The Orient Express: A Golden Era of Travel

(dramatic music) (whistle blowing) Comm: For over a hundred years, the Orient Express, the world's most iconic train, crossed Europe.

If you were traveling on the Orient Express in its golden age, this is the kind of carriage you would be traveling on.

Until it's withdrawal, the train tied Europe together.

Prince Ferdinand was quoted in saying that the Orient Express is of vital interest to us.

A service famed for its glamour and luxury... This space was for the crme de la crme, the best of the best.

...that became world famous.

The Cold War made the Orient Express the hotbed of spice.

And whose legacy is still felt.

Let's say 150 years ago you came here with the Orient Express, you would have seen exactly the same mosque of today.

(upbeat music) In this series, we'll take a 2,000-mile journey across Europe.

It's always a very exciting moment when we are doing a route for the first time.

And follow a new luxury train as it retraces the fabled route, exploring the history of a golden age of train travel along the way.

(jaunty music) During the railway golden age, passengers could buy a ticket that would take them from London all the way to Istanbul, the gateway to the east.

Orient Express passengers caught a connecting boat train to the south coast of England... before crossing the Channel by ferry to northern France and onwards to Paris.

There they joined the iconic train and traveled through Munich, Vienna and Budapest before arriving at its final destination, Istanbul.

(vivacious music) (train horn blowing) On the first part of the journey between London and Paris, the height of luxury... You've got people who were spending quite a bit of money to be on the Orient Express.

This is the experience that they want.

...the cutting edge of cool... People who were traveling with the Orient Express actually just to have a look at what was the most modern part of the world.

...and a night passengers would never forget.

For the passengers of the Orient Express, the Moulin Rouge really was a must-do.

It was at that time already the most famous cabaret in the world.

(cheering & applause) (upbeat music) Interwar London was a wealthy imperial capital, and by the 1920s, the largest city in the world.

The wealthy and influential expected the height of sophistication.

And train companies did not disappoint.

The Orient Express never called at London directly.

But passengers from the city boarded a boat train that connected with the Orient Express in France.

Passengers boarded here at Victoria Station.

It's such an impressive station, Victoria Station, the gateway to the continent.

And here we have beautiful Portland stone and this beautiful baroque design.

Hazel Baker is a historian and tour guide who has a deep love for this station.

Hazel: We have four mermaid caryatids.

Here they are, holding up the station themselves, also with boat trains under their arms.

In the middle we have a beautiful festoon here, shrouded with the cornucopia, horns of plenty, filled with beautiful fruits and then really exotic flowers.

And on top of all these beautiful festoons is the crown, reminding us Victoria Station is named after Queen Victoria.

Opened in the 1860s, the station was originally run by two companies, who were arch-rivals.

Here are Southern Railways then we've got The Brighton Line on the other side.

Two separate stations, one next to each other, competing for that attention.

A huge wall was built down the middle to make sure that passengers didn't accidentally stray onto their rival's platforms.

It wasn't until 1923 the two stations were finally united.

And here the archway would have said, "The Gateway to the Continent."

(uplifting music) If I'd been standing here, getting on the Orient Express, I think I would have felt real excitement.

You would've smelled the steam and the coal.

You would've felt the vibrations around you.

You would've seen all the porters busily carrying everybody else's luggage as well.

Everybody in their finest attire, eager to look their best and start their adventure towards the continent.

Victoria Station had everything you might need, even a bank.

'Course, you need your traveler's checks, you need your foreign money, and here at Victoria Station you were able to do all your banking requirements.

This was the second bank ever to be built on a railway platform.

So, this here is the night safe.

So, this is where people would be able to deposit their money quite safely whilst the bank is closed.

So, you'd slide that back and you'll be able to put your deposit in there nice and safe.

Right here there used to be the departures board.

All manually changed.

All the different destinations, you had Vienna, Brussels, over 400 destinations from this station alone.

It's really quite remarkable.

And you also had a map of Europe so, you could see exactly how far across the continent we were able to get to from right here.

The station was rebuilt in the 1980s and 1990s, sweeping away a lot of its original grandeur.

But it's still there, if you know where to look.

This hotel opened in 1862.

It was supposed to be the greatest hotel to be built at the time.

And looking at it, you can tell.

We've got these fierce, majestic lions looking down at us.

And also there are two familiar faces.

We have Queen Victoria and Albert, Prince Consort.

I think we're in good company.

(upbeat music) Originally named The Grosvenor, this Grade II listed hotel was designed to impress.

(anticipatory music) Wow, this is gorgeous.

The chandelier would've been gaslit, of course, so, extra sparkle there.

And all of this gold, it's actually real gold.

Exquisite.

During its most recent restoration, the columns were re-gilded and the original white marble pillars brought back to their former glory.

You know you've made it when you've been here.

I love this place.

This was the first class waiting room.

Look at it, the size of it.

I love it.

I came here when I want to feel a little bit bougie, have a nice cocktail, and soak in that atmosphere.

This space was for the crme de la crme, the best of the best.

(gentle music) There's something quite special also about being able to see the concourse through these huge glass windows.

And you're up above it all, above all the normal hoi polloi on the street.

You're able to see your train, you'll be able to see all the porters, you'll be able to see maybe your maid sitting on a bench waiting to get onto the third-class train as well.

You're above it all, and you can relax before your journey begins.

A hundred years ago, sitting at this bar, it would have been filled with smoke, for a start.

That's not from the train stations, that's from the pipes and the cigars that you could also buy here.

You'd have seen celebrities here, you'd have seen foreign secretaries here, all waiting to get on the first-class carriage of their train.

And there would have been a quiet ambiance, I think, rather than the hustle and bustle from the concourse.

And when it was time to leave, you'd use your very own private exit, and you'd probably be escorted across the concourse onto your luxury train.

(vivacious music) The days of opulent transcontinental trains may have passed here at Victoria, but on special occasions, you can still relive the golden years.

(train rattling) On this, the Sussex Belle, a steam-hauled heritage train service that goes to the south coast, like the boat trains of old.

(train chugging) And like today, those passengers would've been excited to have started their adventure.

(upbeat music) (train horn blowing) A hundred years ago, with London fading into the distance, passengers' 2,000-mile journey to Istanbul on a luxury train service had begun.

The first section of the journey was the 77 miles from London to Folkestone on a connecting boat train.

There, passengers would disembark and catch a steamship to France.

Wealthy passengers connecting to the Orient Express in France would take a boat train, such as the Golden Arrow.

This First Class-only service offered effortless luxury... with an onboard bar and dining car, and luggage checked through to your final destination.

The trains were a popular haunt for dignitaries and film stars.

But it was an altogether less flashy passenger who would make the Orient Express infamous... Agatha Christie.

Tina: So, Agatha Christie is the world's best-selling author.

She's only outsold by the Bible and Shakespeare.

And her novel, Murder on the Orient Express is still as popular today as it was when it was first released.

Tina Hodgkinson is a guide and Agatha Christie historian who has researched the real-life inspiration behind her novels.

One of the worst periods of Agatha's life was the late 1920s, when her mother died and she got divorced.

So, she decides to book a holiday and she's gonna go off to the Caribbean.

However, two days before she's due to sail, she goes to a dinner party.

And amongst the friends is a naval officer.

And he tells her stories of the wonderful treasures that are coming out from Mesopotamia.

And Agatha is enthralled by this.

So much so that the next morning she basically changes her plans.

She's going to travel on the Orient Express to have a look at the artifacts that had been found.

Agatha had seen the Orient Express when she was a child.

It was on her wish-list.

That was something she really wanted to do.

The archaeologist, Leonard Woolley, was excavating the ancient city of Ur in modern-day Iraq.

A key member of his team was his assistant, Max Mallowan.

And when Agatha arrived, Max was tasked with the job of showing her around.

Agatha, at the end of the trip, was due to go and do some traveling.

However, she gets a message that her daughter, Rosalind, is seriously ill.

And what she decides to do is go back on the Orient Express.

Max decides to travel with her and he supports her through the anxiety, because we're talking about a trip that will take four, five, six days to get back.

And all that time she's worried about the welfare of her daughter.

And really, for me, that really cements the relationship.

That's when she knew he was a keeper.

(romantic music) Christie's daughter recovered, and over the next ten years, she and Mallowan traveled frequently on the Orient Express.

It was the inspiration behind her most famous novel, featuring the detective Hercule Poirot, who is also a passenger on the train.

Tina: Poirot retires to bed in the evening, only to wake up the next morning to find that in one of the neighboring compartments, a businessman called Ratchett has been murdered.

His bedroom door is locked, the window is open, and there's been a snowstorm during the night.

They can't progress any further, but there are no footprints in the snow, and it's for Poirot to investigate.

The incident was based on a real-life episode.

Tina: In 1929, the Orient Express was just outside Istanbul when it got caught in an enormous snowdrift.

It had been a terrible winter, and the train was stuck in the snow for several days.

Agatha had her own trapped-on-the-Orient-Express story as well.

There were floods, which wiped away some of the railway track, and she was stuck on the Orient Express for two days.

And while she was on the train, she made observations, and what she captured was the other guests, how they behaved, how they responded, what they were like.

And they would help to create the characters that would appear in the novel.

Even today, over 90 years since Murder on the Orient Express was first published, it is still the most famous novel about a train ever written.

(light-hearted music) Seventy miles from London, the boat train approached the south coast of England, and for its passengers, the final stretch of their journey on British soil.

Today, trains stop at Folkestone Central Station, but passengers bound for the Orient Express would have headed straight towards the harbor on tracks that are long abandoned and visible only from above.

This steep one-mile branch line took passengers down from the main line to Folkestone Harbour.

Initially built for freight, it soon started to transport passengers heading to the continent.

Helen: So, if you were stood here 100 years ago, this is a really busy, bustling port.

There's a lot of freight coming in, there's a lot of coal going out.

We've got big ships, we've got small ships, the fishing fleet, but we've also got the passenger lines coming through direct from London.

It's the first rail-sea-rail link in the world that actually takes you from one country to another.

And it comes down the viaduct, which we're standing on now.

So, this line really made Folkestone special.

Helen Sharp is a journalist and broadcaster who writes about Folkestone and its past.

Coming down the viaduct on two lines would be steam trains going back and forth from the harbor.

And behind us is one of the steepest inclines up to Folkestone Junction.

It's a 1 in 30 gradient, so, that's... for every 30 feet you go horizontally, you're dropping one foot at a time.

And so, it was a real effort to get the trains going back up to Folkestone Junction to meet the line that goes to London.

People talk about watching two steam engines at the front of the train, pulling it up the hill, with another steam engine behind, pushing it up in order to get it back up that steep incline.

So, it takes a lot of effort.

In the 1850s, the very first rail-sea-rail service from London to Paris passed through Folkestone Harbour, taking around 12 and a half hours to complete.

Helen: Here is the first time that you do get off the train.

You're entering into Folkestone Harbour Station, the train is slowing down, and this is where you're going to get off and you're going to go all of it undercover so that you don't have to brave the elements.

And it would have been around about here that there would have been double doors which would take you through, and so that you can complete the last bits of your boarding before you get onto the ferry.

So, absolutely the height of luxury, because you've got people who are spending quite a bit of money.

This is the experience that they want.

So, you would have walked through from the waiting room, totally undercover, out onto what is now what we call the Harbour Arm, it was called the Pier.

And so, here we've got an example of where the boats would have been tied up on these mooring kidneys.

And I reckon that first step onto the boat, which is going to rock gently with the lull of the water, is that moment where you know you're leaving the UK and you're really set on your adventure right the way across the sea and onto the continent.

So, if you are on the most luxurious train in the world, then your ferry has really got to come up to those standards as well.

What was a ferry that would have had maximum capacity of 1,700 passengers, but when you've got the Orient Express on there, then you are catering for about 400 people.

And so, therefore you've got space to move around.

In 1936, a new service launched, the Night Ferry, which left from Dover.

Operated by the same company that ran the Orient Express, its first-class carriages were shunted onto rail ferries which sailed across the Channel while its passengers slept.

Some heading for the Orient Express swapped to this more luxurious and quicker service.

Dover becomes far more viable.

It's got a floating dock so that the trains can actually roll straight onto the ferry.

You don't have to get off your train anymore.

Almost 60 years later, train travel between England and Mainland Europe was revolutionized even further by the Channel Tunnel, a �4.65 billion project between Folkestone and Calais that took six years to complete.

The idea of a rail link beneath the Channel dates back to the 19th century, when Britain and France first began digging.

Tunnelling The English Channel by the silent film pioneer Georges Mlis was first shown in 1907.

It shows the ambition behind one of the most complex engineering challenges of the time, connecting Britain and France via an underwater tunnel, an idea that would take almost a century to realize.

It wasn't until 1986 that construction was finally approved, long after the golden age of luxury train travel had passed.

In fact, the day the Channel Tunnel opened was the day that the boat train stopped to Dover and Folkestone.

Today, the historic station and harbor have been repurposed into a vibrant cultural and leisure space.

Helen: Having opened it as an entertainment site, as a visitor destination, with food and drink opportunities, with a marketplace which has got creative artisans in there, selling their wares, when it comes to summer, it really is a hive of activity.

When Folkestone Harbour's alive, it really is the beating heart of the town.

(seagulls calling) (upbeat music) (horn blowing) Three and three-quarter hours after leaving London, passengers would step off their steamer onto northern France.

In the 1920s, Wagons-Lits, the company that ran the Orient Express, had a luxury train network that stretched across three continents.

At the core of this network were their multiple Orient Express services.

After crossing the Channel by ferry, passengers from London would have connected to an onward service in Calais, or headed south, towards Paris, to experience the City of Light for an evening before continuing their journey on the Orient Express.

The next 185 miles followed the Longueau-Boulogne line.

(train horn blowing) Built between the 1840s and the 1860s, it was the main route for trains steaming towards the French capital.

The Orient Express carried travelers from all walks of life, and despite the beautiful views, some of them carried ugly secrets.

(dramatic music) One man used the service so often that compartment 7 was reserved for him alone... a man who became known as the Merchant of Death.

Basil Zaharoff is one of the most enigmatic persons from the 20th century.

There's very little that we know about him.

He burned all of his papers towards the end of his life.

Yohann Lardiere is a guide and historian who has long been fascinated by Zaharoff.

He was one of the wealthiest persons in Europe, one of the most hated also, and that he boarded the Orient Express in 1885 and changed his life entirely.

Born into poverty in what is now Istanbul, Zaharoff did odd jobs across Europe before he began working for an arms manufacturer.

Zaharoff was tasked to sell submarines, and nobody wanted them.

So, he started with Greece, where he sold them cheap.

Then he jumped on the Orient Express and went to the Turks and said, "Look, the Greeks, they have submarines."

So, they bought submarines, but this time for the full price.

He then persuaded the Russians that the Turks' new submarines posed a threat to their interests.

And the Russians that were not interested in the first place started to buy submarines.

A good scheme for a man like him, and he became extremely wealthy thanks to that.

Reporter: And now meet the big shot himself, Sir Basil Zaharoff, mystery man of Europe, maker of kings and the greatest munitions salesman ever known.

Comm: Zaharoff used the Orient Express to criss-cross Europe, selling arms to countries in the Near and Middle East.

He became one of the best customers of the Orient Express, to the point that they reserved a compartment just for him, compartment number seven.

During World War I, he sold machine guns, Maxim machine guns, and he sold them to both sides, to the French, to the Germans.

And it's been said that for every dead person, he received one pound of gold.

There were 10 million people dead during World War I. That made him the wealthiest person in Europe, but definitely the most hated.

Reporter: Of Zaharoff, it has been said that the tombstones of millions killed by the munitions he sold will form his monument, and their dying groans shall be his epitaph.

Comm: Zaharoff owned properties across Europe and beyond, but none is more mysterious than this.

The Chteau de Balincourt, 40 miles from Paris.

Built around 1780, its original owners were guillotined during the French Revolution.

It was later owned by King Leopold II of Belgium.

He grew rich on the back of colonial exploitation of the Congo.

He was also a proud sponsor of the Orient Express, from its inception.

King Leopold II had bought that castle for his mistress, and she was the owner of this place, and all his illegitimate children were living here also.

Zaharoff bought the house from him for one million francs, then cut himself off from the world.

Yohann: And when you're the most hated person in Europe, of course you're gonna think about security.

And...oh, actually, if you... this way, you can see how high the wall goes.

So, the whole estate is completely walled up.

And it's...we can't see anything from the outside.

When everybody wants you dead in Europe, when you've been responsible for so many dead people during World War I, and all the other wars in Europe at the time, there's nothing around us, except this chunky wall here that's at least three meters high.

Oh, here you can see better, actually.

You can see how high it goes.

It's actually quite thick as well.

So, it's been there quite a while, so you have all this grove on it.

And you can see here, the columns on each side, how they build it.

They've put those stones in the middle, and then you get the columns to support it.

So, really, it's a very strong wall, so he was very well protected.

There's an archway right there.

Yeah, here, you can clearly see the differences in the coloring.

Like the stone here, at the very bottom, that's the original archway.

That must have been built during the 18th century, when the castle inside was built.

The arch was decorated with fleurs-de-lis, a powerful and enduring symbol of the French monarchy.

As if it was not enough, you had to add even more luxury, and that's why we have those statues on top, that this royal arch was not enough.

So, you can see at the bottom, that looks like it's been there since 1780, at the construction of the castle.

And then the statues up there have a different coloring, really proving that they've been added by Zaharoff afterwards.

There is a story that Zaharoff who, remember, came from nothing, actually bought the bed of the most famous king in France, Louis XIV, the Sun King, le Roi Soleil.

And allegedly, that bed is here in this castle.

Is it still there?

We don't know.

Today, the chteau is still owned by his descendants.

This is what we have, just a glimpse.

And because that's the closest we're ever gonna get, nobody's allowed inside, so, a lot of mystery around this person.

(mysterious music) It was on this estate in 1924 that Zaharoff married the love of his life, the Duchess de Villafranca.

They met unexpectedly on the Orient Express, when she was married to her first husband.

At 2: 32am, someone bangs on the door, and there's this woman, semi-naked, covered in blood, trying to escape her husband, who, out of a fit of madness, tried to kill her.

This moment would be the start of a love story that would carry on for 38 years.

This woman was very pious.

So, she would not divorce her husband.

And when he died, she finally married Zaharoff.

After they got married, they moved here to Balincourt, and they lived here only for a very short period of time, 18 months, because she died of an infection that left Zaharoff completely heartbroken.

And two days after her funeral, he took the Orient Express for the very last time.

He asked a bodyguard that after his death, he was to bring a photo of him and his wife, a photo that Zaharoff always carried, to compartment 7 of the Orient Express.

Yohann: And at 2:32am on the dot, the bodyguard would have to shred and throw through the window as a last romantic gesture, showing that his whole life started and ended in the Orient Express.

(train horn blowing) (upbeat music) Around seven hours after leaving London, Orient Express passengers finally arrived in Paris.

Here, at Gare du Nord, Europe's busiest station.

This neoclassical monument to the railway, built in the 1860s, was designed to impress.

Its 23 statues represented major cities served by the railway.

And its soaring iron columns were cast in Scotland, the only country with forges big enough.

Then, as now, the station offered an unforgettable welcome to the French capital.

Orient Express passengers, with just a night in Paris, would have been keen to enjoy the city at its most vibrant before connecting to the legendary train.

Here, we are probably in the most exciting district, in the most exciting city in the world.

Elsa Noel-Guesnon is a tour guide and historian, and expert on early 20th century Paris.

(light-hearted music) To fully appreciate Paris in the 1920s, you need to consider the trauma of the First World War, and how artists were searching for new forms of expression and a deliberate break from the past.

Paris was at the center of it all.

People wanted hope to create a new society, so, everywhere in the city, there were artists who were enjoying the fact that we were in peace, finally, after years of war.

And here, we are in Montparnasse, probably the most exciting district of the 1920s.

Montparnasse was a magnet for artists, writers, and models who were drawn to the area's vitality, and its cheap rents.

Elsa: Here we are in front of one of the most iconic workshops of Montparnasse, and here you can see three remaining workshops.

The one just behind me was used by Cham Soutine, the famous painter, who arrived there in 1910.

These studios were basic, with no running water or electricity, but they were all the artists could afford.

Most of these workshops were also made of two parts.

The main room was made to work, to live, and you had a sort of little mezzanine.

If you were not able to afford a house, you could live in this little mezzanine, having your bed and all your stuff.

These were not only places to work, but also place to live.

So, it means that creation was at any time in these artists' lives.

These studios have a connection to Paris's most famous monument.

These workshops were all made of up-cycled materials.

I mean that what you can see here is a part of the ancient pavilions that were built for the Universelle Fair of 1889.

You know the one when we built the Eiffel Tower.

(bohemian music) As Montparnasse thrived, its cafs became the center of cultural life, where art and ideas collided, and a magnet for travelers in search of the new.

People who were traveling with the Orient Express had to do a stop, just to have a look at what was the most modern part of the world.

Montparnasse was considered as the center of the artistic world, so, obviously you had to see what was happening.

You can really feel this very cozy feeling of the 1920s, and it's also very marked by what's called Art Deco.

You can see that inside it's very geometrical, and you have a lot of decorations.

So, it's typical of the French cafs of this time.

(gentle music) So, at night, the artists, they habit together in the caf, in order to have something to eat, something to drink, and most of all to get warm.

You were meeting people who became your friends.

So, it was more than just going to a place to have dinner or to have a coffee.

It was a way to show that you belonged to a clique, and also, maybe to an art movement.

Pablo Picasso was a frequent visitor, as was Mexican artist Diego Rivera, and Spanish cubist artist Juan Gris.

So, now these artists are, like, famous, they are considered as the most important for the 20th century, but at this time, I think that they were more considered like weirdos, you see.

People were not really understanding what they were doing.

Its owner, Victor Libion, was a very generous man, and he understood that what was happening in this district would change the world.

And he said, "Okay, I'm just, um, letting them stay the whole day in my caf just buying only one poor little coffee, but I know that one day they will become famous, and they will bring me more and more people."

And I think that he was absolutely right, because even today this place is one of the most famous in Paris.

(inspirational music) The caf's frequent visitors, some Americans who had traveled on the Orient Express, were so captivated by the city that they decided to stay.

Paris was considered as the main place to live your life, in a sort of freedom, in a sort of, like, effervescence.

Ernest Hemingway is one of the most famous.

He was a part of what we call the Lost Generation.

So, the people who consider that their generation was totally wasted by the war, and the future was uncertain.

So, they were just trying to forget about this while enjoying Paris.

At the time, one of the most influential Americans was the writer and art collector Gertrude Stein, who lived here at 27 Rue de Fleurus.

Elsa: Every Saturday at 9:00pm here, all the most famous artists of the district had the habit to do a giant meet-up at Gertrude Stein's apartment, in this building just next to me.

Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Joyce, but also Picasso, Matisse, Modigliani.

So, you see, all the most famous writers, sculptors and painters of the era.

Stein was a pioneering writer in her own right, and her weekly salon was a magnet for young avant-garde artists.

(gentle music) She lived openly here with her lover, Alice B. Toklas.

I mean that in Montparnasse at this time, it was not only about doing art, but it was also about enjoying freedom, by enjoying all the life's pleasures, and also, by living some, like, love stories without getting married, living love stories with men or women, with your friends, one day and not the other, et cetera.

So, it was a very, very free way to live.

If Paris is still a highly important capital for culture and art in the world, it's because of this golden age and all the people who were converging to Montparnasse in the 1920s.

Paris might have been exciting during the day, but it was when the sun set that the city really came to life.

(vibrant music) With just one night in Paris before catching their onward train, Orient Express passengers would have wanted to make the most of it.

Luckily for them, the City of Light delivered.

Paris in the 1920s exploded with nightclubs and jazz bars.

And African-Americans, fleeing racial prejudice in the US, flocked to the city.

At the heart of this cultural explosion was Josephine Baker, who would become the wealthiest black woman in the world.

Baker became a symbol of Paris itself, an icon who drew audiences from across the globe.

Arguably Paris's most famous cabaret was, and remains, the Moulin Rouge, which opened in October 1889.

Fanny Rabasse is its press relations and events manager.

Fanny: The Moulin Rouge became successful straight away for many reasons.

It was a beautiful place, brand new, and there was a lot of artists who wanted to inspire themselves.

Henri Toulouse-Lautrec designed its first poster with the dancer La Goulue.

And it created a huge scandal because La Goulue on the poster, because she showed her bottom.

Everybody was shocked, but a big scandal attracts.

So, everybody rushed to the Moulin Rouge to see La Goulue.

So, this is how it started.

During the two wars, the Moulin Rouge really was the iconic venue of the Paris artistic scene.

The most famous artist during that time was Mistinguett.

And she's the one who created the kind of show we still do at the Moulin Rouge.

Lots of people on stage, big costumes, feathers, jewelry, and she was really a character.

Mistinguett reigned as Queen of the Moulin Rouge until the mid-1930s.

She was called The General because she was very tough.

If a dancer was too pretty next to her, the girl was put behind because she always wanted to be the star.

For the passengers of the Orient Express, the Moulin Rouge really was a must-do.

It was at that time already the most famous cabaret in the world, and it still is 135 years after its opening.

The Moulin Rouge in the '20s were... was already avant-garde.

The show today has the same spirit, but of course, we are more technical, you know, it's more grandiose and it's more impressive for the audience.

We have 60 people on stage, so, people are stunned by our show.

The costumes have always been important.

We have 1,000 costumes handmade in our workshop, shoe workshop, feather workshop.

And, for example, one of my favorite costumes, the Pink Finale, we have 50 dancers on stage wearing this amazing pink costume.

(dance music) And the cost for one costume was 15,000 euros.

So, multiply by 50, 750,000 euros just for four minutes on stage.

The total budget of the costumes since the opening of the show 25 years ago is now 10 million euros.

(dance music) (cheering & applause) (upbeat music) In the 1920s and '30s, multiple dancers were on stage at once to create a great spectacle.

Today, there are around 80 people in the troupe, and Portia Secker is one of them.

I started dancing when I was two years old.

And I just kind of never stopped.

I fell in love with it.

I trained almost every day.

I performed as much as I could growing up.

To become a dancer at the Moulin Rouge is even more competitive now than it was 100 years ago.

It's one of the hardest auditions I've ever done.

We do cartwheels, kicks, walks, combinations, everything you can imagine.

So, there's a height requirement.

So, girls have to be 175 centimeters.

I'm probably a little bit short.

But I stood up as tall as I could.

(laughs) The whole audition, I don't think I slouched once.

I really wanted the job.

And then finding out I booked it was probably one of my happiest memories.

I screamed, I jumped up and down so much.

My neighbors probably thought I was, I don't know, dying or something.

(light-hearted music) There has been hundreds and thousands of girls before you, and you suddenly feel like you're part of the legacy, I guess.

You know, Moulin Rouge, it's an institution, it's iconic, it's historic.

You need to be flexible, you need to be able to perform and command the space, because at the end of the day, you know, we're all on stage together, but you want to stand out a little bit.

In the 1920s, there was typically one show a night.

Now, there are two performances a day, six days a week.

It is very hard, but, you know, we love it.

It's what we've trained our whole lives to do.

It doesn't feel like work.

At the end of the day, I think we're all very grateful that, you know, we get to do what we love.

My favorite number in the show, I think can-can is the most rewarding.

The can-can was first performed in 1861.

It soon became synonymous with the Moulin Rouge.

For its time, it was provocative, daring and risqu.

(can-can music) (rhythmic clapping) There's intention behind each movement, which is, it's so incredible.

And it's nice to, you know, follow in the footsteps of the greats that have come before us.

(can-can music) (whooping) (applause) I think it's just incredible that, you know, 100 years ago, people could step off the Orient Express and come to the Moulin Rouge and see a very similar show to what they're getting today.

(screeching) (cheering & applause) (vibrant music)