Régine Zylberberg

Zylberberg died on 1 May 2022, according to her granddaughter.

On 22 April 1996, Zylberberg and her son were arrested for refusing to comply with crew requests and smoking on an American Airlines flight. It was alleged that, though she was travelling economy, Régine had demanded a first-class upgrade, which the airline declined. In June 2011, she appeared as Solange in Follies at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. She lived with her husband in Saint-Tropez.

In the 1970s, Zylberberg moved to New York and lived in a suite of the Delmonico Hotel. She opened Regine's nightclub on the ground floor of the hotel in 1976. The club served food under the direction of French chef Michel Guérard. In the 1970s, she designed a line of "Ready-to-Dance" evening clothes which were proof against wrinkling and so could be packed, which were sold at Bloomingdale's. In 1988, she was in charge of the Ledoyen Restaurant on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.

In 1957, she opened Chez Régine in the Latin Quarter, which became the place to be seen for visiting celebrities, socialites and royalty. As Zylberberg's celebrity expanded she established other venues under the name Chez Régine's in London, New York City, Monte Carlo and elsewhere. These were ultra-selective venues in prime urban locations, all featuring her signature "disco-style" layout. Zylberberg's Paris Whisky à Gogo became the inspiration for the later establishment of the Whisky a Go Go nightclub in Los Angeles. She also established Jimmy'z, a nightclub in Monaco, in 1974.

Known as Régine, she became a torch singer; by 1953, she was a nightclub manager in Paris. She is attributed with the invention of the modern-day discothèque, by virtue of creating a new dynamic atmosphere at Paris' Whisky à Gogo, with the ubiquitous jukebox replaced by disc jockeys utilizing linked turntables.

Régine Zylberberg (born Rachelle Zylberberg; 26 December 1929 – 1 May 2022), often known mononymously as Régine, was a Belgian-born French singer and nightclub impresario. She dubbed herself the "Queen of the Night".