At The Movies G R I L `Liam' Extraordinary Seafood • Black Sea Bass • Flounder Stuffed with Crabmeat • Eastern Halibut 20 • Whole Maine Lobster • Soft Shell Crabs • And dozens of other seafood and grill choices Director Stephen Frears explores anti-Semitism in 1930s Liverpool. n/ OFF YOUR T TOTALBILL '1 0 WITHTHIS AD Reservations 248-644-5330 Experience the Difference 30855 Southfield Rd. at 7 0 Mile Rd. sea a_s ifield THE GALLERY RESTAURANT Enjoy gracious dining amid a beautiful atmosphere of casual elegance BREAKFAST LUNCH DINNER OPEN 7 DAYS: MON. - SAT. 7 a.m.- 9:30 p.m. SUN. 8 a.m.- 9 p.m. West Bloomfield Plaza • 6638 Telegraph Road and Maple • 248-851-0313 I:iiitimliokima Fine Italian Dining in a Casual Atmosphere EN FOR LUNCR ENJOY OUR NEW MENU! I ' 213% OFF: i LUNCH ONLY I TUESDAY THRU FRIDAY a OUR NEW HOURS Tuesday Ore Thursday: Limited Time Only 16 en Must present coupon Expwes 10/31/01 was Friday: llsam 11pm 4 Saturday: PM -11pm Sunday: 4 pm - Opm JN int ou. 11 am -Rpm JIM 11111 33210 W.14 Mile Road SPOSIWS In Simsbury Plaza Just East of Farmington Road West Bloomfield RISTORANTE (2481 538-8954 SPECIAL OF THE WEEK, OCT. 5 - OCT. 11 CHICKEN ARTURO S ZLT4SD, I t 8 Sauteed Breast with Peppers Mushrooms, Tomatoes and Zip Sauce AND DESSERT SHIVA DINNERS Our New Hours AND Mon - Sat 7 am - 8 pm 10/5 2001 74 50 POTATO, VEGETABLE BEAUTIFUL PARTY TRAYS Closed Sundays FREE DELIVERY DELI AND GOURMET RESTAURANT 21754 W. 11 MILE RD. • HARVARD ROW • 248 352 4940 FAX: 352 9393 - - 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 - ❑