An A-list Hollywood agent’s menacing pro-Israel message lands him in hot water
Hollywood agent Brandt Joel (right) with actor Renee Zellweger at the 2005 Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy. (J. Vespa/WireImage)
(JTA) — A Hollywood agent who wrote “Screw the left kill all” in a pro-Israel WhatsApp group has lost at least one major client, in the latest storm over the Israel-Hamas war in the show business industry.
Brandt Joel, of the marquee agency WME, has apologized for the leaked message, which he sent and quickly deleted following the weekend’s news that Hamas shot and killed six Israeli hostages, according to the Hollywood Reporter. The publication reported that Oscar-winning actor Mahershala Ali has already left Joel’s services over the message.
Joel’s other A-list clients include Justin Timberlake, Kevin Hart, Jason Momoa, Matthew McConaughey and Jewish actor Jonah Hill, according to the Internet Movie Database. According to reports, the agent later met with colleagues over Zoom and told them he had only meant that Israel should “kill all” the members of Hamas.
Like many other arts and culture industries, Hollywood has experienced deep internal divisions over Israel and the war in Gaza since Oct. 7 — often involving disputes between agents and their talent. The actors Melissa Barrera and Susan Sarandon are among those who were dropped by their agencies after making pro-Palestinian statements that critics said crossed the line into antisemitism or echoes of it.
Agents, meanwhile, have variously come under fire for encouraging their firms not to represent clients “posting against Israel” or accusing Israel of “genocide.” And an Oscars acceptance speech by Jewish director Jonathan Glazer, widely perceived as being critical of Israel, sparked a deep backlash from hundreds of Jewish industry professionals, including many agents.
Meanwhile, creatives-led activist groups like Artists4Ceasefire, which includes Ali as well as Jewish entertainers such as Ilana Glazer, Tony Kushner, Drake and Elliot Gould, are advocating a halt in U.S. arms sales to Israel.
WME is part of Endeavor, a major entertainment and sports conglomerate that also owns the WWE pro wrestling organization and the Ultimate Fighting Championship. It’s headed by Jewish star agent Ari Emanuel, who made his own recent headlines for calling on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to step down over his handling of the war in Gaza. Emanuel made the comments while receiving an award from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a pro-Israel group, sparking anger from its members.
This was not the first of Joel’s pro-Israel comments to cause alarm among his colleagues. He also took a stance against agents in the same group chat for not firing clients who expressed what he called “abhorrent” views about the war. “We have been weak,” he wrote.
“[E]very department has clients we should have fired and we didn’t and it shows we are weak and we have tolerated abhorrent behavior,” he texted to the group weeks ago, according to screenshots sent to the Hollywood Reporter. He added, “This is all pollyanna crap.”
That string of texts drew some gentle pushback.
“I think you are barking in the wrong chat,” a fellow WME agent, Ryan Feldman, wrote to Joel in response to those comments, according to the screenshot.
Feldman then quoted an aggressive Jewish character from the movie “The Big Lebowski,” writing, “Don’t roll on the shabbos!”
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