And i am a magazine writer so im always looking for my next meal. Whats the Next Magazine topic . And i thought, the hoxha children. He did have children, three of them, could make a good magazine piece. Then the next thought, i thought you could do a survey of such sons and daughters and make a book of it called children of monsters. And i filed the idea way off of the stove, not even on the back burner. But i acted on it years later. Brian hitler, mussolini, stalin, mao, kim, i could go on. Which one of these 20 that you profiled in here did you find was the family the most difficult with other human beings . Jay that is a close competition. The stalins had a lot of trouble. That should not surprise anyone. The mao children are a mess. Pol pot has a daughter that is welladjusted. He had her pretty late in life, he was about 60, 61 years old. She got married last year. Most are disastrous. There are not many happy stories, but there are some. Brian we got a lot of children and their dictators. Here is a man who was jay he was a claimant, his mother was a french peasant girl. She said that hitler was the father of this boy. She didnt inform him of this until he was i think about 30. He denied it at first for years. He was tormented by it. Then he become obsessed. Then he become convinced he was, in fact, the son of hitler. Most historians say hitler had no children and this claim is not true. Whats important for my book is he thought himself the son of hitler and what effect did that have on him . Answer pretty bad. Brian he is talking in french. [video clip] [speaking in french] brian he looks little like hitler. Jay his son, felipe, looks so much like him. One of the things i say as, any number of french woman could have told their son that the german soldier father he never knew was hitler. Any number of french women. Why did this ones son have to look so much like hitler . It is a little uncanny. Now of course, he didnt have to grow that kind of mustache, did he . Thats him embracing the believed identity. It is creepy. Brian did he have any of the characteristics of hitler . Jay im not sure. I think he was a fairly normal man until he become obsessed with the question. It is a question that would make anyone nuts. I try to be sympathetic. Because, say one fine day, you have never known your father. You knew he was a german soldier. All of your life youve been called a bad phrase for son of a german soldier in france. And you are an adult. Your mother says to you about 30, that father you never knew about, he was the late chancellor of germany, hitler. Thats a card dealt to very, very few people. Very few. And so i try to cut him and some of the others some slack, although it was very, very hard to cut him slack for his admiration of hitler. Brian from april 29th, 1945, Benito Mussolini and his i mistress. Jay this is the gas station in milan. They had been shot before and murdered. He and his main mistress. Now the corpses are being hanged. Brian how many kids did he have . Jay officially speaking, i think he had five. A lot of these dictators, like other men, have kids off of the books. A lot of them have lots of kids off of the books. And, he was a good father on ceremonial occasions. What do i mean by that . He would swoop in and play the great papa. You know, when there was a crisis or something. But mainly he was busy being dictator of italy. Though his children absolutely adored him. It got complicated for his daughter, edda. Whose husband executed. That is a kind of a fine howdoyoudo. She loved her father and also her husband, count ciano. There are other daughters until that book whose husbands were killed by their father. Thats a very ticklish thing. Brian heres a video of the wedding. Edda . Jay shes edda. Brian edda mussolini. You say he had her husband killed . Jay yes. This was a grand affair. It was one of the great occasions of the italian fascism. The wedding of the fascism princess. Edda wins a fascist prince. He became the foreign minister. But then there was a rift. Ciano voted the wrong way on the grand council. He wanted to restore powers to the king. This is when italy was clearly losing the war. So mussolini is imprisoned and snatched by the nazis. And ciano was caught and slated for execution. And this drives edda wild. She pleads. The father will not stay the execution. And ciano is executed. Nad for a while, edda says, my name is no longer mussolini. But eventually she forgave and loved her late father and her late husband in equal measure. It is a very strange psychological case. Brian in 1995, we have video of her funeral. Jay oh. This is ive never seen. [video clip] brian this was 1995. They are saluting her. Jay yeah. Not yet out of style. Brian how active are they today . Jay they are around. They are a remnant. They are very enthusiastic. They dont have much electoral success. The leader is none other than his granddaughter, alessandra. Brian this video is this year. Shes on the floor of the european parliament. This is in italian. Lets watch. Jay how does she look . [video clip] [speaking italian] brian did you get all of that . Jay a bit. Yes. Brian what is her story . She was in the italian parliament. Jay shes had a long political career. Shes been in both chambers, the house of deputies and the senate. Shes been in the european parliament. Shes a somewhat big deal. Her father was romano mussolini. One of mussolinis sons. Romano was a jazz pianist. He performed with ella fitzgerald, dizzy gillespie, all of them. His first wife was the sister of sophia loren. So, alessandra is the daughter excuse me the granddaughter of mussolini and the niece of sophia lauren, one of the greatest stars in italy and the 20th century. So, alessandra has quite a heritage. Shes very faithful to her grandfathers legacy. She is a socalled neofascist. Interestingly enough, shes rather supportive of israel and disavows a bit of her grandfathers antijewish laws. Brian this is probably my favorite clip for a reason that has nothing to do with dictators. But some of the people watching will remember alfalfa and buckwheat. They will remember spanky and darla. Here is toro mussolini. Jay the little rascals . Brian yes. Jay he was the son. He wanted to make his name as a movie writer about movie and a director and writer and a screen plays. Een he was a bigshot for a while. World war ii killed him. Brian this is brief. He was a producer he had come to meet. If you listen closely after the foreign language, youll be able to hear spanky and darla and all of the brief things. [video clip] [speaking in a foreign language] brian the little rascals. Whats the point of this . Jay victorio and hal roach formed a pact, a business agreement. They were going to produce movies together, and as i remember, grand operas, starting with rigoletto. This was just before the war. It might have been 1938 or so. Hal roach took some heat in hollywood for the alliance. He said, i believe this is a direct quote, using the language of the time, he said Benito Mussolini is the only square politician i know. Square means straightforward or honest. But the pressure was too much. Roach brought out victorio. So he wasnt able to consummate the deal. Brian so far not that vicious. Who is the meanest of all of your 20 dictators . Jay the sons and daughters or the dictators themselves . Brian the dictators themselves. Jay theres no way ill give you an answer but with a preface. Theres no way you rank hitler, stalin, pol pot, amin, duvalier, others i dont think you should get much into the ranking business. Saddam hussein. But i want to tell you something about mao. Ill give you an opinion about mao. Not my opinion, but the opinion of those close to him. Theres something especially chilling about him, i would say. Because he seems to have been devoid of human feeling. He seems to have been so clinical. Saddam hussein, forgive me for saying so, you can kind of understand. He had a volcanic temper. He was a human being. An outrageous human being. A human being who engaged in great evil. But you can sort of see a person in him. Mao is almost robotic. Hes an ideological robot. And he views the hundreds of millions of chinese as so much experimental material. He wasnt happy. He wasnt sad. He wasnt mad. He was just detached. Brian how many kids did he have . Jay he had about 10. He knew about four. The others died in infancy or were given away during the war or the civil war. He didnt care much about his children. Brian what happened to them after he was gone . Jay the two daughters live on as kind of ceremonial figures. There was a grandson. He was a kind of general in the army. He was promoted in the army based on his name. People mock him. Hes dopey and quite chubby, doesnt look like a military man. Mao had a granddaughter who was one of the richest women in all of china. Her husband is one of the richest men in all of china. But maos children, this perhaps goes without saying, led very sad and turbulent lives. Just very difficult lives. Brian the only video we have is maos daughter. This is a visit in northwest china in 2015. This was this year. Jay really . This is the only child, i believe, that mao had with the wife we know as madame mao. Brian how many times was he married . Jay i think about four. He intended to discard his wives for others without telling the original wives. Brian how long did it take to get the information . Jay it was hard. Theres a great stinginess about concerning dictators families. Often theres often a code of silence around many dictators families and the legacies of those families. It is a tight knit thing after the dictators falls. But i describe myself as a scavenger. I describe myself as a kind of garbage man. I was digging around. These sons and daughters most of them, some of them are famous and important. Some of them become dictator. But most of them are footnotes and asides. And you really have to dig to find out about them. A few of them write memoirs. Most of them keep their own counsel. So you just pick up things. An historian, a visitor, a scholar will remark on a dictator. You go ahha. It is real gold to you. Brian people today would know uday and qusay . Who are they . Who were they . Jay i think senator mccain said the lovable scamps. They were the two sons of Saddam Hussein. They were little monsters. They are an example of boys who were the monsterous reflections of their monster father. In fact a renegade in saddams secrets says they were 100 worse than him himself. That is hyperbole, of course. But i think as i say in my book, once you get to know the two sons, you can forgive the hyperbole. Because they were awful. And in particular, uday, i shouldnt say too much about him, but he was a monstrous person who tortured and raped and murdered and terrorized his way through life. Brian we have a video of him firing an ak47 during a party in a restaurant. [video clip] jay hes trying to create a little bit of excitement. I dont think we can see it, but there are lights strung in the form of happy birthday. Surely in arabic. And he shoots the lights out. Musicians duck. He just did it for fun. He kept constant chaos around him. He had total license in a country of about 27 million. There was one person, one human being who could stop him, and that was his father. His father sometimes did and mainly didnt. Brian how many times was saddam married . How many kids did he have . Jay saddam was married twice. Some people say three or four times. He had one original wife and one later in life. He never divorced the first one. He had those two sons, and i think three daughters. Two of the daughters married brothers who were cousins of saddam. And those two couples with their families defected once to jordan. You may recall this, brian, they stayed there under the protection of king hussein. They were enticed back home. There was a lot of bloodshed after that. Brian what happened to them . Jay the husbands were promised safety and reconciliation. They are immediately made to divorce the wives, saddams daughters. They were stripped of their military ranks, they were sent home to their fathers villa or compound. And then there was a great gunfight and they were killed. I think within about 48 hour of returning home. Brian were you able to talk to anybody in iraq about the se children and what happened to them . Jay yes. I was able to talk to some knowledgeable people. I couldnt talk to any family members. Which was usually the case. In the preparation for this book. There are only so much around to talk to, and only so much willing to say what they know or to divulge their feelings or experiences at all. It is a very touchy business being the son or daughter of a dictator. But i was able to find out quite a bit about saddams family. And one of the daughters is a bit of a public figure. She lives in oman and is in jordan again. She was one of the defecting wives. Shes a great loyalist to her daughter, though her father killed her husband. In fact shes nicknamed little saddam. Shes a great supporter of isis. Shes wanted by interpol. She goes to the finest boutiques, has tons of plastic surgery, shes in jewelry design, and shes a keeper of the Saddam Hussein flame. And why the government of King Abdallah ii maintains her and shelters her, im not 100 sure. Brian the History Channel did a documentary on uday and qusay. They came to an early familiar end. We will watch 20 seconds of this. [video clip] a ferocious fourhourlong firefight ensues. Later that day, after troops storm the house, word comes from Central Command about the results of the raid. Four persons were killed during the operation. They were removed from the building. We have since confirmed that uday and Qusay Hussein are among the dead. Two days later, these gruesome pictures confirm the identity of the dead. For many iraqis, the death of husseins two sons is cause for celebration. Because under their rule, iraq had become a living hell. Brian what would those two men do to others . Physically when they were alive. Jay a lot of the people in my book order torture and killing. A few of them like to do it themselves. Uday liked to do it himself. He liked to get his hands dirty. He tortured and killed a great many people. A great many. Brian and never suffered from it. He could do anything he wanted . Jay he was the kind who it goes without saying that he could abduct and rape the daughters of ordinary men. That goes without saying. He could abduct and rape the daughters of governors, of high officials. He was untouchable except by saddam. And except for this. There was an assassination attempt. He took some bullets. It partially paralyzed him. And when the saddam regime fell, our soldiers found about 100 canes, some of which functioned as firearms. Brian how did you pick the 20 . Jay i went for what i thought was the worst of the worst, the very worst dictators. Modern dictators. I didnt go back into antiquity. You could have gone for the ivan the terrible who killed his son with a with his scepter. The czar killed his son with his own scepter and immediately regretted it. This was in a rage, and he was mortified by it. Theres a famous painting of this moment. I didnt do that. So i picked the ones that i thought theres some subjectivity here. There are a couple who really dont belong. Theres one i feel sort of guilty about. Franco doesnt belong in a book called children of monsters. He doesnt belong with stalin and mao and idi amin and pol pot and all of the rest. He was a dictator. We wouldnt want to live under him, or any other dictators. Sometimes in the dictator business, we grade on a curve. He was a lamb. I included him. Maybe i shouldnt have. Ill give you my reasons. They are probably bad. Hes famous. People know of him. He had a daughter whos led an interesting life. He was a dictator after all. I erred on the side of including him. Brian we have some video of carmen franco. This is his daughter. This is from her wedding in 1950. How many children did franco have . Jay just the one. Just the one. [video clip] brian thats him on her left. Jay that was a very grand affair. She married a marquis who was a surgeon playboy. He was a friend of christian barnyard in south africa. He did the first heart transplant. Carmens husband did the first heart transplant in spain. Brian what happened to carmen . Jay carmen lived on. Her children and grandchildren have lived quite difficult lives. She has lived with a great deal of grace and poise. Shes a symbol of neofascism. Theres just a few fascists left in spain. Shes a bit of a grand lady. One thing i discovered in this book is that well, it may be true that fathers in general especially prize their daughters, theres nothing like a relationship between a father and a daughter. And franco had only one child. That child was this girl. He absolutely adored her. She was the greatest, brightest thing in his life. They lived until the end of his life pretty near each other. They spent a lot of time together. It was the most prized relationship in francos life by far. Brian what book is this for you . Jay this is my second real book. I have a collection of journalism and speeches and things like that. Brian i wanted to ask this question while i was reading your background what is it like to write about monsters and their children and dictators and all of the horrible things that you report in this book compared to all of the time you spent writing about music, and explain how many writing you do about music . And, explain all the writing you do about music. Jay i say i have a day job and a night job. Music criticism is my night job. I like the balance. I dont think i would like to do all of one. I must say, i was pretty happy finishing children of monsters. I was glad to begin it, i was glad to do it, and i was glad to wash my hands of it. I wrote before that to a history of the nobel peace prize, and i was reluctant to see the history end. Some of the characters are unsavory. But to have written the book about sons and daughters of dictators, you rub up against a lot of unpleasantness. I tell the story about, here is a boast, name dropping. My friend, paul johnson, whom i love, the british historian. He he wrote a book called open quote creators wrote a book called, creators, about intellectuals and maybe comedians. He was doing a series of sketches of lives in categories. He was going to do one called monsters. He called it off. He didnt want to spend so much time with the material. He did later on write a brief life of stalin. I asked him, was that left over to the research . The bigger book on monsters. He said yes. He wanted to use the material. Brian you wrote about franco and mussolini and then you wrote about hitler. What is it about these dictators that came out of europe, that life that they lived, compared to the kind of people that you write about that people had wrote symphonies and operas. Jay yes. Brian how does that come out of the same body . Jay the dictators had a great will and thirst for power. They imagined themselves doing good. They deluded themselves that they were doing good for the great masses. They didnt think of themselves as on ego trips necessarily. They almost always had a rational or some fake humanitarian or governmental rationale. And the composers and other artists really, i th