In this year marking 80 years since the liberation of the last concentration camps, renowned historian Sir Simon Schama has made an extraordinary new documentary film for the BBC.
In this exclusive event for JW3, Simon, in conversation with the film's director, Hugo Macgregor, will examine how the Holocaust has been portrayed on screen since the war’s end and reflects on what its legacy means today. Simon will also introduce a special preview screening of the documentary, followed by a Q&A. The conversation will be moderated by journalist, presenter, and producer Wendy Robbins.
About The Road to Auschwitz
The Road to Auschwitz is the most personal and unflinching film of Simon Schama's career, in which he confronts the enormity of the Holocaust as not just a Nazi obsession, but as a European-wide crime of complicity. In a journey that ends with his first visit to Auschwitz, Simon travels to mass killing sites in Lithuania - the home of his mother’s family - and to the Netherlands - a nation famed for its long history of tolerance - to reveal how across the continent deep-rooted prejudice was weaponised to turn people against their Jewish neighbours.
Simon was born two weeks after the liberation of Auschwitz - it’s been with him all his life, but until now he’s never actually been there. He has dedicated much of his career to documenting Jewish history, but has been committed to telling the story of life, not death. In a profoundly emotional first ever visit to Auschwitz, the film follows Simon as he finally confronts the ‘monster’ and comes face to face with the horrifying reality of what happened there.
At every step Simon uncovers extraordinary evidence of the resilience of the Jewish people and recounts remarkable acts of resistance, above all the compulsion of Jewish "keepers of memory" to document the unprecedented atrocities that were happening to them, in the hope they could never be denied or repeated.
And, as a moving interview with 98-year-old survivor Marian Turski reveals, ‘evil comes step-by-step’ - a statement that remains powerfully relevant today. With hatred once again on the rise and the last survivors passing on, this film is a powerful testament to the importance of preserving the truth and ensuring that the full enormity of the Holocaust is never forgotten.
Sir Simon Schama
Sir Simon Schama is Professor of Art History and History at Columbia University and a Contributing Editor at the Financial Times. He is the author of 20 books on art and history including Two Rothschilds and the Land of Israel, Citizens, A Chronicle of the French Revolution, Landscape and Memory, two volumes of The Story of the Jews, and most recently the vaccine history, Foreign Bodies. Over the past 30 years he has written and presented over 60 documentary films for the BBC including A History of Britain; The Story of the Jews, and The Power of Art which won an International Emmy. He is currently at work on the third and last volume of The Story of the Jews.
Hugo Macgregor
Hugo Macgregor has been directing documentaries for over 20 years and has been shortlisted for BAFTA, Grierson, Royal Television Society and Emmy awards. His work has appeared on Apple, Disney, the BBC, and Channel 4. His films include the much talked about In Vogue, Becoming Matisse,and Plunderer: The Life and Times of a Nazi Art Thief. He has made 10 films with Simon Schama including the acclaimed series, The History of Now; The Romantics and Us, and episodes of The Story of the Jews and Civilisations.
Wendy Robbins
Wendy is a British radio and television presenter and producer. She is especially well known for presenting on BBC Radio 4 and reporting for The One Show on BBC One. She was Executive Producer of last year's extraordinary Holocaust film, The Commandant's Shadow.