Photo Flashback: Remembering Jean-Claude Baker

As BroadwayWorld reported last week, Jean-Claude Baker, cable-television pioneer, biographer, historian and internationally known restaurateur of Theatre District hotspot Chez Josephine, died on January 15, 2015. He was 71. His death was a suicide. BroadwayWorld remembers Baker below.

Chez Josephine is a French restaurant that is well-known amongst the Broadway community and was referred to as a "cocktail of human beings" by Baker.

Mr. Baker achieved international recognition as the owner and ebullient host of Chez Josephine, a restaurant on New York City's Theater Row. It was named for his adoptive mother, Josephine Baker, the American performer who became a superstar in Paris in the 1920's.

Mr. Baker was born in France and left as a young man to go to Liverpool and then West Berlin, where he opened a nightclub in the 1960's that became a sensation, drawing the kind of clientele that Studio 54 did in New York.

A Requiem Mass will take place at Holy Cross Church on West 42nd Street in late January. A memorial service will be held in the spring, on a date to be announced. In lieu of flowers, donations to the charity Autism Speaks are requested (www.autismspeaks.org).

Photo Credit: Walter McBride

Jean-Claude Baker attending the opening night performance of PONIES at Studio Dante Theatre in New York City. October 14, 2004

Jean-Claude Baker & Lauren Bacall attending "First Readings: A Benefit for Studio Dante" with a Tribute to the Legendary Lauren Bacall at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City. March 31, 2008.

Jean-Claude Baker & Lauren Bacall attending "First Readings: A Benefit for Studio Dante" with a Tribute to the Legendary Lauren Bacall at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City. March 31, 2008.

Jean Claude Baker attending the opening night performance of PONIES at Studio Dante Theatre in New York City. October 14, 2004