In-Person Q&A with SPEER GOES TO HOLLYWOOD Director/Producer Vanessa Lapa & Producer Tomer Eliav, Co-presented by the Museum of Jewish Heritage
Saturday, October 30, 7:00 show
Moderated by Columbia University Film Professor Annette Insdorf
The Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust is New York’s contribution to the global responsibility to never forget. As a place of memory, the Museum enables Holocaust survivors to speak through recorded testimony and draws on rich collections to illuminate Jewish history and experience. As a public history institution, it offers intellectually rigorous and engaging exhibitions, programs, and educational resources.
Vanessa Lapa is an Israeli Academy-winning director and producer. She started as an accomplished journalist, who produced and directed over 100 news reports for Israeli TV. In 2006 she founded Realworks Ltd., an independent production company, specializing in documentary film. Her first TV documentary, OLMERT: CONCEALED DOCUMENTARY (2009), about Israel’s former Prime Minister was hailed as a uniquely insightful achievement in cinéma verité. Eight years in the making, the award-winning documentary THE DECENT ONE (2014) - a glimpse into the mind of SS chief Heinrich Himmler, based on his personal diaries - was officially selected for Panorama at the Berlinale. Vanessa returned to the Berlinale in 2020, officially selected for “Berlinale Specials”, with SPEER GOES TO HOLLYWOOD: a feature documentary about another Nazi official - Reichsminister Albert Speer, one of Hitler’s closest confidants - told in his own words. She was awarded “Best Director” from the Jerusalem Film Festival 2021. Moreover, the film won “Best Documentary” at the Israeli Academy Awards (“Ophir Awards”) that same year. Photo by Aline Frisch.
Tomer Eliav is an Israeli Academy Award-winning producer. Born and raised in Israel, he graduated as a sound engineer and worked as a sound designer and re-recording mixer in the Mixroom, the Dolby certified Mix stage in Israel for 25 years. Tomer designed and mixed over 100 features (an array of documentaries and short films), has mentored and lectured various cinema students and became a member of the Israeli Academy. He is the co-owner of Realworks Ltd., an independent production company and post production studio in Tel Aviv. Photo by Aline Frisch.
Annette Insdorf is Professor of Film at Columbia University's School of the Arts, and Moderator of the popular "Reel Pieces" series at Manhattan's 92Y, where she has interviewed almost 300 film celebrities. She is the author of the landmark study, Indelible Shadows: Film and the Holocaust (with a foreword by Elie Wiesel); Double Lives, Second Chances: The Cinema of Krzysztof Kieslowski; Francois Truffaut, a study of the French director's work; Philip Kaufman, and Intimations: The Cinema of Wojciech Has. Her latest book is Cinematic Overtures: How to Read Opening Scenes, currently in its fourth printing.