Montmartre, la nuit

Between 1919 and 1939, Montmartre became the point of convergence of every migration and every innovation — in 1930, France was the world’s leading country of immigration, ahead of the United States. This human mosaic found a common language in dance: Montmartre became a “second Harlem”, where musicians, dancers and artists from all over the world crossed paths. The team behind Noire — Best Immersive Work at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival — reunites in full to relive this history in one night of celebration.

Welcomed as a V.I.P. guest, the spectator first visits the dressing rooms: on approaching each door, a virtual vignette is revealed — Eastern European musicians tuning their violins, dancers in feathered headdresses, a magician chasing his rabbit. After passing upstage among the final touch-ups, the spectator takes a seat in the cabaret room, between round tables and stools.

A shadow theatre tells the story of the venue interwoven with history at large, then the newsreels come to life: protagonists step out of the archives and materialize in the cabaret, while the cancan dancers enter the images in turn. Spectators are invited to dance — charleston, black bottom, lindy hop — up to the grand finale shared between the real and the virtual audience.

Then the front page announcing the 1929 crash appears at the door: the party fades, the cabaret empties, the walls dissolve — before a final ascent above the rooftops of Paris, carried by an anthem of resistance. “The cabaret no longer exists, but the show lives on within us.”