Marie Tussaud

... 40,000 heads rolled, uh, one of which was, uh, Marie Antoinette.

And her head was given to Madame Tussaud of the House of Wax, and she made a waxworks out of her head, and then the head was given back to the family.

So, um, and Dr. Guillotin was a very progressive doctor, and he felt that this was a very humane, uh, way to kill people.

But, uh, during, uh, when he saw how many people [laughs] were killed, killed with it during the revolution, he said, "Eh, maybe, maybe it wasn't such a good idea." But you gotta admit, couple of milliseconds-

Did she see a ghost? No, but what she described gives us a fascinating glimpse into just how unsettling those lifelike faces could become when the lights went out.

So, settle in, get comfortable and let's step back into the dark history of Madame Tussaud, the woman who made faces of the dead.

So as I said, tonight we're going back to the French Revolution, to a time when the streets of Paris witnessed public executions, political betrayals and the collapse of the monarchy.

And we're going to explore the life of a woman who survived that terrifying period and became famous for making lifelike representations of the dead.

Her name was Marie Grossholz.

although history remembers her as Madame Tussaud.

Her story includes imprisonment, the threat of the guillotine, death masks and an exhibition that would eventually become one of the most famous wax museums in the world.

But there's another side to the story.

Back then, you know, it was a scrying ball, you know.

Madame Tussaud and her silver whatever.

You know, the s- the, the crystal ball.

But the crystal ball now is your phone.

Which I don't think is what this book is about, but I don't think we ever talked about this in Spooked Over before.

You go all the way back to Marie Tussaud and her wax figures, her chambers of horrors in the-

Yeah

...

The BBC removed one episode from that which featured slavery, Victorian child workers, and chimney sweeps, and it has edited sketches, bits of other episodes.

So they've cut sketches, for example, which include Madame Tussaud making a wax death mask from severed heads, and that's kind of presented like a TV craft show, obviously as a spoof.

There's another sketch which teaches children about slavery in ancient Rome, and it imagines a Roman galley as an airline flight, uh, with these enslaved rowers chained to oars, and they're told that unlike Roman passengers who, you know, essentially have paid for their flight, they will not be allowed to escape if the ship sinks.

Now, what the BBC says, actually, they made these edits seven years ago in consultation again with the program makers.

There, there was an entire episode of the show featuring slavery and Victorian child workers, chimney sweeps, blah, blah, blah, where it would have white actors using dark makeup to portray ancient Egypt- Egyptians or Incas.

Um, and there was another one to- been removed that was Madame Tussaud making wax masks from severed heads.

[laughs]

[laughs]

So we don't know where she is.

But when Madame Tussaud sets up her wildly successful wax model museum, that head of Marie Antoinette that she sculpted just after the queen's execution, that'll be pride of place.

I went to the Vatican archives once, and I saw the last thing.

She wrote a little scrap of paper she wrote to pope, one of the last things she did, didn't she?