orchestration. The arrangement includes the well-known tunes of the operetta - Vilja's Song Ich...
ballet.
- Georges FeydeauGeorges FeydeauGeorges Feydeau was a French playwright of the era known as the Belle Époque. He is remembered for his many lively farces.-Biography:Georges Feydeau was born in Paris, the son of novelist Ernest-Aimé Feydeau and Léocadie Bogaslawa Zalewska. At the age of twenty, Feydeau wrote his first comic...
's play named La Dame de Chez Maxim (The Girl from Maxim's, 1899) which was adapted into a film The Girl from Maxim'sThe Girl from Maxim'sThe Girl from Maxim's is a 1933 British musical comedy film directed by Alexander Korda and starring Frances Day, Leslie Henson, Lady Tree and Stanley Holloway. A Doctor tries to pass off a singer as his wife in Paris in 1904...
directed by Alexander KordaAlexander KordaSir Alexander Korda was a Hungarian-born British producer and film director. He was a leading figure in the British film industry, the founder of London Films and the owner of British Lion Films, a film distributing company.-Life and career:The elder brother of filmmakers Zoltán Korda and Vincent...
in 1933.
- A popular Parisian urban myth claims that Ho Chi MinhHo Chi MinhHồ Chí Minh , born Nguyễn Sinh Cung and also known as Nguyễn Ái Quốc, was a Vietnamese Marxist-Leninist revolutionary leader who was prime minister and president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam...
worked at Maxim's as a busboy and waiter when he was living as an exile in ParisParisParis is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
in the early 1920s.
- The restaurant is mentioned several times in Jean RenoirJean RenoirJean Renoir was a French film director, screenwriter, actor, producer and author. As a film director and actor, he made more than forty films from the silent era to the end of the 1960s...
's 1937 film Grand IllusionGrand Illusion (film)Grand Illusion is a 1937 French war film directed by Jean Renoir, who co-wrote the screenplay with Charles Spaak. The story concerns class relationships among a small group of French officers who are prisoners of war during World War I and are plotting an escape.The title of the film comes from a...
.
- Maxim's was also featured in the movie GigiGigi (1958 film)Gigi is a 1958 musical film directed by Vincente Minnelli. The screenplay by Alan Jay Lerner is based on the 1944 novella of the same name by Colette...
featuring French actors Maurice ChevalierMaurice ChevalierMaurice Auguste Chevalier was a French actor, singer, entertainer and a noted Sprechgesang performer. He is perhaps best known for his signature songs, including Louise, Mimi, Valentine, and Thank Heaven for Little Girls and for his films including The Love Parade and The Big Pond...
, Leslie CaronLeslie CaronLeslie Claire Margaret Caron is a French film actress and dancer, who appeared in 45 films between 1951 and 2003. In 2006, her performance in Law and Order: Special Victims Unit won her an Emmy for guest actress in a drama series...
and Louis Jourdan. The story focused on the effort of two older women to train Gigi, the granddaughter of one and grandniece of the other, to become a courtesan. The movie is set during the Belle Époque.
- Maxim's is mentioned in the 1979 Doctor WhoDoctor WhoDoctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
serial City of DeathCity of Death-Pre-production:Writer David Fisher had contributed two scripts to Doctor Whos sixteenth season – The Stones of Blood and The Androids of Tara – and was asked by producer Graham Williams for further story ideas...
.
- Maxim's is mentioned in the 1970s British television sitcom Fawlty TowersFawlty TowersFawlty Towers is a British sitcom produced by BBC Television and first broadcast on BBC2 in 1975. Twelve television program episodes were produced . The show was written by John Cleese and his then wife Connie Booth, both of whom played major characters...
. Faced with a food inspection, Chef says to Basil FawltyBasil FawltyBasil Fawlty is the main character of the British sitcom Fawlty Towers, played by John Cleese. The character is often thought of as an iconic British comedy character, and has been deemed unforgettable despite only a dozen half-hour episodes ever being made....
, "Have you ever read George OrwellGeorge OrwellEric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
's experiences at Maxim's in Paris?" Fawlty retorts, "No, do you have a copy? I'll read it out in court!" Chef is referring to Orwell's 1933 book Down and Out in Paris and LondonDown and Out in Paris and LondonDown and Out in Paris and London is the first full-length work by the English author George Orwell , published in 1933. It is a memoir in two parts on the theme of poverty in the two cities. The first part is a picaresque account of living on the breadline in Paris and the experience of casual...
, which gives gruesome details of Orwell's work as a dishwasher in the filthy kitchen of the hotel.
- Maxim's is mentioned in the short story "The Secret of Lieutenant Villar" from the collection Secrets of the Foreign Office (1903) by British thriller writer William Le QueuxWilliam Le QueuxWilliam Tufnell Le Queux was an Anglo-French journalist and writer. He was also a diplomat , a traveller , a flying buff who officiated at the first British air meeting at Doncaster in 1909, and a wireless pioneer who broadcast music from his own station long...
.
- Maxim's is briefly mentioned in both Ian FlemingIan FlemingIan Lancaster Fleming was a British author, journalist and Naval Intelligence Officer.Fleming is best known for creating the fictional British spy James Bond and for a series of twelve novels and nine short stories about the character, one of the biggest-selling series of fictional books of...
's From A View To A Kill and The Man with the Golden GunThe Man with the Golden Gun (novel)The Man with the Golden Gun is the twelfth novel of Ian Fleming's James Bond series of books. It was first published by Jonathan Cape in the UK on 1 April 1965, eight months after the author's death. The novel was not as detailed or polished as the others in the series, leading to poor but polite...
.
- The exterior of the restaurant is featured at 1:14:31 in a film starring Peter O'ToolePeter O'ToolePeter Seamus Lorcan O'Toole is an Irish actor of stage and screen. O'Toole achieved stardom in 1962 playing T. E. Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia, and then went on to become a highly-honoured film and stage actor. He has been nominated for eight Academy Awards, and holds the record for most...
, Night of the GeneralsThe Night of the GeneralsThe Night of the Generals is a 1967 suspense thriller film directed by Anatole Litvak. Set during World War II, the story was adapted from the novel of the same name by Hans Hellmut Kirst. It stars Peter O'Toole, Omar Sharif, Tom Courtenay, Donald Pleasence, Joanna Pettet and Philippe Noiret.The...
. O'Toole's character (General Tanz) described it as "An adequate restaurant, very clean."
- Mentioned in the Ivor NovelloIvor NovelloDavid Ivor Davies , better known as Ivor Novello, was a Welsh composer, singer and actor who became one of the most popular British entertainers of the first half of the 20th century. Born into a musical family, his first successes were as a songwriter...
song "And Her Mother Came Too" which is performed by Jeremy NorthamJeremy NorthamJeremy Philip Northam is an English actor. He is best known for his roles as Ivor Novello in the 2001 film Gosford Park, as Dean Martin in the 2002 television movie Martin and Lewis, and as Thomas More on the Showtime series The Tudors...
in the Robert AltmanRobert AltmanRobert Bernard Altman was an American film director and screenwriter known for making films that are highly naturalistic, but with a stylized perspective. In 2006, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences recognized his body of work with an Academy Honorary Award.His films MASH , McCabe and...
film Gosford ParkGosford ParkGosford Park is a 2001 British-American mystery comedy-drama film directed by Robert Altman and written by Julian Fellowes. The film stars an ensemble cast, which includes Helen Mirren, Maggie Smith, Eileen Atkins, Alan Bates, and Michael Gambon...
.
- Appeared as a location in the 1981 Danish comedy Olsen-banden Over Alle BjergeThe Olsen Gang Long GoneThe Olsen Gang Long Gone is a 1981 Danish comedy film directed by Erik Balling and starring Ove Sprogøe.-Cast:* Ove Sprogøe - Egon Olsen* Morten Grunwald - Benny Frandsen* Poul Bundgaard - Kjeld Jensen* Kirsten Walther - Yvonne Jensen...
, in which three Danish criminals steal a red suitcase from one of the customers by diverting people's attention, switching the cook's famous Sauce Impériale with a typical Danish one, causing everybody to get sick.
- Prominently featured in the 2009 film "Chéri"
- An extended sequence in Quentin TarantinoQuentin TarantinoQuentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...
's Inglourious Basterds takes place in Maxim's.
- Owen WilsonOwen WilsonOwen Cunningham Wilson is an American actor and writer, known for his roles in the films The Haunting, The Royal Tenenbaums, Zoolander, Meet the Parents, Wedding Crashers, You, Me and Dupree, Bottle Rocket, the Cars series, The Darjeeling Limited, Marley & Me, Midnight in Paris, Shanghai Noon,...
and Marion CotillardMarion CotillardMarion Cotillard is a French actress and singer. She garnered critical acclaim for her roles in films such as La Vie en Rose, My Sex Life... or How I Got Into an Argument, Taxi, Furia and Jeux d'enfants...
's characters travel back in time to the Belle ÉpoqueBelle ÉpoqueThe Belle Époque or La Belle Époque was a period in European social history that began during the late 19th century and lasted until World War I. Occurring during the era of the French Third Republic and the German Empire, it was a period characterised by optimism and new technological and medical...
and have dinner together at Maxim's in Woody AllenWoody AllenWoody Allen is an American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, jazz musician, author, and playwright. Allen's films draw heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Jewish identity, and the history of cinema...
's Midnight in ParisMidnight in ParisMidnight in Paris is a 2011 romantic comedy-fantasy film written and directed by Woody Allen. The plot centers on a small group of Americans visiting the French capital for business and pleasure...
.