Meet Louise Weber ( 'La Goulue' ) World Famous Can Can Dancer of the Moulin Rouge

Louise Weber (13 July 1866, Alsace-Lorraine – 30 January 1929) was a French can-can dancer who performed under the stage name of La Goulue ("the glutton").
She also was referred to as the Queen of Montmartre.

It is believed that Louise Weber was born into a Jewish family from Alsace that eventually moved to Clichy, near Paris.
Her mother worked in a laundry. As an impoverished young girl who loved to dance,
Weber is said to have enjoyed dressing up in laundry customers' expensive clothing and pretending to be a glamorous star on a great stage.
At age 16, she was working with her mother in the laundry, but behind her mother's back began sneaking off to a dance hall dressed in a customer's "borrowed" dress.

Dancing at small clubs around Paris, Louise Weber quickly became a popular personality,
liked for both her dancing skills and her charming audacious behavior.
In her routine, she teased the male audience by swirling her raised dress to reveal the heart embroidered on her panties
and would do a high kick while flipping off a man's hat with her toe



Louise Weber was taken under the wing of Jacques Renaudin (1843–1907), a wine merchant who danced in his spare time under the stage name "Valentin le Désossé".
They danced at the renowned Moulin Rouge in Montmartre when it first opened, performing an early form of the Cancan known as the "chahut."

Because of her frequent habit of picking up a customer's glass and quickly downing its contents while dancing past their table,
she was affectionately nicknamed "La Goulue" (The Glutton).

La Goulue became synonymous with the Cancan and the Moulin Rouge nightclub.
The toast of Paris and the highest paid entertainer of her day, she became one of the favorite subjects for Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,
immortalized by his portraits and posters of her dancing at the Moulin Rouge





His paintings portray and echo the life, drama, tragedy, pleasures and magic of Montmartre and Parisian cabarets and theaters,
as well as the sinful scents of the Parisian brothels he regularly frequented.
He loved women. And Louise Weber was his greatest unfulfilled passion and desire.
Despite her refusal to accept his advances or to pose for him he painted her while observing her dancing the Can Can at "Le Moulin Rouge"



Her star power got the best of her when she decided to leave the Moulin Rouge and take her show on the road as a solo act.
she invested a huge amount of money, literally, all her earnings and savings into a show that toured France as a part of a large fair, but unfortunately,
her adoring fans who used to line up to buy tickets at the Moulin Rouge did not like the new setting and entertainment formula.
Her show turned into a catastrophic failure.

Following the closure of her show, La Goulue became bitter and disillusioned .
She disappeared from the public eye. Suffering from depression, and financial difficulties, alcohol began taking over her life.
Two years later, Louise Weber returned to Paris and decided to open her own cabaret,
hoping to cash in on her remainining energy, joie de vivre, fame and eccentricity.
Unfortunately, luck was not on her side.
She failed miserably. Very few customers came to see her at the new cabaret as well.
Louise Weber attempted other ventures, however the curse of failure soon followed her every move and did so to her dying days.

(here she is much later in life - this stands as the only footage of her dancing)



What did she accomplish in the world of French Can Can?
And why so many Parisians, French dancers and choreographers still remember her and revere her?
Well, would it be enough to say that Louise Weber created the French Can Can!? She invented the original Can Can routine,
including the middle and high front kick copied by the New York's Rockets which later became their trade mark and dominant signature.
Also, she invented the legendary high jump in the air and the floor slam (Grand Ecart) of the Parisian Can Can dancers.
Such acrobatic maneuvers were frequently copied by leading stars and world class dancers,
including Shirley MacLain, Cyd Charisse, Sza Sza Gabor, Leslie Caron and especially Maria Felix in "CAN CAN".
Louise Webber was the first dancer-stripper to develop a systematic Can Can style and an assimilated dance routine.