Meryl Streep Slams Disney as Being Sexist, Racist & Anti-Semitic While Honoring 'Saving Mr. Banks' Emma Thompson, VIDEO
Meryl Streep accused Walt Disney of being sexist, racist and anti-Semitic in her speech presenting a National Board of Review award to Emma Thompson on Tuesday, Jan. 7, for her work as the novelist P.L. Travers in the movie Saving Mr. Banks.
Thompson stars opposite Tom Hanks' Disney, the visionary who wanted to turn Travers' heroine Mary Poppins into the character well-known today.
In her presentation Streep characterized Disney as a man who "had racist proclivities" and "supported an anti-Semitic industry lobbying group," according to The Hollywood Reporter. She also called him a "gender bigot."
The actress noted that Disney joined the anti-Semitic, anti-communist MPA - the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, which he in fact did.
Streep quoted Disney animator Ward Kimball, who said, "[Walt] didn't trust women or cats," and she read from a 1938 letter from Disney informing a female job applicant, "Women do not do any of the creative work in connection with preparing the cartoons for the screen, as that task is performed entirely by young men. For this reason, girls are not considered for the training school. "
However, Streep made the remarks while trying to prove a point.
Dubbing Thompson a fellow "rabid, man-eating feminist," she argued that art can compensate for someone who harbors prejudices and that Disney, despite all his flaws, "brought joy, arguably, to billions of people."
Spokespeople for Streep and Disney had no comment on the incident, but many have already picked sides when it comes to deciding if what she said is true.
"Meryl Streep is right," the Los Angeles Times wrote. "At some point in his storied career, Walt Disney belonged to an anti-Semitic group and surely was sexist."
Douglas Brode, the Jewish author of Multiculturalism and the Mouse: Race and Sex in Disney Entertainment, said. "There is no evidence in the work of anti-Semitism via negatively portrayed Jewish characters."
"Disney, let's recall, was the first filmmaker ever to cast a Jewish actor, Ed Wynn, as Santa Claus, in Babes in Toyland. We ought to give Disney the benefit of the doubt," he added. "Such attacks, including the recent one by Ms. Streep, constitute the repetition of a vicious rumor that has no basis in anything that can be thought of as fact."
