“An unbearable anti-Semitic and Holocaust denial version”: the widow of the composer of “Couleur mint à l’eau” files a complaint

“She was dressed in striped pajamas in her period photos/She said that they made thousands of soaps based on her roommates/She was a bit of a myth, my grandmother from Birkenau, with her fake number tattooed on her skin/But I couldn’t take it anymore, I never really believed her/She was really a myth, the Birkenau mother. »

The scene takes place in August 2023 during an open-air gathering of Equality and Reconciliation, the far-right movement of Alain Soral, a racist, anti-Semitic activist and Holocaust denier convicted on multiple occasions. A bearded man in shorts and a beret, accompanying himself on the guitar, makes his table friends laugh by singing an anti-Semitic and negationist parody of the hit “Colour mint in water”, Eddy Mitchell’s most listened to song.

The girl with the “mint-colored” eyes becomes “My grandmother from Birkenau”… A reference to Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi concentration and extermination camp in Poland, where 1.1 million deportees died during the Second World War. The parody is to cry… But not to laugh. The video made the rounds on social networks and platforms without anyone being outraged, until the Médiapart site spotted it, revealed it and denounced it on December 13.

“Ulcerated by such a misappropriation”

As soon as the investigation was published, Eddy Mitchell, who wrote the lyrics of the song and has performed it since 1980, as well as his record company, Universal Music France, “strongly” condemn this misappropriation and “demand the immediate removal of the video”. The Minister Delegate in charge of Equality between Women and Men and the Fight against Discrimination, Aurore Bergé, makes a report to the Public Prosecutor…

All platforms agreed to remove the shame video except two, Instagram and Facebook, where it is still visible. Annette Papadiamandis, 86 years old, the widow of Pierre Papadiamandis, composer of “Couleur mint à l’eau” and many other Eddy Mitchell classics, therefore decided to file a complaint against X for counterfeiting this Monday with the public prosecutor of the Paris judicial court.

According to her lawyer, Richard Malka, she “is outraged by such misappropriation” and denounces “an unbearable anti-Semitic and Holocaust denial version”. As the holder of the moral rights over her husband’s composition since the latter’s death on March 22, 2022, she also put Instagram and Facebook on notice to immediately stop disseminating “this negationist counterfeit”… which has already accumulated seven million views and generated more than eight thousand comments.

Why not also attack this recovery for anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial? According to Me Richard Malka, who filed a complaint on behalf of Annette Papadiamandis, only counterfeiting is not subject to limitation and can thus be condemned. In agreement with his friend’s widow, Eddy Mitchell, 83, did not join the complaint, which concerns the musical part of his song, but he is closely following the development of the case.