Jewish Film Professionals Denounce Speech by ‘Zone of Interest’ Director

Hundreds of Jewish actors, producers and others in the film industry have signed a letter condemning remarks critical of Israel that the director Jonathan Glazer made when he accepted an Oscar for his film about the Holocaust, “The Zone of Interest.”

Described as a “statement from Jewish Hollywood professionals,” the letter was signed by the actors Debra Messing and Julianna Margulies; the producers Lawrence Bender and Amy Pascal; and the writer and showrunner Amy Sherman-Palladino, according to Variety, which first reported on it on Monday evening.

The signatories were confirmed Tuesday by Allison Josephs, an activist who has promoted Jewish representation in films and television and who helped with outreach for the letter. She said that by Tuesday morning it had nearly a thousand signatures.

The letter criticized a speech Glazer made when he accepted the Oscar for international feature at the Academy Awards earlier this month for “The Zone of Interest,” which follows the Nazi commandant who runs Auschwitz and his family as they lead quiet domestic lives just beyond the walls of the camp.

“All our choices were made to reflect and confront us in the present,” Glazer, who is Jewish, said as he accepted the Oscar. “Not to say ‘Look what they did then,’ rather, ‘Look what we do now.’ Our film shows where dehumanization leads, at its worst.”

“Right now we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people,” he said. “Whether the victims of October the 7th in Israel or the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims of this dehumanization, how do we resist?”