Laliberté’s annual Grand Prix party in Montreal every June attracted A-listers from all over the world. The Sunday night after the big Formula One race, Laliberté would host a bash at his sprawling mansion in Saint-Bruno that would usually end up lasting a few days. It became the highlight of the year for the world’s jet set crowd. Years later, Laliberté had to move the party to an airport base because of recurring complaints by neighbours about the incredible noise level and wild partying. Everyone who attended was awed.
“I have attended the finest parties all over the world, but nothing that compares to this,” says Myra Jones, a Milan-based fashion model who experienced several of Laliberté’s parties. “Everything you wanted was available at Guy’s parties—drugs, the best music spun by famous DJs flown in from Europe and the U.S.A., and the wildest sex you could ever imagine.”
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Many people in Laliberté’s inner circle worked for months in advance to plan his big bash. One of his close friends, “Jake,” recalls when Robert De Niro attended in 2001 while in town shooting the film The Score, which turned out to be legendary star Marlon Brando’s last flick before he died. De Niro was known for dating beautiful black women. “I rounded up the hottest black strippers, prostitutes and models in Montreal and invited them to Guy’s party,” Jake reveals. “Guy likes to do anything and everything to please his guests. He wants them to have the time of their lives at his parties. If he knows a special guest likes Italian wine, he’ll have the most expensive bottles flown in. These are bottles you’d never be able to get at a liquor store in Montreal. Guy pays attention to detail in everything he does. And he spares no expense.”
Laliberté’s mountainside home in Saint-Bruno was an architectural gem. Its security system was one of the most sophisticated in the world. Laliberté had his own private lake and immense gardens filled with rows of tall, centuries-old trees.
B-list guests at his parties would be asked to sign confidentiality agreements before being allowed entrance. Gorgeous women from all over the world were often present, in addition to many of the world’s leading entertainment, arts, and business moguls. The fun would usually last several days before Laliberté would instruct his staff to turn on the grounds’ sprinkler system, which was the signal that the party was officially over.
“Everything was permitted,” says “Abby,” a stripper from Las Vegas who was a regular at his parties. “I tripped out for four days. There were tents, campers, and rooms set up for everyone to sleep in. During the party there were rooms available for people to have sex in. A lot of orgies took place. We also did lots of drugs. It was quite the experience.”
Despite Laliberté’s worries about police interference at his parties, he refused to lock out his close cop friends. But he made them promise to turn a blind eye to what was happening.
“Essentially it was give and take with the police,” journalist Esmond Choueke says. “Guy would let them in if they promised to behave and have a good time. Lots of cops party hard when they’re off duty. It was a brilliant strategy on Guy’s part to make sure the place didn’t get busted, since there was so much sex and drugs. He needed to do something to ensure a SWAT team didn’t descend on his home in the middle of the party. It would have created headlines all over the world. He managed to avoid that.”
Nevertheless, says a close friend of Laliberté’s, “By 2003, there was a lot of heat on Guy to tone it down. He moved the party to the Saint-Hubert airport and in recent years has just had close friends over for the Grand Prix weekend. He got tired of dealing with all the crap involved. Because of previous complaints he made sure no drugs were in the open and he put a tight rein on how things were organized. It was a far cry from his parties a few years back when everything you can think of was totally out in the open.”
One group Laliberté did keep off limits was Quebec’s notorious chapter of the Hells Angels. Although he casually knew several leading members of the biker gang, he didn’t go out of his way to invite them to his parties.
“Guy wanted to make sure that his parties exuded class and went off without any trouble,” one of Laliberté’s close friends says. “He was never one to try to mix with bikers or undesirables. He knew a lot of them, but in Montreal it’s rare to find someone on the party scene who doesn’t have some connection to them. I never noticed bikers at his parties; if they were there, they certainly were not wearing leather jackets and leather pants. They would have got in by dressing in more formal attire.” The friend adds that around a thousand of the guests at the main party would leave the grounds of the mansion the following morning, while several dozen would be invited to stay on and enjoy the next couple of days.
