It was almost like a scene from “Night at the Museum,” starring Ben Stiller. Except it was “Day Off at Versailles,” starring the Anglo-American Press Association.
 
The event aired on Monday, March 18th, when about 40 of us got a wonderful “insiders” tour of the Chateau de Versailles on the day when its doors are closed to the public.
 
We followed museum historian and curator Beatrix Saule, who led us through the halls, salons and bedrooms of Louis XIV’s palace, regaling us with tales about how the court lived. Her giant set …

 
UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova highlighted her organization’s financial plight when she met with a dozen AAPA members at a breakfast meeting at UNESCO headquarters on October 11.
“UNESCO needs all our members,” she said, calling it “unfair that UNESCO is caught in the Middle East conflict” over a US law requiring a halt to payments to international organizations that admit Palestine as a member before there has been a peace agreement. The US contribution to UNESCO would normally represent 22% of its budget.
She noted that there has been a heartening …

 
 
 On May 10, AAPA members were treated to a viewing of Yememi filmmaker Khadija al-Salami’s  “Amina,” followed by a thoughtful discussion about the current situation in Yemen and the Middle East. The event was hosted by AAPA President John Keating at his apartment.
Ms. al-Salami, who lives in Paris, is considered to be the first female filmmaker & producer in Yemen. Originally married off at age 11, she escaped immense family and society pressure by finding employment with the local television station and simultaneously attending school in the mornings. At age …

 
Days before it opened to raving critics and enthusiastic audiences, more than  30 AAPA members and guests enjoyed a sneak preview of the popular musical “My Fair Lady” at the Chatelet Theater on Dec. 3.
 
 The show’s lively, creative director, Jean-Luc Choplin  spent nearly an hour with us, answering questions about challenges of
presenting  a musical in English with  French  subtitles . He explained his strategy  for bringing such shows to the centuries-old Chatelet, including past hits “The Sound of Music” and “Le Chanteur de Mexico”, which he described  as “populaire sophistique,” …

A crowd of more than 50 people filled John Morris’ loft Nov. 22 to hear best-selling novelist Douglas Kennedy talk about himself, his art and his vision of the world.  Kennedy, whose 1998 novel “The Big Picture” has recently been made into a box hit of a movie in France, “L’Homme Qui Voulait Vivre Sa Vie,” has sold millions of books worldwide. Kennedy explained how he organizes his writing, and how he keeps up his output by producing two complete pages a day. He said his view of the world …

Eager to meet a 1940s existentialist icon turned grande dame of la chanson française up-close, a group of AAPA members gathered Oct. 28 in an ideal Left Bank setting: the plush red velvet-armchaired Empire-style bar of L’Hôtel on the rue des Beaux-Arts (where the Association celebrated its 100th anniversary in December 2007). Our guest? Juliette Gréco. About to embark on a tour of Japan, Gréco confirmed that she had been “living in the present for six decades.” Topics of discussion ranged from memory lane descriptions of Saint-Germain-des-Prés and nods to …

As Joe Ray wrote recently about a subject dear to many of our hearts, they say it’s the worst wine crisis in France in 35 years…