Madame Claude – selling gold-plated sex

Pretty Woman, the Julia Roberts movie disneyfied prostitution, with a happy-ever-after ending which was repeated decades earlier by girls of Madame Claude, infamous as the most powerful and exclusive pimp in the world. Her indentured employees were famed for their beauty and sophistication, trained like geishas to fit into elite social circles and often sent for plastic surgery. Netflix is now showing an original French film about the procuress whom JFK, Marlon Brando, Charles de Gaulle and the Shah of Iran amongst many others turned to for their illicit escorts who could mingle with duchesses and never be spotted and some even made it up the altar.

Her client list allegedly spanned kings, presidents, government ministers, ambassadors, and leaders of industry and at her peak she even became an agent of the French state and worked for the CIA in a ‘morale-boosting’ operation. When public distaste for state use of high-level prostitution surfaced she was finally done for tax evasion. Despite subsequent skirmishes with the law she evaded prison time.

  One of her girls said she hated men. ‘She used them strictly to make money and saw them as nothing more than wallets.’ Another likened her to a ‘slave driver on a plantation in the American South.’ She took 30% of their fees as well as any monies spent on their improvement. At her peak she had 200 girls on her books and was charging $5000 a day for their services.

  Born 6 July 1923 9am Angers, France, her earlier years are wreathed in mystery though it was hardly a comfortable or reassuring childhood. She had her Aries Moon in the 8th opposition Saturn in the financial 2nd squaring onto a controlling Sun Pluto in Cancer – not a bundle of compassion, for sure – ego-centric, dominating, cold, hard.

  Her Sun Pluto was also in a self-protective Water Grand Trine to Jupiter in money-making Scorpio trine Uranus, formed into a Kite with Uranus (on cusp of 8th house of sexuality) opposition the Virgo North Node – so definitely out of step with the conventional morals of the society. She also had Mars in Cancer trine Uranus. A Water Grand Trine can be healing but it can also be a fantasist, locked into its own bubble of reality.

  She also had a Yod of Saturn sextile Neptune inconjunct Uranus – which would certainly mark her out for a unique path in life. She would be rebellious, wilful, a trailblazer, uncaring about convention, even lawless. Evidently she is credited with having created the term ‘call girl’ since her clients had to book by telephone.

 She had a daughter who she sent back to be raised by her mother and barely knew.

Sun Pluto in Cancer tied into Saturn and the Moon has echoes of the worst kind of Terrible Mother ever.

5 thoughts on “Madame Claude – selling gold-plated sex

  1. It’s interesting to see her Venus and Mercury conjunct in Gemini – they do symbolise the idea of “call girl”, quite literally. Also they suggest someone who could talk things up with the superficial charm of a saleswoman. The other thing I’m curious about is the Part of Fortune aligning with fixed star Algol, the Medusa’s Head. The power of money perhaps, and making money from powerful individuals.

    Heidi Fleiss, the ‘Hollywood Madam’ (30th December 1965) has a wide conjunction between Venus and Mars in Aquarius, which we’ve discussed before as a very sexual kind of aspect. She also, like Mme Claude, has an Aries Moon, square her Capricorn Sun. Plus a mutable grand cross with Pluto/Uranus in Virgo opposing Saturn in Pisces, Jupiter in Gemini, and Mercury in Sagittarius.

  2. Interesting how using different house systems give different interpretations. In reply to the previous comment by S4cast4ever, if you use the natural house system Jupiter is in the 8th, the house of other people’s money, sex, death, divorce. This explains her wealth coming from the sex industry. Her moon in Aries in the first is in opposition to Saturn in her 7th house of partners which would explain her own difficult love life and aggressive stance toward men.

    • Jupiter in the 8th does make more sense. Btw, I’ve seen oppositions across the 2nd/8th house, as well as those across the Taurus/Scorpio polarity in the charts of women who marry for money.

  3. Saturn in the 2nd house is interesting, considering the amount of money flowing to her. There would be restrictions and consequences throughout her life, with Saturn in so many notable aspects. Her tax problems ended in an enormous fine. Other life events: she was raised in a convent and served a short prison term of 4 months for trying to restart her business some years after the tax debacle. She ended up in a small apartment, saying loneliness was her only companion, and died in her 90’s.

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