Overview

Filled with 14 exciting, interactive zones and the amazing Marvel Super Heroes 4D movie
experience, Madame Tussauds London combines glitz and glamour with incredible history.

Walk down the red carpet and strike a pose with Kate Winslet, before challenging your favourite
sportstars like David Beckham or Lewis Hamilton. Start your royal experience with an audience with
the Queen, before planting a kiss on Prince Williams cheek.

For the brave, get face-to-face with scary serial killers in our live fear experience SCREAM. After a
sneaky behind-the-scenes look at how our World-renowned sculptors create the figures, relax in our
taxis and relive the rich history of London.

Then step up to your favourite Marvel Super Heroes before getting ready to experience the
spectacular and exclusive Marvel Super Heroes 4D movie, where our Marvel Super Heroes battle it
out to save London from impending doom.

So, who do you want to meet?

Touted as "London's favorite tourist attraction", the statues at Madame Tussauds Wax Museum
have been thrilling visitors since Tussaud opened her first permanent exhibit in 1835.

Madame Tussaud

Madame Tussauds
 The Beatles

Marie Tussaud (1761-1850) was born in Strasbourg, France, under the name of
Marie Grosholtz. After her father's death in 1761 she moved with her mother
toParis, where she learned the fine art of sculpting from her mother's employer,
a physician skilled in the art of wax modeling. The doctor, Philippe Curtius, was
one of the first to display wax models, opening an exhibition in 1776 called 'The
Cavern of the Great Thieves'.

Young Marie made her first sculpture at the tender age of sixteen, fashioning a
likeness of French enlightenment writer, Franois Voltaire. Word of her talent
spread and reached the royal family, who hired Marie as an art tutor.

Her relation with the royal family caused her to be thrown in jail when the
monarchy was toppled during the French Revolution. To show her allegiance to
the new regime, she was forced to search for severed heads in the piles of dead
bodies so she could make death masks of those executed by the guillotine.

The Wax Museum

 Tiger Woods

Hitler

Marylin Monroe

In 1795 Marie married Franois Tussaud, but she left him in 1802 so she could
tour around Britain with her collection of death masks. The gruesome roadshow
included the death masks of the French king Louis XVI and his wife Marie-
Antoinette. Tussaud's collection affirmed the disdain of the British audience for
France's bloodthirsty revolutionaries and was a big hit. Marie Tussaud never
returned to France.

In 1835, after more than thirty years touring the country, she created a
permanent exhibit on Baker Street. There was a surcharge for the famous
Chamber of Horrors, a separate chamber with the most horrifying displays of
criminals and victims of the French Revolution. In the meantime, Marie Tussaud
added many likenesses to her collection.
In 1884, several decades after her death, Madame Tussaud's wax museum
moved to its current location on London's Marylebone Road, where millions have
stood in queue for hours to get a glimpse at her work and that of her
successors.

The current museum suffered a fire in 1925 and many statues were lost.
However, the molds remained intact and several of the pieces were recreated.
Unfortunately hundreds of molds were destroyed during the Blitz at the start of
the Second World War. Ironically one of the surviving masks is that of Hitler,
which was created in 1933.

Today the wax museum is one of London's busiest attractions and during peak
tourist season, it is common to encounter long lines that stretch for blocks. The
museum started an overseas expansion in 1970, when it opened a branch
location in Amsterdam. Today it has expanded to many more cities including Las
Vegas, New York City, Hong Kong, Washington DC and Hollywood.

What You'll See

King Henry VIII

Tussaud and her successors have fashioned literally thousands of replicas of

famous people. Visitors can view world leaders, actors/actresses, sports
legends, famous writers and artists, religious figures, musicians, and a host of
other characters. Besides those displays there are also several themed sections
in the museum including the Chamber of Horrors and an taxi ride for a journey
through history.
While the London museum has a decidedly British slant, visitors from all over
the world will recognize a majority of the characters.

History[edit]

Marie Tussaud was born as Marie Grosholtz in 1761 in Strasbourg, France. Her mother worked as a
housekeeper for Dr. Philippe Curtius in Bern, Switzerland, who was aphysician skilled in wax
modelling. Curtius taught Tussaud the art of wax modelling.

Tussaud created her first wax man figure, of Voltaire, in 1777.[4] Other famous people she modelled
at that time include Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Benjamin Franklin. During the French
Revolution she modelled many prominent victims. In her memoirs she claims that she would search
through corpses to find the severed heads of executed citizens, from which she would make death
masks. Her death masks were held up as revolutionary flags and paraded through the streets of
Paris. Following the doctor's death in 1794, she inherited his vast collection of wax models and spent
the next 33 years travelling around Europe. Her marriage to Francois Tussaud in 1795 lent a new
name to the show: Madame Tussaud's. In 1802 she went to London, having accepted an invitation
from Paul Philidor, a magic lantern and phantasmagoria pioneer, to exhibit her work alongside his
show at the Lyceum Theatre, London. She did not fare particularly well financially, with Philidor
taking half of her profits. As a result of the Napoleonic Wars, she was unable to return to France, so
she traveled throughout Great Britain and Ireland exhibiting her collection. From 1831 she took a
series of short leases on the upper floor of "Baker Street Bazaar" (on the west side of Baker Street,
Dorset Street and King Street),[5] which later featured in the Druce-Portland case sequence of trials
of 18981907. This became Tussaud's first permanent home in 1836. [6] One of the main attractions
of her museum was the Chamber of Horrors

Madame Tussauds indoor on Baker St

By 1835 Marie had settled down in Baker Street, London, and opened a museum.[7] This part of the
exhibition included victims of the French Revolution and newly created figures of murderers and
other criminals. The name is often credited to a contributor to Punch in 1845, but Marie appears to
have originated it herself, using it in advertising as early as 1843. [8]
Bernard Tussaud finishes the wax figure of Lady Alice Scott and the Duke of Gloucester - 1935.10.16

Other famous people were added to the exhibition, including Horatio Nelson, and Sir Walter Scott.
Some of the sculptures done by Marie Tussaud herself still exist. The gallery originally contained
some 400 different figures, but fire damage in 1925, coupled with German bombs in 1941, has
rendered most of these older models defunct. The casts themselves have survived (allowing the
historical waxworks to be remade), and these can be seen in the museum's history exhibit. The
oldest figure on display is that of Madame du Barry. Other faces from the time of Tussaud
include Robespierre and George III. In 1842, she made a self portrait which is now on display at the
entrance of her museum. She died in her sleep on 15 April 1850.

By 1883 the restricted space and rising cost of the Baker Street site prompted her grandson (Joseph
Randall) to commission the building at its current location on Marylebone Road. The new exhibition
galleries were opened on 14 July 1884 and were a great success.[9]However, the building costs,
falling so soon after buying out his cousin Louisa's half share in the business in 1881, meant the
business was under-funded. A limited company was formed in 1888 to attract fresh capital but had to
be dissolved after disagreements between the family shareholders, and in February 1889 Tussaud's
was sold to a group of businessmen led by Edwin Josiah Poyser.[10] Edward White, an artist
dismissed by the new owners to save money, allegedly sent a parcel bomb to John Theodore
Tussaud in June 1889 in revenge.[11] The first sculpture of a young Winston Churchill was made in
1908, with a total of ten made since.[12]

Entry of Madame Tussauds in Berlin

Madame Tussauds in New York City opened in 2000

The museum opened inWashington, D.C. in 2007

Madame Tussaud's wax museum has now grown to become a major tourist attraction in London,
incorporating (until 2010) the London Planetarium in its west wing. It has expanded and will expand
with branches in Amsterdam, Bangkok, Berlin, Blackpool, Hollywood, Hong Kong, Las Vegas, New
York City, Shanghai, Sydney, Vienna, Washington, D.C., Wuhan, Tokyo and a temporary museum in
Busan (Korea) with locations coming to Beijing, Prague, Singapore, Orlando and San Francisco.
Today's wax figures at Tussauds include historical and royal figures, film stars, sports stars and
famous murderers. Known as "Madame Tussauds" museums (no apostrophe), they are owned by a
leisure company called Merlin Entertainments, following the acquisition of The Tussauds Group in
May 2007.

In July 2008, Madame Tussauds' Berlin branch became embroiled in controversy when a 41-year-
old German man brushed past two guards and decapitated a wax figure depicting Adolf Hitler. This
was believed to be an act of protest against showing the ruthless dictator alongside sports heroes,
movie stars, and other historical figures. However, the statue has since been repaired and the
perpetrator has admitted he attacked the statue to win a bet. [13] The original model of Hitler, unveiled
in Madame Tussauds London in April 1933 was frequently vandalised and a replacement in 1936
had to be carefully guarded.

Madame Tussauds in popular culture[edit]- Did you know

 Madame Tussauds is the focus of Steve Taylor's song "Meltdown (at Madame Tussauds)" in
which the song talks about someone turning up the thermostat and causing the wax figures to
melt.[16]

The Doctor Who serial Spearhead from Space features a scene at Madame Tussauds.

Tussauds appeared in an episode of Living TV's paranormal programme Most Haunted.

The museum was featured on the History Channel's series, Life After People: The Series.

Several sculptures from the London branch appear in the music video "Pop!ular" by
singer/songwriter Darren Hayes.

On 3 November 2009, the museum's New York City branch was featured in a segment
on NBC's The Today Show in which weathermanAl Roker posed in place of his lifelike wax figure
for two hours and startled unsuspecting visitors, who were at first led to believe they were
viewing Roker's wax counterpart. In 2010, Ozzy Osbourne attempted a similar publicity stunt to
promote his Scream album.[17]

In the song "My Object All Sublime" from The Mikado by Gilbert and Sullivan, the title
character sings of punishments fitting the crime, including:
The amateur tenor, whose vocal villainies
All desire to shirk,
Shall, during off-hours
Exhibit his powers
To Madame Tussaud's waxwork.

Madame Tussauds features in the film Shanghai Knights.

In Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps, Mr. Hannay tells Pamela that his uncle
is featured in Madame Tussaud's murderer section and that one day she
will be able to take her grandchildren to Madame Tussaud's to see him.

In Elizabeth Bowen's novel The Death of the Heart (1938), Portia and Eddie
have tea at Madame Tussaud's and Portia is disappointed that the
waitresses are real and not made of wax.

Marie Tussaud is mentioned in The Scarlet Pimpernel.

 Madame Tussauds sculptures are used on the cover of Rick Wakeman's
album The Six Wives of Henry VIII. A waxwork of Richard Nixon also
appears in the background.

Madame Tussauds in Las Vegas was featured in Travel Channel`s Ghost

Adventures

In the Parks and Recreation episode "Indianapolis", Leslie Knope mentions

the "Misshapen Celebrity Palace", a fictional tourist trap where Madame
Tussauds sends their failed wax figures.

Did you know?

It can take up to three weeks to

insert all the hair into the head of a

Madame Tussauds wax figure, with

the hair inserters working in

shifts day and night!

Sculptures can be made from many different kinds of

materials. At Madame Tussauds they use wax. This helps them

to create the best likeness of the celebrities they are modelling.

Other materials can be used in sculpture as well.

10 facts about Madame Tussauds.

1. Madame Anna Maria Tussaud (AKA Marie) was a real person. She was
serving as a housekeeper for Dr. Philippe Curtius who made wax models to help illustrate
anatomy. She picked up the trade she would become famous for from him. You can see
Madame Tussaud in her own museum: she did her own portrait in wax just eight years
before she died at the ripe old age of 88.

2. She ended up becoming more famous for her work than he did - her work was so well-
known that she was invited to be part of the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette so she
could teach art to the king's sister. The sad part? Madame Tussaud ended up
making her former employers' death masks after they were executed in
the French Revolution.

3. Just this year, Ozzy Osbourne posed as himself and scared

unsuspecting visitors when they sat down to get their pictures with the
"wax" Ozzy.

4. In 1940, Madame Tussauds of London was hit with a bomb. More

than 350 head molds were destroyed.

5. In 2008, a German man rushed

past security on the opening day of the Berlin Madame Tussauds and
ripped Hitler's head off.

A sign asked people to refrain from posing with or taking pictures of the statue, but didn't
specify that decapitation was prohibited as well. "It disturbs me that Hitler should become a
tourist attraction," said the attacker.

6. Madame Tussauds wanted to make a figure of Mother Teresa, but

she told them no - one of the only people to ever do so. She insisted that
her works were more important than her physical being.
 7. It takes about 150 measurements for
the artists at Madame Tussauds to create a good likeness of the person
they're portraying. And sometimes famous people sit for measurements more than
once - Queen Elizabeth, for example, has modeled for 17 different poses over the years.
8. All figures are made two percent larger than the person really
is. That's how much the wax is expected to shrink throughout the entire process.

9. The smallest wax figure Madame Tussauds has ever made is

Tinkerbell. They do occasionally do figures of fiction - other than Tinkerbell, they've also
made wax figures of Shrek, the Burger King (why?!), and the Incredible Hulk.

10. I have to include this fun fact for my own peace of mind. The grammar geek in you
might wonder why I didn't refer to it as Madame Tussaud's with an apostrophe, and I'll be
honest" at first, I did. But Merlin Entertainments Group decided that since Madame
Tussaud no longer actually owns the franchise, there's really no need
for the possessive-indicating apostrophe. So they simply got rid of it. Kind of like
Dr Pepper with no period after Dr., I guess.