The Last
Survivors
To commemorate the 70th anniversary of the end of the Holocaust, THR traveled the globe to gather testimonials from the entertainment world’s remaining survivors. Seven years later, nearly half of them have since died. But their voices remain. Said one: ‘The truth of the matter is that the weapons of mass destruction are not bombs — they’re hatred, intolerance and bigotry’
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Peter Flax
Produced by
Wesley Mann
Portfolio by
Originally published January 8, 2016, in The Hollywood Reporter.
THE STORY BEHIND THIS PROJECT
The next time a major Holocaust anniversary rolls around,
there will be even fewer survivors left. The editor of THR’s package explains the mission and urgency behind this oral history
Read the Introduction
Bill Harvey
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“This story cannot die — I have to be strong enough to tell it,” says the retired cosmetologist, who often did Judy Garland’s hair. Harvey weighed 72 pounds when liberated from Buchenwald. He was photographed Aug. 25, 2015, at his home in Los Angeles at the age of 91.
Ruth Posner
At age 9, Posner slipped out of the Warsaw Ghetto and spent the rest of the war living under a new identity: “Years later, when I became an actress, people told me it was my best performance.” She was 82 when photographed Sept. 7, 2015, at her home in London.
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Curt Lowens
The veteran character actor recalls being 13 and running from a mob in Berlin during the infamous 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom: “When I came home, my mother took me to the window and said, ‘There is not going to be a bar mitzvah — the synagogue is burning.’” Lowens turned 90 shortly before being photographed on Nov. 20, 2015, at the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles.
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Robert Clary
“I stopped having nightmares the moment I opened my mouth,” says the actor and singer, discussing how life changed after he began speaking publicly about his Holocaust experiences. A survivor of Auschwitz, Clary was photographed Aug. 17, 2015, at his home in Los Angeles at the age of 89.
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Branko Lustig
As a child in Auschwitz, the future film producer witnessed seven prisoners about to be hanged who asked those present to tell the world how they died. “I took this as a task in my life,” says Lustig, who won an Oscar for Schindler’s List. He was photographed at the age of 83 on Nov. 25, 2015, at his home in Zagreb, Croatia.
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Dario Gabbai
The last living Sonderkommando, he was forced by the Nazis to help operate Auschwitz’s gas chambers and crematoria. “I have inside some stuff I can never tell,” says Gabbai. He was 93 when photographed Nov. 16, 2015, at Edge Studio & Grip in Los Angeles.
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Ruth Westheimer
“Looking at my four grandchildren: Hitler lost, and I won,” says Westheimer, 87 when interviewed, who was orphaned by the Holocaust. Best known as America’s foremost sex therapist, she was photographed Nov. 30, 2015, at her home in New York City.
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Leon Prochnik
“When I look at footage of these refugees fleeing from Syria, it really stirs me,” says the screenwriter and editor, whose Polish family was on vacation when the Nazis invaded and never returned home. Prochnik was 82 when photographed Nov. 18, 2015, at his home in Los Angeles.
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Celina Biniaz
“[Oskar] Schindler saved my life,” says Biniaz, 84 when interviewed, adding that Steven Spielberg “is my second Schindler because he gave me a voice.” A survivor of Auschwitz and the real-life Schindler’s List who was called upon to help cast and promote the movie, Biniaz was photographed Nov. 19, 2015, at her home in Camarillo, California.
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Meyer Gottlieb
“As a survivor, you have to prove there is a reason for your existence,” says the movie executive, who fled a small Polish village in 1939 and lost 90 percent of his family. Gottlieb was 76 when photographed Nov. 17, 2015, at Samuel Goldwyn Films in Los Angeles.
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Putting an Actual Face on Genocide
The Schindler’s List director and founder
of the USC Shoah Foundation explains why we must confront the origins
of hate with new focus and new tools
Read the column by Steven Spielberg
Trauma and Triumph
The Testimonials
Ruth Posner
Read Ruth's Story
Curt Lowens
Read curt's Story
Ruth Posner
Curt Lowens
Robert Clary
Branko Lustig
Bill Harvey
Dario Gabbai
Meyer Gottlieb
Celina Biniaz
Leon Prochnik
Ruth Westheimer
Branko Lustig
Read Branko's Story
Robert Clary
Read Robert's Story
Dario Gabbai
Read Dario's Story
Bill Harvey
Read Bill's Story
Celina Biniaz
Read Celina's Story
Meyer Gottlieb
Read Meyer's Story
Ruth Westheimer
Read Ruth's Story
Leon Prochnik
Read Leon's Story
Hollywood s Postwar
Holocaust Fear
Weeks after 1945’s liberation, Jack Warner and Harry Cohn were invited to Europe
by the State Department to see the camps, presumably to make films about the Nazi destruction. A generation of silence followed: ‘It was as if Jews couldn’t make films about their own people’s suffering’
Read the story by Neal Gabler
Digital design by Kelsey Stefanson
Original print design by Peter B. Cury
Project Edited by Peter Flax
Written by Gary Baum, Neal Gabler, Marisa Guthrie
and Scott Roxborough
CREDITS
TOP ROW: Lustig, Prochnik, Clary, Posner, Westheimer: courtesy of the Shoa Foundation. Gottlieb, Harvey, Gabbai, Lowens, Biniaz: courtesy of subject.
STAR: courtesy of museum of the holocaust
SPIELBERG AND GABBAI: courtesy of subject.
VINTAGE POSNER, LUSTIG, HARVEY, Gabbai, Gottlieb, Biniaz: wesley mann/courtesy of subject.
VINTAGE LOWENS: Curt Lowens Collection/courtesy of the Rodgers Center for Holocaust Education at Chapman University.
HEROES: Cbs via getty images.
POLANSKI: Nicolas Guernin/contour by getty images.
Photography Credits
In an exclusive interview from Paris with THR, the director recalls the spiraling darkness of a childhood ravaged by the Holocaust, the loss of his mother at Auschwitz, his father’s pain and what liberation felt like
Read the story by Peter Flax
Roman Polanski is far from silent
