Brittni Barnett / Senior Staff Writer
Acclaimed director Jack Garfein, who survived the Auschwitz concentration camp before beginning a long career in Hollywood and on Broadway, will give a lecture at UNT Monday from 1:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. in the Golden Eagle Suite.
Garfein, 81, will discuss his experience during the Holocaust and reflect on how his work as a director and acting teacher has been influenced by his Jewish identity.
The lecture, presented by the Jewish Studies Program, will include a question-and-answer session and a book signing.
Garfein is one of several speakers brought to UNT by the Jewish Studies Program every year, said Richard Golden, a history professor and director of the program.
“An important part of our program is to increase the educational experience of UNT students,” Golden said. “This is a great opportunity for UNT students, the UNT community and the DFW community to hear Mr. Garfein speak.”
In addition to his visit to UNT, Garfein will speak in Dallas as a part of LearningFest, a weeklong series of courses on different aspects of Jewish culture sponsored by the Center for Jewish Education of the Jewish Federation of Greater Dallas.
Garfein, who currently lives in France, was invited to lecture at LearningFest by Meyer Denn, the executive director for the Center for Jewish Education who once worked with Garfein in 1989 on a project that took them to Garfein’s hometown in Czechoslovakia.
As a young boy, Garfein and his family were imprisoned in Auschwitz, Denn said.
Garfein, then 15 years old, was the only one of his family to survive.
At the end of World War II, Garfein traveled to the United States where he took acting classes in New York City and made his debut as a Broadway director.
He went on to direct polarizing films such as “The Strange One” and “Something Wild,” and to work with legendary actors such as James Dean and Marilyn Monroe.
“I think Jack Garfein has a very important message for people today, not only Jewish people, but people from all walks of life,” Denn said. “And that is that he has seen the world go through different stages.”
Garfein has spent the latter part of his life teaching acting classes and in 2010 released a memoir and acting manual, “Life and Acting,” which discusses his life as a Jewish actor and director.
Charlotte Decoster is a doctoral student writing her dissertation on the children of the Holocaust.
“I think it is important to talk to Holocaust survivors since so few of them are left,” Decoster said. “It’s important that students hear their stories.”
Garfein’s lecture is co-sponsored by UNT’s Department of Dance and Theatre, the Center for Jewish Education of the Jewish Federation of Greater Dallas, the Jewish Federation of Fort Worth and Tarrant County, the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation and North Texas Hillel.
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