Hollywood star Bradley Cooper (48) has come under criticism for his portrayal of the famous conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) in the film “Maestro”. Voices on the internet accuse him of using a prosthetic nose to serve Jewish stereotypes.
They also raise the question of whether Bernstein, as the son of Russian-Jewish immigrants, would not have been better played by a Jewish actor. Cooper, who also directs the musical drama, has now received support from Bernstein’s three children.
A “nice big nose”
Cooper showed “deep respect” and “love” for this project when creating the portrait of her parents, wrote Jamie (70), Alexander (68) and Nina Bernstein (61) on Wednesday on the online platform X, which used to be Twitter was called.
Her father actually had a “nice, big nose”. They fully agree that Cooper helped create that resemblance. That would certainly have been right for her father, it said in the message. They can’t wait for the world to see Cooper’s creation.
“Maestro” premieres at the Venice Film Festival
Netflix released the first “Maestro” trailer on Tuesday. In addition to Cooper, who made his directorial debut in 2018 with the acclaimed romantic drama “A Star is Born”, Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg are on board as producers.
The trailer for the music drama shows the conductor, among other things, as a young man in New York in the late 1940s when he met his future wife – the Chilean actress Felicia Montealegre (1922 – 1978), played in the film by Carey Mulligan (38) . “Maestro” revolves around the couple’s tumultuous relationship, which was also shaped by Bernstein’s relationships with men. Bernstein achieved world fame with the filmed musical “West Side Story” (1957).
“Maestro” will premiere at the Venice Film Festival in early September. After hitting theaters in November, the film is scheduled to hit Netflix on December 20th.
