The Zionist Organization of America has called on the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to rescind its decision to award an honorary Oscar to a filmmaker it calls “a virulent anti-Semite.”
The academy will award French-Swiss filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard with the Oscar at a ceremony Nov. 13. Godard has announced that he will not be present at the ceremony.
Morton Klein, national president of the ZOA, said in a statement that it was a “disgrace” that the academy would bestow an honorary Oscar on “an outspoken, long-standing anti-Semite” like Godard.
Two new biographies about Godard have highlighted what some see as the filmmaker’s anti-Semitism. One claims that his friendship with fellow French New Wave movement colleague Francois Truffaut dissolved over Godard’s anti-Semitism (Truffaut had a Jewish father).
The academy responded that it “is aware that Jean-Luc Godard has made statements in the past that some have construed as anti-Semitic.”
It added, “We are also aware of detailed rebuttals to that charge. Anti-Semitism is of course deplorable, but the academy has not found the accusations against M. Godard persuasive.”