We’ve known Mel Gibson is trash for a while now, and this is hardly the first time he’s made headlines for making hateful comments about Jewish people, but we can add another one to the pile: In a new interview with the Sunday Times, Winona Ryder recalled an anti-Semitic encounter she had with the actor.
“We were at a crowded party with one of my good friends, and Mel Gibson was smoking a cigar, and we’re all talking and he said to my friend, who’s gay, ‘Oh wait, am I gonna get AIDS?’” Ryder, who is Jewish, said. “And then something came up about Jews, and he said, ‘You’re not an oven dodger, are you?’”
The Stranger Things actress also discussed her experiences as a Jewish woman in Hollywood, including one time she was denied a role because producers thought she looked “too Jewish.”
“There was a movie that I was up for a long time ago, it was a period piece, and the studio head, who was Jewish, said I looked ‘too Jewish’ to be in a blue-blooded family,” she said.
Ryder also added that she’s experienced anti-Semitism “in interesting ways,” often in the form of backhanded compliments. “There are times when people have said, ‘Wait, you’re Jewish? But you’re so pretty!’” she said.
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