Infamous: pimp to the stars Madame Claude, played here by Karole Rocher
Credit: Netflix
In a quiet street called Rue de Maignon, and later in a modest, 12-room hotel on Rue de Boulanville, waited an elegant blonde women, dressed in grey cashmere and pearls, ready to serve cognac, make polite small-talk, and then quietly and tastefully sell you sex. Before the contraceptive pill made casual sex ubiquitous, late-1960s Paris was full of powerful men with desires to fulfill and the money to pay for it. For those with the right connections, there was only one person to call. What links JFK, Charles de Gaulle and the Shah of Iran? Madame Claude, of course.