"French Cancan" uses one of the most familiar of musical formulas, loosely summarized as, "Hey, gang! Let's rent the old barn and put on a show!" In this case he was inspired by the origins of the Moulin Rouge, the Montmartre cabaret theater which to this day still has success with the kinds of shows it opened with. It is a backstage story centering in the life of the (fictional) impresario Henri Danglard, a womanizer whose career was a series of narrow escapes from bankruptcy.
For his Danglard, Renoir cast Jean Gabin, the greatest of all French leading men, whose genius, like that of so many stars, involved never seeming to try very hard, and simply reflecting his own inner nature. It was their fourth film together, and after the weighty characters Gavin played in "The Lower Depths" (1936), "Grand Illusion" (1937) and "Le Bête Humaine" (1938), a complete change of tone. Danglard is the always insolvent owner of the Chinese Screen, which headlines the infamous courtesan La Belle Abbesse (Maria Felix) as a sultry belly dancer, known to all as Lola, his mistress.
I forgot to translate the word ´´old´ in the bgining of the text. The correct translated sentence is: ´´ Aí, pessoal! Vamos alugar o velho celeiro e fazer um show lá!´´ Sorry ;)