Joaquin Phoenix And 150 Hollywood Creatives Sign Open Letter Supporting Jonathan Glazer

Actors Joaquin Phoenix and Elliott Gould and producer Joel Coen joined more than 150 Jewish professionals in Hollywood who have signed an open letter in support of writer and director Jonathan Glazer, who was widely denounced for sharing his perspective on theIsrael-Gaza conflict at the Oscars last month.

The letter, addressing concerns of “silencing” dissent, was shared Friday with Variety and was signed by a plethora of renowned artists, among them directors Todd Haynes and Mike Leigh; actors David Cross, Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson; and writers Boots Riley and Tom Stoppard.

“We are Jewish artists, filmmakers, writers and creative professionals who support Jonathan Glazer’s statement from the 2024 Oscars,” the letter says, according to Variety. “We were alarmed to see some of our colleagues in the industry mischaracterize and denounce his remarks.”

“Their attacks on Glazer are a dangerous distraction from Israel’s escalating military campaign which has already killed over 32,000 Palestinians in Gaza and brought hundreds of thousands to the brink of starvation,” the statement says.

Glazer, in his acceptance speech when the Holocaust drama “The Zone of Interest” won for best international feature film, said that he and his colleagues simply “refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation.”

“Whether the victims of October the 7th in Israel of the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims of this dehumanization, how do we resist?” Glazer said as he read from a piece of paper while trembling.

Though he found support in the following days from screenwriter Tony Kushner, a fellow Jew who said the conflict “looks like ethnic cleansing to me,” Glazer was slammed by many others in Hollywood who