Sidney Lumet, Political Jew

Abstract

Jews have been drawn disproportionately progressive political and cultural movements-whether substitute for religion, an extension of it, or self-interested and empathetic response oppression-since gaining entry into Western mainstream society in the late eighteenth century.1 Expressing this activist orientation in the United States, Jewish-American filmmakers also have played seminal role in movies that deal with issues: whether forthrightly, in problem pictures, or more obliquely, in film noir. Regarding the former, Brian Neve's study of the social tradition in American film focuses on six politically oriented directors from the classical Hollywood period (1930s-1950s): Orson Welles, Elia Kazan, Abraham Polonsky, Robert Rossen, Joseph Losey, and Jules Dassin, of whom only Welles and Kazan were not Jewish.2 Jewish emigres played similarly predominant role in classical film noir (1940s-1950s), have detailed in Driven Darkness: Jewish Emigre Directors and the Rise of Film Noir, and Alain Silver affirmed in his selection of the ten best noirs: I did have one rule: single movie per director, otherwise [Jewish emigres] Siodmak, Lang, Wilder, and Ophuls might have overwhelmed the field and made it an all-emigre list.3In the post-classical period (1960s on), Jewish neo-noir and politically oriented directors have continued overwhelm the field-and Sidney Lumet has figured prominently in both groups. 4 Indeed, with the possible exception of three other Jewish directors-Stanley Kramer (whose last film was released in 1979), Fred Zinnemann (whose last was released in 1982), and Martin Ritt (whose last was released in 1990)-no American filmmaker has been more closely aligned than Lumet with cinema dominated by a deep and abiding commitment justice.5From an ideological angle alone, then, Lumet deserves to be recognized, David Desser and Lester Friedman unequivocally do, as major American filmmaker whose perspective decidedly American Jewish.6 Moreover, the distinction only magnified when his unsurpassed number of Jewish-themed films-The Pawnbroker (1965), Bye Bye Braverman (1968), Just Tell Me What You Want (1979), Daniel (1983), Garbo Talks (1984), Running on Empty (1988), and A Stranger Among Us (1992)-is considered. Ultimately, among (post)modern American directors, only Woody Allen can claim prolific and consistent an association with Jewish characters and themes in his filmmaking career. That Allen has attained this distinction through more personal and philosophical, less socio-political approach does not reduce his pertinence this study. Indeed, it obliges us begin with comparison of these two foremost American Jewish auteurs.7Woody's Dark DoubleCritical, popular, and film industry plaudits notwithstanding, both Allen's and Lumet's auteurist credentials have been impugned, throughout their careers, for lack of originality: Allen's for his Xeroxing of Bergman and Fellini, among others; Lumet's for his translations of noted playwrights (Anton Chekov, Arthur Miller, Eugene O'Neill, Tennessee Williams) and novelists (Jay Presson Allen, E. L. Doctorow, Wallace Markfield, Mary McCarthy).8 Their genre proclivities mirrored each other also, but in reverse, with Allen's atypical WASP-woman trilogy of serious dramas (Interiors [1978], September [1987], and Another Woman [1988]) presenting perfect (mis)match with Lumet's change-of-pace trio of New York Jewish comedies (Bye Bye Braverman, Just Tell Me What You Want, and Garbo Talks).9 Although both directors are locationally (and residentially) linked New York City (each grew up, lived most of his life, and has set three-fourths of his films there), Allen has tended romanticize the Big Apple, while Lumet has probed its problematic core.Part of what makes [Allen's Manhattan] so 'attractive,' Jonathan Rosenbaum observes, is the nearly total absence of blacks and Hispanics, or any hint of racial conflict. …