The biggest, though uncredited, Jewish winner of the evening may have been the late novelist Stefan Zweig (1881-1942), whose writings inspired director Wes Anderson’s “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” winner of the Best Motion Picture-Comedy award. Sharing in the triumph was Jewish producer Scott Rudin.
Maggie Gyllenhaal, who has a Jewish mother, topped the field for best performance by an actress in a miniseries or TV movie for her performance in “The Honorable Woman.” She portrays Nessa Stein, a Jewish businesswoman who tries to bridge Mideast hostilities by linking Israelis and Palestinians through a communication network.
The winner for Best TV Series-Comedy was “Transparent,” written and directed by Jill Soloway. The series revolves around a Jewish family, whose patriarch tells his three grown children that he is adopting a female persona.
Israel’s entry in the foreign-language film competition made the shortlist of five finalists with “Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem,” chronicling the five-year struggle by an Orthodox woman in Israel to convince a rabbinical court to grant her a divorce from her husband.
“Gett” lost out to Russia’s “Leviathan,” the story of a simple workingman fighting the corrupt mayor of his town. Another finalist, and early favorite, in the same category was Poland’s entry, “Ida,” the story of a young Polish woman, about to take her vows as a nun, who discovers that she is the daughter of Jewish parents killed in the Holocaust.
“The Affair” however, created by Israeli director and producer Hagai Levi, did win, taking home the award for best Drama series for its portrayal of two romantically involved people in a relationship outside their marriages. Levi also created the Israeli drama “BeTipul,” and produced its American counterpart “In Treatment.”
“Boyhood” carried the day as Best Motion Picture – Drama. Hollywood columnist Danielle Berrin of the Los Angeles Jewish Journal reported that the film earned a backhanded compliment from Tablet magazine as “one of the least Jewish films ever made.”
In commemoration of the terrorist killings in Paris in the preceding days, the usually light-hearted ceremony, hosted by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, carried a serious undertone.
Actors including George Clooney, Kathy Bates and Helen Mirren wore “Je Suis Charlie” buttons in memory of the 12 people murdered at the Paris offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
