Cast: Veronique/Helene - Mady Mesple; Vicomte Florestan de Valincourt - Michel Dens; Agathe - Andrea Guiot; Estelle/Ermerance - Denise Benoit; Coquenard - Jean-Christophe Benoit; Loustot - Michel Dunand; Seraphin - Jacques Pruvost; Denise - Anne Tallard. Conductor: Jean-Claude Hartemann, with the Orchestre de l'Association des Concerts Lamoureux and Chours Rene Duclos.
A rare french gem!
This is a pleasing little French operette, perhaps more distinguished for its charm than for its musical quality. Its story is a confection in which Vicomte Florestan, a dashing, but impoverished and feckless young man-about-Paris (a sort of primordial Maurice Chevalier), is about to enter into an arranged marriage with a wealthy heiress from the provinces. Said heiress just happens (of course) to overhear the young man complaining about his fate to his most recent mistress, the owner of a flower shop. In approved operetta fashion, the heiress obtains a job at the shop under an assumed name in order to get back at the Vicomte. Confusions and misapprehensions follow. The wandering bridegroom-to-be and the supposed shopgirl spend a day on the town, which includes taking a donkey ride and then on a swing (see cover picture), giving occasion for two hugely popular duets. Love (naturally!) takes a hand and in the end the financially-challenged aristocrat and the spunky heiress end up in each other's arms, just as it was obvious from the very first bars of the overture that they must.
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