The slapstick start of the Paris Taxi Rally

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Yes, that bustling city is Paris, but who’s the chap saluting from the bumper of the car? He’s no less than Louis de Funès who, by the time of the photograph, was on his way to becoming the star of French comedy cinema and France’s best-paid actor on top of that, too. His career spanned some 40 years and more than 140 comedy films, and his own life reads like the script for a comedy, too. Louis was the youngest child of Spanish parents of noble descent who’d moved to Paris. There his dad became a successful diamond merchant, only to be ruined by a case of swindle which saw him flee to Venezuela, leaving his family in chaos.

De Funès’s films often show a rich range of cars, frequently driven to destruction in hysterical chase scenes. Until early November, there’s an exhibition of some these cars in the Musée National de l'Automobile in Mulhouse. The chap to the left with the impressive costume and drum was apparently a real character in Paris’s folklore, too. He represents Anatole, the illustrious Garde-champêtre (rural guard) of the Montmartre district, who was an actual drummer in the French forces and became richly decorated for it.

What are they doing here? It’s not a film scene, we think, but the start of some kind of motorsport event. We can see it turning into a slapstick scene as soon as that gun is fired though! The only additional information is that Anatole and de Funès are seen here at the start of a so-called Taxi Gymkhana in Montmartre on October 19th, 1958. Any further information would be much appreciated. What’s the taxi, for a start?

Words: Jeroen Booij; picture: archive

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