Education Minister Willem Deetman wants to know why the Amsterdam Theatrical Academy insisted on producing a reputedly anti-Semitic play by Rainer Werner Fassbinder in face of angry protests by Dutch Jews and many non-Jews last month. He has ordered an investigation.
Paul Sonke, director of the academy, wants to know why the play, “Garbage, the City and Death,” aroused such fierce emotions among Jews, none of whom had seen it. He has asked for a “scientific study” of the forces at work.
Deetman acted after officials of his ministry met with Sonke and Johan Doesburg, a former student at the academy who directed the play as his graduate project. They had just returned from Copenhagen, where the Fassbinder play is being performed without a murmur of protest.
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