I wanted to talk about my absolute favorite Wax Museum in the world: Musee Conti. Now, Musee Conti doesn't have the cool interactive features of modern Wax Museums. It doesn't necessarily have the creepiest figures. But Musee Conti has a charm of its own that I have never seen replicated.
Just a few blocks of Burboun Street in New Orleans, Musee Conti is true marvel in the Wax Museum universe. French for Museum Conti, the Museum can be found on Rue Conti, which is french for Conti Street.
The Museum has odd hours and is only open three days a week. I was lucky to catch it while I was in New Orleans, and I certainly don't regret it.
The Museum has a strong regional feel, with some of New Orleans greatest themes and legends on display, including this awesome Voodoo display.....
And you can't have a New Orleans Wax Museum without Voodoo Queen Marie Leveau.....
Or famed high society sadistic serial killer Delphine LaLaurie......
Then there is the legend of the "casket girls". Young woman brought over from France to marry. They carried their clothing in small "caskets". There was a legend at the time that the girls carried aborted fetuses in their caskets. Nice.
There is the legendary governor of Louisiana "King Fish" Huey Long, one of the most eccentric politicians in US history. He actually believed in a "wealth cap" where if anyone possessed assets exceeding a million dollars any extra revenue would be seized by the government and redistributed to the poor. Remember that the next time someone calls Obama Socialist. It was actually predicted by some at the time that Long would be President, but he was gunned down by a dentist in the capital building.
Louisiana has no shortage of eccentric governors. Here is Edwin Edwards, Louisiana Governor who went to prison for corruption and actually had a reality show on A&E last year featuring him and his 20 something wife.
And then we have various scenes of assorted New Orleans mischief, such as fighting hookers.....
and hookers robbing sailors..........
Now that I am looking at these photos again, it seems that all the figures have some weird orange makeup on their face.....
Anyways, we have slave auctions....
And people being rounded up and shot in the street.....
And then of course we have Wax Museum perennial Mark Twain. I think there muse be some law that every wax museum has to have a Twain.
One of the absolute highlights in the Museum is this bizarre scene Featuring Napoleon in the bathtub.
Like a lot of other wax museums Musee Conti has a "Chamber of Horrors", however I actually think Musee Conti has one of the strongest Chambers I have scene, mixing modern monsters like Freddy Kreueger...
Along with some great classic movie monsters.........
The Chamber of Horrors works in some more obscure scenes, such as this guy whipping a hunchback.....
And this horrific scene from "The Corpse in the Waxworks".....
Possibly most puzzling is the scene from Edgard Allen Poe's "The Murders in Rue Morgue". It features an animatronic twirling gorilla. I was not familiar with the story at the time, so this made little sense. The story is generally considered the first mystery novel. The killer is revealed to be SPOILER ALERT an Orangutang.
I know that's a bad picture, but you try to take a picture of a twirling gorilla through a smudgy window.
Finally the museum inexplicably ends with a giant Cyclopes in a cage.
And so ends, our trip through one of the most amazing Wax Museums to grace mankind.
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