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Director Stephen Frears explores anti-Semitism
in 1930s Liverpool.
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is the point, he insists. "This is the story
of a man who ends up as a Black Shirt,
so of course his point of view is going to
ritish film director Stephen
be hideously stereotyped," he says.
Frears was drawn to Liam,
His BBC film My Beautiful
about the making of an anti-
Laundrette, about the relationship
Semite, partly because of a
between a Cockney punk and a
startling family secret he discovered in
Pakistani immigrant, earned him
his late 20s.
international acclaim in 1985.
His brother blurted out the news dur-
Three years later, he came to
ing his grandmother's 90th birthday
Hollywood to make his first American
party, not long after Frears had married
film, Dangerous Liasons, starring Glenn
a Jewish woman. "He
Close and John
said how pleased our
Malkovich as French
grandmother was that
aristocrats bent on
I had married a Jewish
games of sexual
girl — and that our
revenge.
mother was Jewish,"
Frears made an
recalls Frears, 60, the
interesting discovery
director of The Grifters
while shooting subse-
and High Fidelity.
quent U.S. films
"Of course I was
such as Hero, starring
Director Stephen Frears
surprised that some-
Dustin Hoffman. "I
thing like this had
found that the film
been concealed from me for so long."
industry here is dominated by Jews,
The revelation came out of left field.
and that America has a completely dif
Frears and his mum had regularly
ferent attitude toward Jews than
attended Church of England services
Britain," he says.
in his gritty hometown of Leicester,
"It was all much more public and
where, he recalls, "there was simply no
up-front and talked about and part of
evidence that Jews existed."
life. So as it were, the British silence
Frears didn't meet his first identifi-
had ended."
able Jew until he was 13 and off at
Yet Frears never bothered to set foot
boarding school. "We called him
in a synagogue or read up on Judaism.
`Ikey,' which is what they used to call
One reason, he hints, is a cruel irony
Jews in the East End, in an unthink-
that devastated him around the time
ing, schoolboy way," he says by phone
he learned he was Jewish. His now 29
from his home in the Notting Hill
year-old son was born with a genetic
section of London.
illness, familial dysautonomia. One in
The anti-Semitism depicted in Liam,
30 Ashkenazi Jews carries the gene.
scheduled to open today at the Maple
"His life has been dominated by this ill-
Art Theatre, is of a more strident
ness," Frears says. "I may not have known
nature. The setting is a rigidly
I was Jewish, but I carried the gene."
Catholic neighborhood in 1930s
Liam, based on Jimmy McGovern's
Liverpool, where 7-year-old Liam
autobiographical screenplay, is one of
(Anthony Borrows) prepares for his
the few times Frears has actively sought
first Communion as his father becomes
out anything to do with his heritage.
increasingly resentful toward the Jews.
"I was very aware that this was the
The trouble starts when Dad is laid
first time I was making a film that dealt
of by his Jewish employer, forcing
with the Jewish experience and people,"
Liam's teenage sister to go to work as a
he says. "I guess I was curious. I was
servant for a Jewish adulteress (she's
sticking a toe into the water."
bribed to keep silent about the affair).
A Jewish pawnbroker and money-
Liam, rated R, is scheduled to
lender continually gouge the family.
open Friday, Oct. 5, at the Maple
Eventually Dad becomes a fascist.
Art
Theatre in Bloomfield
Frears admits some of his Jewish char-
Township.
(248) 542-0180.
acters are less than flattering — but that
B
VALID MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY EVENINGS
EXPIRES 10/26/01
sposligs
NAOMI PFEFFERMAN
Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles
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