Transcript: 
[Francesca]
Phillipe Collin, Welcome to Writer's Voice.

[Phillipe Collin]
Thank you so much for your warm welcome.

[Francesca]
The Barmen of the Ritz is a story that's based on a real person and many real figures appear within it, and yet it's a novel. I think it's a novel very much about the moral ambiguities that are forced by war and the need for survival, and also the courage that extreme events engender, often very surprisingly in people. For listeners who haven't yet read The Barmen of the Ritz, introduce us to Frank Mayer and the predicament he faces when the Germans occupy Paris.

[Phillipe Collin]
So, in the 1930s, Frank Mayer was a household name and one of the most celebrated cocktail makers in the world. He was very famous and, for example, his bar in the Ritz during the 30s hosted Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Gabrielle Chanel or many others. He was very famous, but in the 1940s, when German troops entered and occupied Paris, Frank had to learn how to survive and it was very special because in a few hours, his world has totally changed.

The beginning of the novel, it's a quiet world, it's his world and it's like a switch, it's like a collapse. And in a few hours, his world changed totally and he had to learn to cope with German officers. And then, most of customers are unaware that Frank Mayer, Australian émigré and a world war veteran one, is hiding a dark secret.

He is Jewish. So now, his world has changed, he is in danger and he has to learn how to survive among Nazis and collaborators, spies, socialites, high-ranked prostitutes. A new world for Frank Mayer in the Ritz bar for four years.

So it's an amazing story, in fact. And Frank was trapped in this theatre of shadows and lights where the best and the worst of humanity would cross paths. So it's like, yes, a little theatre.

It's like a microcosm of France occupied for four years. So it's a strange world, really.

[Francesca]
And what a gripping story you tell. You did an enormous amount of research, of course, into this book, but where that record falls silent, how did you decide what you could imagine? I mean, for example, you invent a diary for him.

You mix some of the characters, but you also invent some characters. What were some of the decisions behind those inventions?

[Phillipe Collin]
In fact, of course, at the beginning, I dug into the archives. But first, the Ritz does not give up its secrets easily. So it's not easy to know what happened during World War II inside the Ritz.

That's the first thing. And the second thing, that is, Frank was very known, very famous, but he was not a very important person. So there is not a lot of archives about him.

So quickly, I decided to write a fiction because I have not enough information about him. But immediately I said to myself, OK, but it's a golden opportunity because Frank did exist, really. But I was allowed to get inside his head and imagine all his thoughts, all his fears, all his desires, anxieties.

And so there is a lot of grey zones in his life. And for a novelist, it's a big gift because, you know, I'm a historian by trade. So it's a new way for me.

And it was very liberating and very exhilarating.

[Francesca]
Well, you do it so well. And the characters, of course, are so vivid. There are characters who, in the beginning, in Frank's eyes, he doesn't have a whole lot of respect for.

There are people who he thinks are really not important or don't have a real moral background, who end up having perhaps even more of a moral background than he does. Talk about some of the ambiguities. I mentioned the word moral ambiguity, and there are many that are abound.

First talk about, of course, the most important one, which is the whole issue of survival. Some people in the novel, for example, Blanche. Blanche is a figure in the book who is also hiding her Jewish identity.

Someone who seems to have a penchant for self-destruction. On the other hand, one could also say that, to some degree, that's a response to the stress that she's under. Talk about some of the different ways that people deal with this confrontation with mortality and the threat to their lives.

[Phillipe Collin]
It's the way of this novel. It's the only question. Who are you in front of this situation?

And it's a very difficult question for all of us. My idea is to ask all readers the same question. What would you have done in Frank Mayer's shoes, in Blanche's shoes?

I guess that all characters are ambiguous, except Blanche, because she's my heroine. She's the best. She's my queen, Blanche because she's very clever, very brave.

All information in this novel about her are true, are real. She has been arrested three times by Nazis and it's real. For me, it's the strongest character in this novel and in real life, too.

But, for example, Frank is not so brave than her. But he moved during these four years. At the beginning, his world has changed, but not really.

It's the same job. He's behind the bar at the Ritz every evening. Okay, the first days, okay, it will be fine.

Maybe it will be better. But the question is, should I stay or should I go? Should I keep quiet or resist?

And at the beginning, Frank says to himself, to himself, to him, okay, it will be fine. I go on to work on the Ritz and I will be fine. Except, of course, the clients now are Nazis.

They're not generals. And it's very difficult for him, in fact. And, we can talk about Goering, for example.

Marshall Goering, the number two man in the Nazi regime, whose behavior in the hotel was extremely strange and dangerously unpredictable. And Frank, for example, every night lived with anxieties of never quite knowing what to expect next from him and living with the fear that Frank might be on the receiving hand of his irrational brutality. And Frank had to deal with this type of situation for four years.

So it was a very difficult and anxious life. And maybe my novel is talking about that, just talking about that. Who he was and who are you?

Because this question comes from the past. But in fact, Francesca, I think this question is our present. Who are you?

Because the world is changing a lot. And who are you in the front of this new situation in the world? So I think it's a very interesting question for the present.

And, you know, maybe we could experience the same thing. Maybe the world could change really quickly. And maybe we will be in the same situation as Frank in 1940.

In a different way, of course. In France, in the next spring, there will be a very important election, maybe historical election. And maybe we will be in front of a new situation, like a switch.

And we will see who I am, who I'll be. So it's very interesting.

[Francesca]
Well, so many of us are already facing those choices here in this country. And we already have people who have died standing up for others who are being put in the same position that Jews were put in, in 1940 to 1944, in your novel, , in The Barmen of the Ritz. I've often found that I need to interrogate myself because I get afraid, but I still haven't been tested the way the people were really tested in this novel.

And even Frank, I mean, yes, he makes his accommodation with the Nazi guests that he has to in order to keep his job and to keep his life. But he takes serious risks, risks that could have put him into a situation, you know, where he would have been killed, murdered by the Gestapo, had he been found out. He arranges for false papers for people, which was, of course, absolutely crucial.

And yet also he takes advantage of the situation because he gets paid for this and he begins to amass quite a bit of money. How did you negotiate the morality or the immorality of Frank's actions?

[Phillipe Collin]
I'm sure you remember, but in the novel, it's not a decision of Frank. It's Beannis Barre and Mr. Seuss had a deal to give to Frank. It's like a threat.

And Frank said, OK, no, I risked my life and I have to do to it. OK, no. OK, let me 24 hours and I give you an answer.

But, you know, it's not his choice. So it's life forced him to do that. And it's very important for me because OK is almost a resistance, but not really.

Not really. It's OK. I do that.

But it's not my idea at the beginning. So it's very interesting. And I don't know if he was a hero.

He was my hero. Because, you know, in fact, I guess my answer, my answer about this question, what would I have done in France Media Shows? My answer, which I believe to be completely honest, is my novel.

It's my answer. And, you know, I think at the end of the story, maybe I feel like shame on me, maybe, you know, because I would like to be like Blanche Rosello, more resistant, more stronger. And at the end, OK, I'm not a hero.

I'm just a little guy just in the bar and I deal with myself to survive. Yes.

[Francesca]
But, you know, I think that's what we naturally think of ourselves until we are confronted with a situation. For example, as my listeners know, my father was in the resistance in Holland during World War Two. His wife was absolutely not interested in being part of that resistance.

Yet when confronted with a fait accompli, that there were people that my father had allowed into his home in hiding, she not only helped that situation, but at a crucial point, she confronted the Gestapo, pulled it off and saved everybody in that house.

[Phillipe Collin]
Yeah, I totally agree. And I think maybe we have some things inside us that we don't know, really. And maybe we are stronger than we think about us.

And it's a hope for me, in fact. Maybe inside you, maybe there is something that could be better when the collapse arrives. And I trust in that.

I trust in this taste of humanity, maybe. Because, you know, I stay optimist forever.

[Francesca]
Well, that's wonderful. But nonetheless, there are many, many people who did collaborate. And one of the points that you make, and I think it's one that really struck home to me as an American in this time, is how many in the bourgeoisie made their accommodations, the people who were more powerful, who had more resources, made their accommodations with the Nazis, than one might expect.

Just like here, it's the powerful law firms, it is the powerful media moguls who have made a compromise with democracy and have served fascism, to say the word, in this country where so many ordinary people have stood up. Talk a little bit about that and how that plays out in this book as well.

[Phillipe Collin]
It's very important to write because when you live in a luxury, when you live at the Ritz under Nazi occupation, it's an enclave. And people who live there live with another lifestyle, another rules, compared to the people surrounding them. And, you know, there were two worlds in Paris during Nazi-occupied France.

The world inside the Ritz, the world outside the Ritz. And I think when you live at the Ritz, you become blind. And it's very easy to become blind because your life is very comfortable.

You are not hungry, you are not cold, you are not scared. But everywhere around the Ritz, you are very hungry because there is nothing to eat everywhere in Paris. But in the Ritz, it's not the same thing.

It's very interesting because there is no more connection between them and the others. And it was a goal of my novel to be careful to be not too rich. Because, yeah, because when you are too rich, you are not be aware with the real world.

And especially during World War II in Paris. And of course, there is big parties at the Ritz with a beautiful dress and with champagne, foie gras, caviar. And with the Nazi diners, with German officers, life goes on.

But in reality, Jewish people are arrested and deported in Paris too. So it was very interesting for me to write about that too. Okay.

The Ritz, it's the most elegant and captivating hotel in the world. Okay. But during World War II, it was a very, very strange place.

[Francesca]
Now, another issue that you talk about, and in the book, it comes up with Frank's son, who joins him at a certain point. And he warns his father that after the war, because by that point, the Eastern Front has collapsed, or is collapsing, and the end is on the horizon for the Nazi regime. He warns his father that people will see his comfort and his Nazi customers only, and not his hidden acts of resistance.

Talk about that whole issue that in order to preserve himself, he had to present one front to the world. But in reality, he has been, whether forced or by choice, pushed into doing the right thing in other ways, but he can't talk about that. What does that do to him?

[Phillipe Collin]
I think he was anxious about that, because he wanted to protect his son and his niece. And I think he decided to keep this secret. But in fact, the relationships between him and his son was very horrible in the real life.

And but it was his son as well. So, and he decided to protect him in a certain way. But, you know, in the novel, Jean-Jacques, who is his son, is tough with his father.

Okay, who are you? You are the bartender from Goring. You are a coward.

You are a collaborator. And, okay, I say nothing, because I want to protect me, baby, and I want to protect you. And so it's interesting, because sometimes you can have a judgment on someone, but you don't know him or her very well.

Sometimes there is something hide behind a mask.

[Francesca]
And I finally want to ask you about a very interesting character in the novel, who's a real person. Ernst Jünger really, I think, embodies this whole confusion around collaboration versus resistance. I mean, one thing you don't mention in the novel is Ernst Jünger was famous for in 1939, before, in fact, the war broke out, you know, before France was occupied.

He published a novel in English, it's called To the Marble Cliffs, which was widely seen as an anti-Hitler novel. It's about a forester who is like a Hitler figure, and who oppresses the common folk. And yet Jünger himself said the interpretation of the novel is up to anybody who reads it.

And Jünger was, in fact, tapped in a kind of sinecure during the occupation of France. He had a really great time in Paris, among them, going to the Ritz during the occupation. And after the war, he had to be rehabilitated.

Now, Jünger was one of the most famous writers in Germany before the war. He wrote a bestseller called Storm of Steel from World War I. He was seen as a great hero.

You also say in the novel that Frank has a hard time figuring him out, and even the reader has a hard time figuring him out. Talk about this ambiguous figure and what he represented for you.

[Phillipe Collin]
It's interesting, because in my mind, Ernst Jünger is a trap for the readers, because he seems to be very elegant, very clever, very witty, very brilliant. And he was. But Jünger is a very dangerous writer.

First, I think he's a very, very great writer. I think he's one of the most important writers in the last century. But at the same time, he was at the beginning of the 20s and even 30s, he was very close to the Nazis.

And in my mind, you know, before the war, Frank Mayer was very close to Fitzgerald, Francis Scott Fitzgerald, the American writer, of course, Gatsby. And I decided to, I don't know, how do you say, like a trap. It's a trap for Frank, because Frank liked so much his bar before the war with Fitzgerald.

And when Jünger came in, he said, oh, maybe it could be a new Fitzgerald for me. But it's a trap because, of course, he was not the same. But Frank began to admire him.

But in my mind, it was to say to readers, be careful, because maybe in a certain situation, you could be blind again. OK, there is a guy who looks like different than the others, so smart, so brilliant. And it seems to be like Fitzgerald.

And it's comfortable for me to have this client with me every night. But this client is a poison. So it was like a trap for Frank and for all the readers.

Because if you don't know Jünger, OK, Jünger seems very, very good guy and very, very interesting guy. But if you have checked just one minute who he was, OK, this guy was very dangerous. So it was like that in my mind.

It's like a trap for readers to describe the reality of the Nazi occupation of Paris. Yeah.

[Francesca]
Well, it is really fascinating. What is up for you next? Are you going back to being a historian only or are you going to try your hand at fiction again?

[Phillipe Collin]
Both, because I'm going to produce a new historical podcast for the public radio in France with historians very seriously. But I begin to write another novel, a historical novel, of course, but it's fiction, too. It's not a storybook.

It's fiction like The Barman of the Ritz.

[Francesca]
Well, I know that Frank is happy for you. And this was just a terrific read, The Barman of the Ritz. Thank you so much, , for joining us here on the show.

[Phillipe Collin]
Thank you so much, Francesca. Thank you so much. It was my pleasure.