[ad_1]
In a Facebook post on Tuesday last week, Red politician and author Mímir Kristjánsson strongly objected to the depiction of the April 1940 days on NRK’s main series “Atlantic Crossing.”
When Dagbladet calls, Kristjánsson emphasizes that he understands this is a drama series, but thinks it’s important to keep your tongue straight in your mouth anyway.
– What I react to is that Prime Minister Nygaardsvold and his entire government are portrayed as hysterical, cowardly and completely incapable of doing anything sensible these days in April, he says. Dagbladet.
Johan Nygaardsvold (1879-1952) became Prime Minister of the Labor Party in 1935 and led the government in exile in London until 1945.
Kristjánsson emphasizes that he has only seen the first episode when he talks to Dagbladet.
The director of “Atlantic Crossing”, Alexander Eik, rejects the criticism.
– It is good that Kristjánsson is involved, interested in history. But the claim that we portray “the whole government” as “hysterical and cowardly” is incorrect, he writes in an email to Dagbladet. Read his answer below in the case.
Historian Ole Kristian Grimnes grants Kristjánsson and Eik a partial right. You can read the expert judgment at the bottom of the case.
“Atlantic Crossing” premiered on NRK on October 25. The Dagbladet critic called it a “soft soap opera”, and rolled a two on the dice.
NRK responds to the carnage
– Historical fact
Many people know of the meeting on April 10, 1940, where the king rejected the Germans’ demand that the government resign. But already the day before, Chancellor Halvdan Koht had delivered the same message to German envoy Curt Bräuer.
However, Kristjánsson believes, many people have the notion that Norway’s “no” was the king’s initiative. “Atlantic Crossing” helps cement this perception, he believes.
– It seems as if he made that decision alone, while the government is playing the fool and nervous about dying. That story is wrong, says Kristjánsson.
He had the same objection in his time against “The King’s No” (2016), directed by Erik Poppe.
– It’s a bold story. It suits us very well, but unfortunately it was not that easy.
see more
“Villain”
Johan Nygaardsvold was far from the “villain” who was later portrayed, according to Kristjánsson. Nygaardsvold’s portrait and the April days in “Atlantic Crossing” are “highly caricatured at best,” he believes.
– What disappears from this story is that it was primarily the Nygaardsvold government, and not the king, who said no to the Germans. The no of the king is less important than the no of the government.
The king, he notes, followed the constitution and confirmed a decision that the government had already made.
– My goal is not to drag King Haakon or Crown Prince Olav into the mud. We are happy to pay tribute to them. Although the “no” of the king was not as unique as we pretend, it was important that they say no, and that in the end they leave, he says.
Kristjánsson points to several possible explanations for the fact that this performance arose:
– One of them is that we love our royal house. I also. There is the idea that it should be built and celebrated. It is the simplest national symbol we have.
Scream warning about NRK recording
– Willing to stay in Norway
In the royal house, there were different opinions about what to do in the days of April.
– Crown Prince Olav, who becomes the hero of “Atlantic Crossing”, was willing to stay in Norway to cooperate with the German Administrative Council, while the king leaves the country, says Kristjánsson.
That was not the case. Kristjánsson draws on, among other things, the books of the royal biographer Tor Bomann-Larsen, who describes Olav’s wish to stay in Norway in the book ‘The Word of Honor’.
– The image drawn by Olav in this series, at least until now, is that he was a rock solid anti-Nazi who did not hesitate for a second, and that long before the government and everyone else were aware that they had to resist the resistance.
That’s wrong, Kristjánsson thinks. He says he’s “almost willing to bet” these nuances won’t appear on “Atlantic Crossing.”
– It doesn’t fit into our story of a heroic royal house.
see more
– embarrassing
Kristjánsson emphasizes that Olav probably had noble reasons for wanting to stay in Norway, noting that this in no way means being a Nazi sympathizer.
– Perhaps it could have contributed to less war and less rioting and destruction.
He also says that Olav, to a greater extent than his father, was a supporter of a thought that was common at the time: that Germany and England should be united against the real enemy, which was Stalin and Bolshevism.
– That is why it is so strange that it appears as an incredibly rock-solid anti-German voice, even long before the Germans arrived in Norway, when we know that it considered a line of cooperation until June 1940.
The dark side of the “no king” story is the “cowardly” government narrative, Kristjánsson believes.
– What I find embarrassing is how you portray the government, the elected representatives and Nygaardsvold. To build the royal house, one has to pretend that everyone else was completely flat on their faces and dizzy in those days.
– Sitting alone in a hotel room
– injustice
On the contrary, he believes that the government was more firm in its decision than the royal house.
– There is a historical injustice, especially against Nygaardsvold, which remains a scapegoat.
Kristjánsson also believes that everything is mixed with “desperate macho performances” in the series.
– All members of the royal family are strong, robust and brave men, who do not fear invasion, and little Nygaardsvold is cowardly and pathetic. I think everyone was pretty desperate and scared back in April 1940, and I don’t think it was the case that the bravest and toughest men made the best decisions.
He believes that the tendency to oversimplify stories about World War II is widespread.
– You see that in “Atlantic Crossing”: Germans must be so bad they shoot dogs for no reason, those who are hysterical must be damn hysterical, and there is no way how good and caring the Crown Prince is as a father, he says . and concludes:
– I don’t think Nygaardsvold was the great hero in 1940, but neither was he the hysterical coward as he is portrayed now.
Receive a courtship letter after TV hit
– error
“Atlantic Crossing” director Alexander Eik responds in an email to Dagbladet. The presentation of the opposition of the Nygaardsvold government to the Nazis in “El No del Rey” has little to do with “Crossing the Atlantic”, he believes.
– We haven’t even touched on the subject, and in fact the government barely gets involved in the first episode of “Atlantic Crossing.” Precisely because “El No del Rey” portrayed him so thoroughly. And, in my opinion, responsible.
Oak elaborates:
– Nygaardsvold’s fear during the attack, in contrast to the calm of the king and crown prince, is duly portrayed by many eyewitnesses. Kristjánsson could still have criticized us for placing the Prime Minister in Lillestrøm during the bombing. In fact, he and Hambro took a car to Hamar.
Oak shows the book ‘9. April 1940: a reported attack ‘, where the historian Aage G. Sivertsen writes:
Nygaardsvold was physically and mentally exhausted. He cried and begged Hambro to be allowed to give up responsibility (…) The Prime Minister simply couldn’t do more. “
– The nervous breakdown in Hamar is not included in “Atlantic Crossing”. In that sense, Nygaardsvold gets away cheaply, Eik writes.
Alerts about new information
– Obvious criticism
The anti-Nazi attitudes of King Haakon and Crown Prince Olav, and their frustration at the government’s “lack of preparation” before the war, are well documented, he believes.
“Both my father and I were desperate about the situation, but there was little we could do. The government had little doubt about what my father meant,” King Olav said later.
Eik further claims to have found a letter in the United States while working on the series, written by Crown Prince Olav and sent to President Roosevelt:
“My unfortunate country, which fully believed in its neutrality, was taken, as it were, with its pants down.” An obvious criticism of the government.
However, it is true that Crown Prince Olav in June 1940 proposed that the government stay in the country, Eik writes.
– But to say firmly that this “considered a line of cooperation” is a bit unadorned. One of the scenarios discussed was that the Crown Prince should be captured, as an inspiration for continued resistance. Instead, this was General Ruge’s lottery. We don’t hide this under the rug, the Crown Prince’s proposal is included in episode two of “Atlantic Crossing.”
Expert judgment
Dagbladet has presented Kristjánsson and Eik’s statements to historian Ole Kristian Grimnes, who is an expert on the history of the Norwegian occupation.
– Kristjánsson is absolutely right that the king’s no was not decisive. But Norway’s no was also not decided in advance by the government, despite the fact that the foreign minister had met with the Germans, he says. Dagbladet.
Decisions of this magnitude were made in the Cabinet.
– So it was the government and the king who together, in Nybergsund on April 10, officially rejected the demand of the Germans to appoint Quisling as prime minister.
He has seen “Atlantic Crossing” himself and partly agrees with the reviews. But not quite:
– Nygaardsvold is quite one-dimensional. In the series, he is very unnerving, but perhaps not as violent as Kristjánsson should have.
It gives both Kristjánsson and Eik a partial right:
– It is true that Nygaardsvold became depressed and, in part, tried to remove responsibility. The flip side is that he eventually joined, continued as prime minister, and rejected Quisling.
Guri Varpe, head of communications for the Royal House, writes in an email to Dagbladet that they do not want to comment on the case.
