Dame Helen Mirren has addressed criticism over her portrayal of former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. The 78-year-old actor, who is not Jewish, stars in the film Golda – which charts the life of Israel’s first female prime minister from 1969 to 1974, including the years of the Yom Kippur war. Critics have questioned her casting, with fellow actor Dame Maureen Lipman arguing that the Jewishness of the character is integral. Mirren told the BBC that there is a “very delicate balance” to playing people with different heritage, especially with “the whole question of assuming a certain physiognomy because you’re playing a particular race,” noting that “there is something offensive about that”.
The actor previously spoke about the film in an interview with Variety, in which she said that Golda Meir’s rise to power was “an astounding moment for young women” as previously “it was incomprehensible that a woman could lead a country.” She described Meir’s leadership during the Yom Kippur war as “an incredibly important moment in female history”: “Just the fact she didn’t put on power suits and walk around like ‘I’m running a country,'” Mirren said. “On the contrary, she just stayed exactly who she was before she became prime minister.”
Golda, which is directed by Emmy-winner Gurinder Chadha and written by Lee Hall, explores new narratives using top-secret government documents from the time of the war that have been declassified in the last decade. The Yom Kippur war began in October 1973 when Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel on the Jewish festival of the Day of Atonement and resulted in thousands of deaths
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