Awaiting Madame: Life Inside the House of One Uber-Class Family

In the wake of an injury, Broadway dancer Matthew Whyteman goes overseas to serve as the fitness trainer for an octogenarian heiress. But after being thrust into an unfamiliar old-money world and initiated into the ranks of a highly dysfunctional live-in staff, Matthew finds out that life with Madame is a far cry from the easy-money gig he anticipated. In spite of the fact that his idle assignment (Awaiting Madame) becomes an inescapable purgatory, he digs into the role and fights to secure his position within her entourage. While traveling to various properties in Morocco, Austria, England, and France, his middle-class American upbringing humorously collides with her European ber-class lifestyle. And although the journey with Madame ultimately renews Matthew's creative spirit, it also reminds the reader that inspiration often dwells in unexpected places. Based on actual events, Dan Weltner details Matthew's gap year abroad in the form of a witty first-person narrative, and pointedly exposes the oddities of working as a servant within a twenty-first century upstairs/downstairs household.