The Chosen Ones: An Interview With 'Denial' Star Rachel Weisz

There are rumors that my grandfather, Yerachmiel Wirnik, who was originally from Poland, was in the Mossad, though my mother gets irate when I say this. Anyway, the official story is that he and Menachem Begin were Jabotinsky’s secretaries. Not like go-get-me-a-coffee secretaries, but his aides. He was also a journalist and author, and the foreign correspondent in Paris for Cherut, Begin’s party, before the establishment of the state. He spoke seven languages and taught himself to speak English by reading The New York Times. He liked to eat herring and raw onions and he drank straight vodka with freshly pepper ground into it. Even though he died when I was 12, I have very clear and warm memories of him. In one, when I was about 3 years old, he let me draw all over his bald head with a red lipstick.

Also, he married my grandmother in order to save her life. The rest of what would have been our family was burned in the ovens by the Nazis. All this to say that while I don’t really like to go see movies in movie theatres, I accepted the invitation to see Rachel Weisz’s new film, Denial, because I do have a soft spot for my own history.

Continue reading "The Chosen Ones: An Interview With 'Denial' Star Rachel Weisz" at...