Early Cinema Research Group, Leeds

@ecrg.bsky.social

The Early Cinema Research Group, Leeds. Exploring the past, present and future of motion pictures.

Here is the full text of an open letter signed by 50+ film journalists and counting to @variety.com following their publication of an article blaming Rachel Zegler's pro-Palestine political activism for the box office results of a Disney film.

We, the undersigned, wish to express our strong condemnation of the Variety article “Inside Disney’s ‘Snow White’ Fiasco: Death Threats, Beefed-Up Security and a Social Media Guru for Rachel Zegler”.


As film journalists and steadfast supporters of the Palestinian cause, we are shocked by this attack on Rachel Zegler and her activism, masquerading as a piece of insider news, in what is considered our industry’s leading trade magazine. Blaming a box office failure on a young actor’s messages of solidarity with Palestine is particularly objectionable when Israel has drastically resumed its attacks on Gaza. This week, Hamdan Ballal, co-director of the Oscar-winning No Other Land, was seriously injured in an attack by Israeli settlers and detained by Israeli forces. Also this week, our press colleagues Hossam Shabat and Mohammed Mansour were killed in Israeli airstrikes, taking the number of journalists killed to over 170. Our industry should have more urgent lines of enquiry than bullying an actor at this time.


Coming after the same publication’s hit-piece on the actor Melissa Barrera for similar reasons, this article adds to a dismaying suspicion that Variety is editorially partisan to Israel. Amnesty International has found that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza strip.


Free Palestine.