WILLACY: Casablanca, perched on the North Atlantic coast of Africa, was a strategic port in the Second World War. Allied leaders Churchill and Roosevelt famously met here in Morocco in 1943, the same year the celluloid classic was released.
For many Casablancas mystery and intrigue comes more from Hollywood than history.
WILLACY: Set in the upheaval and desperation of world war, Casablanca is a film about one mans inner conflict.
Starring Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart who plays Rick Blaine the owner of Ricks Café Americain, a bar and gambling den in Vichy-influenced Casablanca.
Now more than sixty years after the war Ricks Café has come to life in the colourful heart of Casablanca.
Kriger: Well I was here in Casablanca as a diplomat and I decided that I would be better off if I left the government and put together a project that I thought would be a very symbolic one, that of building a Ricks Café, because I thought it could show the qualities of Americans,
risk-takers, optimists, determined people, and entrepreneurial and at the same time show a lot about Morocco.
WILLACY: Throwing in her high-flying diplomatic career, American Kathy Kriger spent months raising money to fund her dream. Then two years ago she opened Ricks Café in an old courtyard-style mansion built against the walls of Casablancas old Medina.
Kriger: People look at this and they say you were born to do this and it does put together all my passions along with my deep feeling for Morocco and just like Rick I found myself in Casablanca and found that through one way or another, it sort of provided the focal point to everything that I had always loved to do.
WILLACY: Just like the movie, Ricks Café is inhabited by a motley collection of bemused locals, mysterious expats, and eccentrics like Serge. A former trick-show rider, the extroverted Frenchman has become a late night fixture at the bar.
Serge: For me, personally, I feel very comfortable here. As for what I can bring to Ricks Café, its just my presence. I have the reputation of being a boy who arrives very late and who leaves very early in the morning.
WILLACY: In the Academy Award winning movie Casablanca, the piano-playing Sam is Ricks confidante. In Ricks Café the man tickling the ivories is a young Moroccan named Issam.
Issam: Well I think its a coincidence, but its true that its weird. Why not?
-- Play it once Sam, for old times sake.
Issam: When they know that my name is Issam, they say play it again Issam. But most of them dont know, so they say play it again Sam.
WILLACY: And every night Issam plays As Time Goes By again and again as patrons let themselves slip into the characters in the movie.
Kriger: Heres looking at you kid.
WILLACY: A portrayal of a chaotic world ravaged by war, Casablanca tells the story of outcasts, of refugees trying to flee the conflict for the safety of America. But in Ricks Café there are outcasts from America opting for the anonymity of Morocco.
MacNamara: So its an interesting irony that I find myself in Casablanca, the real Casablanca, which is another place for outcasts in a way.
WILLACY: Mark MacNamara isnt just any American outcast, hes a child of Hollywood, the son of a fashion model mother and a movie publicist father.
MacNamara: After my mother and father divorced, she was on the loose in Hollywood, went here and there, and one of the places she went was on Humphrey Bogarts yacht, Santana. What she did on the yacht with Humphrey Bogart I cant tell you. It was about a year before he died.
Kriger: OK, for the bar Rashid after the jam session Im sure Serge is going to come
WILLACY: More than sixty years after Bogart and Bergman made Casablanca famous, Ricks Café has come to life -- a place of luminous shadows, outcasts, and intrigue.
Bogart: Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Reporter: Mark Willacy
Camera: Geoffrey Lye
Editor: Garth Thomas
Producer: Ian Altschwager
For many Casablancas mystery and intrigue comes more from Hollywood than history.
WILLACY: Set in the upheaval and desperation of world war, Casablanca is a film about one mans inner conflict.
Starring Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart who plays Rick Blaine the owner of Ricks Café Americain, a bar and gambling den in Vichy-influenced Casablanca.
Now more than sixty years after the war Ricks Café has come to life in the colourful heart of Casablanca.
Kriger: Well I was here in Casablanca as a diplomat and I decided that I would be better off if I left the government and put together a project that I thought would be a very symbolic one, that of building a Ricks Café, because I thought it could show the qualities of Americans,
risk-takers, optimists, determined people, and entrepreneurial and at the same time show a lot about Morocco.
WILLACY: Throwing in her high-flying diplomatic career, American Kathy Kriger spent months raising money to fund her dream. Then two years ago she opened Ricks Café in an old courtyard-style mansion built against the walls of Casablancas old Medina.
Kriger: People look at this and they say you were born to do this and it does put together all my passions along with my deep feeling for Morocco and just like Rick I found myself in Casablanca and found that through one way or another, it sort of provided the focal point to everything that I had always loved to do.
WILLACY: Just like the movie, Ricks Café is inhabited by a motley collection of bemused locals, mysterious expats, and eccentrics like Serge. A former trick-show rider, the extroverted Frenchman has become a late night fixture at the bar.
Serge: For me, personally, I feel very comfortable here. As for what I can bring to Ricks Café, its just my presence. I have the reputation of being a boy who arrives very late and who leaves very early in the morning.
WILLACY: In the Academy Award winning movie Casablanca, the piano-playing Sam is Ricks confidante. In Ricks Café the man tickling the ivories is a young Moroccan named Issam.
Issam: Well I think its a coincidence, but its true that its weird. Why not?
-- Play it once Sam, for old times sake.
Issam: When they know that my name is Issam, they say play it again Issam. But most of them dont know, so they say play it again Sam.
WILLACY: And every night Issam plays As Time Goes By again and again as patrons let themselves slip into the characters in the movie.
Kriger: Heres looking at you kid.
WILLACY: A portrayal of a chaotic world ravaged by war, Casablanca tells the story of outcasts, of refugees trying to flee the conflict for the safety of America. But in Ricks Café there are outcasts from America opting for the anonymity of Morocco.
MacNamara: So its an interesting irony that I find myself in Casablanca, the real Casablanca, which is another place for outcasts in a way.
WILLACY: Mark MacNamara isnt just any American outcast, hes a child of Hollywood, the son of a fashion model mother and a movie publicist father.
MacNamara: After my mother and father divorced, she was on the loose in Hollywood, went here and there, and one of the places she went was on Humphrey Bogarts yacht, Santana. What she did on the yacht with Humphrey Bogart I cant tell you. It was about a year before he died.
Kriger: OK, for the bar Rashid after the jam session Im sure Serge is going to come
WILLACY: More than sixty years after Bogart and Bergman made Casablanca famous, Ricks Café has come to life -- a place of luminous shadows, outcasts, and intrigue.
Bogart: Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Reporter: Mark Willacy
Camera: Geoffrey Lye
Editor: Garth Thomas
Producer: Ian Altschwager