Toulouse-Lautrec was an influence on the period setting and style of La Boutique fantasque, and Massine envisaged the principal character "quite Lautrec-like".

[5] Diaghilev arranged for Massine to meet Derain in Paris, and they worked out the scenario with the artist's marionette theatre at his home on the rue Bonaparte.

[7] Massine's scenario centers on the love story between two can-can dancer dolls in a toyshop,[8] incorporating elements of comedy, national folk dance and mime, as well as classical choreography.

Driven out of the shop, the customers watch incredulously through the window as the happy dolls and the shopkeeper dance merrily inside with the re-united can-can dancers.

It had its Australian premiere at the Theatre Royal, Adelaide, during the opening night of the Ballets Russe de Monte Carlo tour on 13 October 1936.

[17] When Massine left the company of Colonel de Basil in 1937, La Boutique fantasque was among the works involved in a copyright dispute.

Among the cast were Simon Semenoff (Shopkeeper), Nicolas Orloff (Shop Assistant), Muriel Bentley (English Old Maid), Antony Tudor (American Patron), Jerome Robbins (American Boy), Nora Kaye and Yurek Lazowsky (Tarantella Dancers), John Taras (Melon Hawker), André Eglevsky (Cossack Chief), Karen Conrad and John Kriza (Dancing Poodles), and Irina Baronova and Léonide Massine (Can-can Dancers).

[19] The Royal Ballet in London mounted the work in 1947 as part of the renewal of its repertoire for Covent Garden; Massine was in charge of the production and danced his original role.

[21] Buckle notes that as the ballet took shape it became clear that each musical number was "perfect of its kind" and that there was ample variety of tunes and related dances.

[22] The Rossini piano works used include Gherkins, Radishes, Butterflies, Themes in Variation, Almonds, Petit Caprice (Style Offenbach), Tarantelle pur Sang, Castor Oil, Abortive polka, and La Danza.

[23] The music was a major contribution to the success of the ballet, whose score was well-orchestrated, kept Rossini's harmonies, and generally retained his phrasing unaltered while investing his melodies with a new breadth.