Playwright Tony Kushner supports Jonathan Glazer’s ‘indisputable and irrefutable’ Oscar speech despite backlash

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Playwright and screenwriter Tony Kushner has spoken out in support of director Jonathan Glazer who is facing backlash following his Oscar acceptance speech.

Kushner, who won the Pulitzer and Tony Prizes for his play Angels in Americadeclared the Haaretz Podcast posted Wednesday that he identified with Glazer’s speech and described it as “a really indisputable, irrefutable kind of statement.”

“Of course. I mean, who doesn’t? What he says is so simple. He says: Jewishness, Jewish identity, Jewish history, Holocaust history, history of Jewish suffering should not be used in a campaign to – as an excuse for a plan to dehumanize or massacre other people.

“This is a misappropriation of what it means to be Jewish, what the Holocaust meant, and (Glazer) rejects that. Who doesn’t agree with that? What kind of person thinks what is currently happening in Gaza is acceptable? he said.

“And if you find yourself saying out loud and in public, ‘Oh, I don’t mind what they’re doing,’ because you feel like that’s the only choice for you, because you’re Jewish, it is to defend everything Israel you know, shame on you.

Kushner, who is Jewish and a longtime critic of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies and treatment of Palestinians, also addressed accusations that calling for a ceasefire was anti-Semitism.

“The people I know who are passionately involved in calls for a ceasefire are not anti-Semitic people, their interest is not the destruction of Israel and certainly not their interest in pogroms against Jews elsewhere” .

Kushner added that he wanted “Israelis to be able to live in peace and security” but that “the treatment of Palestinians, as many Israelis have been saying for decades, the occupation of the West Bank and the imprisonment of people in Gaza, and the checkpoints, and the wall, and all that, do not guarantee the security of Israel.”

Glazer won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film for The area of ​​interest, a German-language film set in the lives of the Höss family, who live comfortably next to Auschwitz during the Holocaust. In accepting his Oscar, Glazer gave the only decidedly political speech that evening, linking the events of his film to the war in Gaza.

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“Our film shows where dehumanization comes to a head. It has shaped our entire past and present,” Glazer said.

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

Glazer faced backlash after his speech was seen by many as a refutation of his Jewish identity. An open letter denouncing his speech was circulated, with signatures from more than 1,000 people, including Debra Messing, Brett Gelman, Julianna Margulies, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Michael Rapaport.

The letter, described as a “statement from Hollywood Jewish professionals,” said: “We refute that our Jewishness was misused in order to establish a moral equivalence between a Nazi regime that sought to exterminate a race of people and a Israeli nation which seeks to avoid its own extermination.

However, others in the industry, including Boots Riley, Zoe Kazan and Asif Kapadia, came to Glazer’s defense. Kapadia said Variety, “He stood up and told the truth. This is what real artists do,” Zoe Kazan posted on X, saying she was shocked that people who had seen Glazer’s film were surprised by her message.

Israel launched its most intense bombardment ever on Gaza and a “total siege” in retaliation for Hamas militants’ bloody attack on southern Israel on October 7. Around 1,200 people were killed in the attack, and 250 others were taken hostage, including small children. Up to 136 of the hostages remain in Gaza, with an unknown number still alive.

Israeli bombings have killed more than 30,000 Palestinians, the vast majority women and children, according to Palestinian health officials in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. At least 60 percent of Gaza’s homes and buildings were reportedly destroyed or damaged. More than three-quarters of the band’s population is displaced.