Shocking! Anti-Semitism Scandal Erupts at Academy Museum – Was it a Cheap Shot?

Less than four weeks after the debut of its much-anticipated exhibit focusing on the Jewish founders of Hollywood, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures has announced plans to modify the display. This decision comes in the wake of criticisms suggesting that the exhibit propagates antisemitic clichés.

The exhibit, dubbed “Hollywoodland: Jewish Founders and the Making of a Movie Capital,” highlights the significant contributions of Jewish immigrants like Harry Cohn, Louis B. Mayer, and Samuel Goldwyn in the formation of the film industry. The museum, dedicated to commemorating Hollywood’s rich and intricate history, had received severe criticism when it opened in 2021 for omitting Hollywood’s Jewish origins. This is a gap it has spent more than two years trying to fill with a permanent exhibit.

However, shortly after the launch of the new exhibit, some members of the industry’s Jewish community voiced concerns that it presented a distorted and overly negative image of Hollywood’s Jewish moguls, thereby perpetuating antisemitic stereotypes.

A group known as United Jewish Writers issued an open letter to the museum on Monday, expressing their objection to the use of terms like “predator,” “tyrant,” “oppressive,” and “womanizer” to depict Jewish executives featured in the exhibit. They suggested that these executives were being subjected to an unjust standard.

“The only section of the museum that maligns the very ones it seeks to honor is this one,” the letter reads. The letter has garnered approximately 350 signatures thus far, including those of actor David Schwimmer, writer Amy Sherman-Palladino, and sports and entertainment executive Casey Wasserman. “While we recognize the importance of addressing Hollywood’s problematic history, the unacceptable double standard of the Jewish Founders exhibit, which blames solely the Jews for that problematic past, is not only unacceptable but also, whether intentional or not, antisemitic.”

In response to the growing backlash, which included a series of irate letters to the academy’s leadership, the Academy Museum issued a statement on Monday, pledging immediate action to address the criticisms.

“We acknowledge these concerns and are committed to making necessary changes to the exhibit to address them,” the museum stated. It added that the first round of changes would be enacted “immediately” to “narrate these significant stories without using phrasing that could unintentionally reinforce stereotypes.”

This controversy surrounding the exhibit comes just weeks after the academy announced the departure of the museum’s director and president, film historian Jacqueline Stewart, who is set to return to her teaching position at the University of Chicago. Neither the museum’s newly appointed director, Amy Homma, nor Dara Jaffe, the curator of the Hollywoodland exhibit, were available to comment further.

Lawrence Bender, a renowned film producer with credits like “Pulp Fiction,” “Inglourious Basterds,” and “Good Will Hunting,” was among those who signed the open letter. He expressed deep concern over the exhibit’s persistent emphasis on the supposed moral shortcomings of the early Jewish film executives.

In one scenario, the exhibit mentions that the office of Columbia Pictures founder Cohn was rumored to be modeled on that of Benito Mussolini, thereby linking the executive with the fascist Italian dictator. “I was taken aback, ‘This is what they’re choosing?’” Bender said. “It was a brief paragraph, but they seemed compelled to highlight the negative aspects of their personal lives.”

“These individuals were the pioneers of our industry, they were responsible for exceptional movies produced over the years, yet there’s no sign of love or joy in filmmaking, no mention of the fact that these men constructed this incredible world,” Bender added.

According to Bender, the placement of the relatively small, poorly lit exhibit on the museum’s top floor “feels like a return to the old shtetl days, a Jewish ghetto. People in the movie business know how to be creative; the rest of the museum is beautifully done,” he says. “This is done so poorly. This is not unintentional.”

Barry Schkolnick, a seasoned TV writer and producer with credits like “L.A. Law,” “Law and Order,” and “The Good Wife,” also endorsed the letter criticizing the exhibit. Schkolnick, who recently visited the exhibit, was disheartened by its accompanying 30-minute documentary, “From the Shtetl to the Studio: The Jewish Story of Hollywood.” He feels it unjustly applies modern attitudes about race, gender, and other social issues to the founders of Hollywood.

“The exhibit seemed to imply that these Jewish founders were to blame for all of Hollywood’s problems,” Schkolnick says. He found the exhibit’s tone markedly contrasted with other current exhibits celebrating “The Godfather” and the work of director John Waters. “It makes no sense to me to project modern issues, including terms like ‘ableism,’ onto a piece about the 1930s and ‘40s. It felt like a low blow.”

The exhibit has also garnered some positive feedback, including from Jewish publications. Sharon Rosen Leib, the great-granddaughter of former Fox Film production chief Sol M. Wurtzel and a consultant on the exhibition, wrote in the Forward that it “captures the founding Jewish moguls’ humanity with wide-angle nuance and empathy.”

For the academy, the controversy underscores the ongoing challenges it faces in trying to present a single, unified narrative of Hollywood’s history that appeals to all. During the museum’s lengthy and often challenging development, the organization grappled with difficult questions about which stories would be told and how the film industry’s own historical issues with racism and sexism would be represented. This issue has become increasingly pressing in the aftermath of #OscarsSoWhite and the #MeToo movement.

Ultimately, 17 task forces were established to represent each of the academy’s branches — from acting and directing to executives and public relations — in developing the exhibitions. An Inclusion Advisory Committee was tasked with highlighting the work of diverse filmmakers and addressing historical gaps.

In recent weeks, amidst growing criticism of the Hollywoodland exhibit, one member of that committee, Israeli American director Alma Har’el, resigned. Har’el declined to comment on her resignation.

The Hollywoodland exhibit drew inspiration from the work of cultural historian Neal Gabler, whose 1988 book “An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood” is considered the definitive work on the industry’s Jewish founders. Gabler served as an advisor on the exhibition and spoke and signed books at its opening. He was not immediately available to comment on the criticisms of the exhibit.

Some of Hollywood’s most influential Jewish figures have provided significant support to the museum, including Steven Spielberg, whose name graces a gallery on the first floor, and Israeli American businessman Haim Saban, who donated $50 million to finalize the construction.

To address the criticisms, the museum announced that it is “assembling an advisory group of experts from leading museums focused on the Jewish community, civil rights, and the history of other marginalized groups to advise us on complex questions about context and any necessary additions to the exhibition’s narrative…. We are deeply committed to telling these important stories in an honest, respectful, and impactful way.”

Speaking to The Times on Tuesday following that announcement, Bender expressed his skepticism.

“I’m not holding my breath,” Bender says. “It’s not like the exhibit is a small thing. It necessitates a significant revamp, and that task needs to be undertaken by someone who truly appreciates cinema and the figures who established this business… I don’t get the impression they genuinely care. It feels like they’re just trying to appease people.”