Nominated for 1 Oscar
- 1 nomination total

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Top cast13

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Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo

Dancers

Léonide Massine

The Peruvian
(as Leonide Massine)

Milada Mladova

The Glove Seller

Frederic Franklin

The Baron

Nathalie Krassovska

The Flower Girl

Andre Eglevsky

Tortoni - The Dancing Master

Igor Youskevitch

Officer

Lubov Roudenko

Can-Can Dancer

Casimir Kokitch

Dancer

James Starbuck

Dancer

Cyd Charisse

Dancer
(uncredited)

Marc Platt

Dancer
(uncredited)

George Zoritch

Dancer
(uncredited)

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Trivia
Completing the film short, the ballet group returned to New York City to ponder their fate. The Ballet Russe impresario Rene Blum returned to Paris. Blum was arrested December 12, 1941 in his Parisian home. Among the first Jews to be arrested in Paris by the French police after France was defeated and occupied by the German Regime, he was held in the Beaune-La-Ronde camp, then in the Drancy deportation camp. On September 23, 1942, he was shipped to the Auschwitz concentration camp, where he was later killed by the Nazis.

Quotes
[last lines]
Narrator: Shall we begin? Very well. Gaîté Parisienne, with the celebrated Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, the story of an evening in a happy, carefree Paris, of long ago.

Connections
Featured in Ballets Russes (2005)

Soundtracks
Gaîté parisienne
(uncredited)
Music by Jacques Offenbach
Compiled and Arranged by Manuel Rosenthal

The movie moguls that ran the studios back in the day liked to make some pretense to culture. For that reason we are lucky in that so many classical artists got to show their stuff on film and are preserved for generations to see.

This is no less true of the ballet than for singing artists as well. For those who love the ballet, The Gay Parisian is filmed version of Leonide Massime's choreographed ballet in which he dances the title role of the Peruvian which he created. The story of the ballet is an eternal love triangle between the Peruvian visiting Paris who falls in love with the glove seller Mlada Madova who has the Baron, Frederic Franklin, who sees her as his personal property.

With the Ballet Russe company performing Massime did a marvelous not only in choreographing, but in selecting the proper music to reflect the Paris of Toulouse-Lautrec. The apache is performed and of course towards the end Offenbach's can-can is performed and worked nicely into the choreography.

The Gay Parisian got an Oscar nomination for Best Short Subject in 1941 and it holds up well today. For lovers of the ballet this is a must.