Centre cancels 'illegal' women-only screening of film by Jewish director

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jun/15/centre-cancels-illegal-women-only-screening-gift-of-fire

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A Jewish community centre in north west London has cancelled plans to show the controversial Israeli drama Gift of Fire after admitting proposals to ban men from a screening were most likely illegal under UK equality laws.

Gift of Fire was due to be screened at the JW3 centre on 19 June as part of the London Israeli film festival, Seret. The film’s ultra-orthodox Jewish director, Rechy Elias, had stipulated “women-only” screenings, leading to a complaint by one male festivalgoer.

Last week Seret’s organisers cancelled plans to show the film at the Odeon in Swiss Cottage after the cinema’s owners made it clear they would not enforce gender-specific entry rules. And today JW3 issued a statement to the Guardian revealing it was pulling the film’s final screening for legal reasons.

Related: 'Women-only' film screening pulled after cinema decides to admit men

“It’s regrettable that we will no longer be able to screen the film by Rechy Elias, a female film director from the Haredi community,” the statement reads. “Elias made Gift of Fire with the explicit intention of it only being shown to female audiences; without that condition, she would never have made the film.”

JW3 CEO Raymond Simonson said the centre “had hoped to be able to provide [a] rare platform for a Haredi female film-maker to express herself artistically, as well as a ‘safe’ environment for Jewish women from across the entire spectrum of the community to see this unique film”. He added: “However, following the one and only complaint we received from a gentleman who also contacted the equalities and human rights commission, we took legal advice. Unfortunately, it seems that showing this film only to female-only audiences would indeed be in breach of UK equality laws, which we would of course never intentionally do.”

Simonson said Gift of Fire had been screened to “thousands of women [all] over the world without ever encountering such problems”, and added that he hoped Seret might be able to find a way to show the film via a private, invite-only event.

Festivalgoer David Lass, who made the original complaint to the equalities and human rights commission, told the Jewish Chronicle he “very much regretted the outcome”, adding: “I would have welcomed a compromise solution allowing two screenings, one for women and one for men, but the organisers would not allow it.”

Seret organisers, who at one point threatened to stand outside the Odeon to prevent men from seeing the film, have not yet made any public comment on the cancellation of Gift of Fire’s single remaining screening.