Tel-Chai Nation

British Dame Maureen Lipman started a whole tempest in a teapot of wokeness by claiming actress Helen Mirren shouldn't be playing the late female Israeli prime minister Golda Meir simply because she's not Jewish, even though a Jewish director chose her for the role:

Dame Maureen Lipman stirred up a blistering row last month when she insisted Dame Helen Mirren should not portray former Israeli prime minister Golda Meir in a new film – because she's not Jewish.

Dame Maureen complained that the choice of a non-Jewish actress to play the legendary premier in Golda was unacceptable.

Writing in a letter to The Guardian, she made the point: 'If the ethnicity or gender of the character drives the role, then that ethnicity should be prioritised.'

The story provoked fierce debate, with several leading Jewish voices arguing that Dame Maureen was wrong. But Dame Helen kept her counsel – until now.

Speaking from the kitchen of her home in Italy, the Oscar-winning star surprised me last night by saying that Dame Maureen was right to raise such a provocative issue.

'It was certainly a question that I had, before I accepted the role,' she said calmly.

Meir 'is a very important person in Israeli history', the 76-year-old continued. She said she'd even expressed her own doubts to Golda's director Guy Nattiv, when they were discussing the possibility of her taking the role.

'I said, 'Look Guy, I'm not Jewish, and if you want to think about that, and decide to go in a different direction, no hard feelings. I will absolutely understand'.

'But he very much wanted me to play the role, and off we went.'

She wasn't at all frosty about Dame Maureen's intervention. 'I do believe it is a discussion that has to be had – it's utterly legitimate,' she said.

But, she added, it throws up all sorts of other questions, too. 'You know, if someone who's not Jewish can't play Jewish, does someone who's Jewish play someone who's not Jewish?'

On this, Mirren's the one who's correct. There have been plenty of Jewish actors who've played the roles of non-Jewish characters in films and theater before, so why she suddely has a problem with it is very dismaying. It would seem Lipman's tragically but one of a whole leftist generation that's taken political correctness to a very insufferable degree, and now, she's joined with those who've caused whole non-troversies that could've been entirely avoided. It's good to see there were Jewish writers who criticized Lipman for taking such an idiotic stance.

What should really be the concern is whether the planned film will omit or insult any of the better qualities Meir displayed in her time, including how she refuted the whole propaganda of a "palestinian" Arab/Islamic people, something that's tragically damaged discourse till this very day. Who knows, chances are the film won't be worth seeing regardless of who plays Golda Meir, yet Lipman must be such a leftist, she'll never comment on that. No wonder then she chose such a cheap route based on an actor's ethnicity instead.

Labels: Israel, londonistan, Moonbattery, showbiz