Taika Waititi, Actor / Jewish Director, On Playing Hitler – The Attacker

Taika Waititi, the three-time director / writer / actor from New Zealand, opened his first film "Jojo Rabbit" on Hitler on Saturday. "It was very strange for me to have to put on the suit and put the mustache on or stuff like that," Waititi told a reporter at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, according to the Jeruaalem Post. Is pretty confrontational and I do not necessarily like to see myself like this. "

Waititi, half-Jew and half-Maori, introduces himself as Hitler in" Jojo Rabbit ", which he writes The film follows a young German Nazi, Jojo (played by Roman Griffin Davis), who discovers that his mother Rosie (Scarlet Johansson) is hiding a Jewish child in their home.Haitler's Hitler is an imaginary friend more fictitious for the confused Jojo

"I play an imaginary friend who is kind of a cross between Hitler and all the heroes of this little boy," said Waititi, according to the Jerusalem Post. "So everything is in so combined in this strange version of … it's not Hitler, I do not try to play this character, so I have not done a lot of research since … I do not try to be authentic. "

Waititi has already proven that it was both an amateur and a fan of blockbusters. Waititi led the very popular "Thor: Ragnarok", which brought in $ 854 million worldwide. He also played the sweet revolutionary rock Korg in "Ragnarok".

Waititi made a splash on the independent scene in 2014 with "What We Do In The Shadows", which he co-directed, co-wrote and starred in. Mockumentary horror comedy has followed a group of vampire roommates doing their best to navigate modern life. He recently scored an American spin-off on FX.

Waititi's propensity for more kookier projects and roles, combined with the subject that he tackled in "Jojo Rabbit," will certainly result in a unique performance of Hitler. . He will be alongside Sam Rockwell, who plays a Nazi captain, and Rebel Wilson, who plays a Nazi camp advisor.

While Waititi will spend the next few months embodying his vague interpretation of the dictator, he did not flinch sharing his thoughts on the man himself

Week 1 of our anti-badface satire, Jojo Rabbit. I can not wait to share it with the world. Also, what better way to insult Hitler than to have him portrayed by a Polynesian Jew?
? #FuckYouShitler @jojorabbitmovie @foxsearchlight pic.twitter.com/bNZ2YlDgaF – Taika Waititi (@TaikaWaititi) June 1, 2018

Juliana Kaplan is a trainee at The Forward. Email it to [email protected] or follow it on Twitter, @julianamkaplan