Guy de Maupassant

Georges Duroy travels through 1890s Paris, from cockroach ridden garrets to opulent salons, using his wits and powers of seduction to rise from poverty to wealth, from a prostitute’s embrace to passionate trysts with wealthy beauties, in a world where politics and media jostle for influence, where sex is power and celebrity an obsession.

An anthology of four comic moral tales about the hypocrisies surrounding sex in 1960s Italy: frothy young love and office politics in the big city; milk advertisements that begin to haunt an aging prude; a trophy wife enduring her husband's very public affairs; a lucky ticket-holder at a small town fair.

Three stories. A solitary sailor falls from his boat and washes ashore on a tropical island. While seeking rescue, he's found by a nearly naked woman who is playful and compliant. He decides to erase his signs of distress and remain on the island. What awaits? In the second, an adolescent searches for the words of a nursery rime he remembers bits of. His journey takes him into dreams, sexual awakening, and Oedipal fantasy. Third, a man of wealth in late-nineteenth century Paris hires a prostitute for the night. She's also cabaret performer and takes him to her room. He fears he's about to be robbed. What's her secret?

Florentine is a young, beautiful and passionate woman with a desire for love. Feeling abandoned by her husband's impotency, she searches for outside affection and seduction within brief, but often passionate encounters. During this web of desire she encounters Dorothy. Unknown to Florentine she is her husband's accomplice. In this twisted, frenzied fantasy her husband Jake becomes excited and aroused by the seduction of his wife. With his secret darkrooms and two-way mirrors he begins to desire his wife once more. Florentine, with the help of their adopted son, discovers his world of distorted fantasy. Amazed, but realising that Jake still loves her, she must act.

Mathilde and her husband, who works in a minister's office, are not rich. Mathilde, however, loves beautiful clothes and her husband loves her too much that he lets her do anything she wants. One day they receive an invitation for an important party and she wants to look her best. She borrows a beautiful diamond necklace from her rich friend, but then the necklace gets lost.

Paul, a young idealist trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life, takes a job interviewing people for a marketing research firm. He moves in with aspiring pop singer Madeleine. Paul, however, is disillusioned by the growing commercialism in society, while Madeleine just wants to be successful. The story is told in a series of 15 unrelated vignettes.

Frau Oberst has 2 young nieces who are very open with their sexuality. She hopes to find adequate lovers for her nieces and along the way finds herself in some precarious sexual situations. After a series of sexual encounters between just about everyone at the estate, the Countess drops by for a party where the nieces announce their wedding intentions.

Three tales of supernatural horror include a woman plagued by threatening phone calls, a family targeted by vampiric monsters, and a deceased medium who wreaks havoc upon the living.

Three stories about pleasure. The first one is about a man hiding his age behind a mask to keep going to balls and fancying women - pleasure and youth. Then comes the long tale of Madame Tellier taking her girls (whores) to the country for attending her niece's communion - pleasure and purity. And lastly, Jean the painter falls in love with his model - pleasure and death.

Family Roland lives in Etretat. Jeanne, the youngest, inherits Mr Marechal's fortune, a friend of the parents. Pierre the elder brother, bogged down in questions, questions the sacredness of the family. Is this money hiding a heavy secret?

Adaptation of "Idyll" (1884), a short story by Guy de Maupassant

Based on "Une vie" by Guy de Maupassant

Simon Cordier, a French magistrate and amateur sculptor comes into contact with a malevolent entity. The invisible - yet corporeal - being, called a "horla" is capable of limited psychokinesis and complete mind control.

A servant girl, given in marriage when she turns out to be pregnant, can't bring herself to live away from her master.

A man developes an obsession with a wig.

Normandy, 1819. Jeanne is a young woman full of childish dreams and innocence when she returns home after finishing her schooling in a convent. She marries a local Viscount, Julien de Lamare, who soon reveals himself to be a miserly and unfaithful man. Little by little Jeanne’s illusions are stripped away.

A wife borrows a necklace for a party, and it is subsequently stolen. Her husband embezzles funds to pay for the loss, but he is discovered and arrested.

A notoriously harsh French judge, vacationing at a luxury resort, finds his holiday interrupted when a mysterious killer begins murdering those in and around the hotel.

Damien and Nadia, 34, leave Paris with Chloé, their 8-year-old daughter, to settle in the provinces. Graphic designer for an events company, the first negotiated a full-time telework to follow his partner who has just been offered a position at the Rivière Research Institute where her friend and colleague Marion already works. The couple are expecting a child. But behind this new beginning hides a deaf threat that will soon implode the happiness of this seemingly perfect family.

The short stories of Guy de Maupassant enjoyed a renaissance in the early 1950s, thanks in great part to the Max Ophuls production Le Plaisir. In Trois Femmes, three De Maupassant stories are dramatized, each conveying the central theme of women falling in love. In the first, a black female carnival entertainer causes an uproar when she falls in love with a white soldier. In the second, a young bride is pressured into having a baby to collect a huge inheritance. And in the final episode, a pregnant girl is "adopted" and protected by a small circle of friends. In standard De Maupassant fashion, each of the three stories in Trois Femmes is capped by a surprise twist.

At a mundane evening, Joseph recalls the strange love affair he lived with a young widow, met during a visit to Père-Lachaise. But was it really a love story?

An anthology of erotic stories by famous writers like Guy de Maupassant, Nicolas Edme Restif de La Bretonne, Marquis de Sade, Giovanni Boccaccio, Marquis de Foudras, Daniel Defoe, Anton Tchekov, Jin Ping Mei, and Aristophanes.

"Chez Maupassant" is a French anthology television series based on short stories by Guy de Maupassant. Created by Gérard Jourd'hui and Gaëlle Girre, it ran on France 2 in three seasons in 2007, 2008 and 2011. It consists of a total of 24 episodes of which half are 60 minutes long and half are 30 minutes.

Armchair Theatre is a British television drama anthology series of single plays that ran on the ITV network from 1956 to 1974. It was originally produced by Associated British Corporation, and later by Thames Television from mid-1968.