“John Perona’s El Morocco Family Album” 1937 ZERBE, Jerome [photographs by]

ZERBE, Jerome [photographer]

Federal Printing Service

1937

with the scarce insert card: ‘Compliments of John Perona’

Fine

14 1/2″ x 11 1/8″

The scarce privately printed photo album of legendary nightclub “El Morocco” documents its many famous members, including Cary Grant, Douglas Fairbanks, Franklin Roosevelt, and other notables

This privately printed book has become as elusive as a table at El Morocco was in the 1930s. Folio-size, it is filled with half-tone portraits of the eclectic mix of Park Avenue society, Hollywood celebrity, and European nobility who frequented the club, all in evening wear and posed with the zebra-patterned banquettes as a backdrop. Divine!

“Those first years of El Morocco were stupendous. There wasn’t a celebrity or a socialite who didn’t clamor to get in. Evening dress was mandatory, and so large were the crowds that there was often a waiting line a block long to get in.”

–Jerome Zerbe