Could ‘The King’s Speech’ Oscar Hopes be derailed by Holocaust-Themed Smear Campaign?

Image by Weinstein Company
The Holocaust, for better or worse, turns up at the Academy Awards as often as Meryl Streep. The genocide has been so ubiquitous in recent years — in movies ranging from “The Reader” to “Inglourious Basterds” — that next month’s Oscars will be notable partly for the absence of films that address it.
That hasn’t stopped the subject from turning up in pre-Oscar campaigning, however. In an e-mail sent out after Sunday’s Golden Globes, an anonymous writer criticized one of this year’s front-runners, “The King’s Speech,” for “largely “gloss[ing] over the Nazi-sympathising past” of the movie’s protagonist, England’s King George VI.
Focused on the king’s real-life speech impediment and his relationship with his speech therapist, the movie is among the favorites to take home the Best Picture Oscar on February 27. Its star, Colin Firth, picked up a Golden Globe on Sunday for playing the king, and is widely expected to claim an Oscar as well.
But the new e-mail, purportedly sent by a member of the group that votes for the Oscars, says the film leaves aside important information about the king, who in the film must give an important speech on the eve of the second World War. “[W]hen it came to actively working to stymie Jews fleeing Hitler’s Germany, George actually communicated quite eloquently,” the e-mail claims.
Some Oscar watchers have raised an eyebrow at the e-mail, saying it echoes past campaigns undermining the chances of front-runner films. “Is the email that I received part of some sort of coordinated smear campaign that is being orchestrated [to harm] ‘The King’s Speech,’ or is it really from an Academy member who would like others to take note of documented facts about the film’s subject that are not reported in the film?,” wrote entertainment writer Scott Feinberg in a blog post reprinted by England’s Daily Mail. “I can’t say for certain, but I do know that it certainly calls to memory other curiously-timed whispers.”
The e-mail includes a link to a 2002 story from England’s Guardian about George VI, including a 1939 letter in which he was described as being concerned about “Jewish refugees … surreptitiously getting into Palestine,” which was then under British control. The king “was glad to think that steps are being taken to prevent these people leaving their country of origin.” Whether any of this will derail “The King’s Speech” remains an open question, of course. And the film is not the only front-runner accused of distorting history.
“The Social Network,” about the creation of Facebook, has been criticized by some for its negative portrayal of Mark Zuckerberg, the social-networking site’s billionaire founder.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 2
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 3
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 4
Culture How two Jewish names — Kohen and Mira — are dividing red and blue states
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward ‘Another Jewish warrior’: Fine wins special election for U.S. House seat
-
Fast Forward A Chicagoan wanted to protest Elon Musk — and put a swastika sticker on a Jewish man’s Tesla
-
Fast Forward NY attorney general orders car wash to stop ripping off Jews with antisemitic ‘Passover special’
-
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.