![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/matt-damon-the-odyssey-041526-cd11e2b9157048148a924ec60f4dfdbb-1.avif\")
<\/a><\/p>\nMatt Damon plays Odysseus in Christopher Nolan’s film adaptation of Homer’s “Odyssey.” (Melinda Sue Gordon\/Universal Pictures)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Local Jewish clergy, as well as Portland\u2019s Jewish federation, have sharply objected to the message even as many admitted that, initially, they didn\u2019t understand its intention.<\/p>\n
The manager, Jordan Perry, whose theater has a history of provocative messaging, didn\u2019t respond to Jewish Telegraphic Agency requests for comment. He told the Portland Tribune he would remove the signage \u2014 and said he intended it as an \u201cintentionally subtle\u201d commentary on what he believes is an overemphasis on antisemitism.<\/p>\n
\u201cThrough the media I consume, I believe modern-day antisemitism is exaggerated, mostly as a defense for Israel\u2019s actions in the Middle East and its involvement in our politics,\u201d Perry told the Tribune. \u201cMy intention in referencing Jewish people on the marquee was to prod at everything being seemingly antisemitic with a statement that couldn\u2019t possibly be construed as antisemitic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perry also said he wanted \u201cto push back culturally back on what constitutes antisemitism, to signal, in solidarity, that it\u2019s not about \u2018the Jews,\u2019 that it\u2019s about Israel, and Palestine, and Lebanon, and Iran, and AIPAC,\u201d the pro-Israel lobby that has become a flashpoint for political criticism of Israel.<\/p>\n
Portland\u2019s Jewish federation has received more than 40 complaints about the marquee, according to its chief community relations officer. <\/p>\n
\u201cAny reference to \u2018the Jews\u2019 at this point in time, with the climate of antisemitism, makes it suspect already, not to mention of course that it was historically inaccurate,\u201d Bob Horenstein said in an interview. (Historians have traced the Jewish community\u2019s existence to ancient times predating Homer\u2019s authorship of \u201cThe Odyssey\u201d in the eighth century BCE.) <\/p>\n
Horenstein asked the theater to change the marquee; the reaction from local Jews, he said, was largely \u201cunsettled\u201d and \u201cunnerved.\u201d Perry ignored him, he said. \u201cAnd our suspicions proved positive because he made it very clear what his intention was.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perry\u2019s fuller comments were even more offensive, Horenstein said, particularly his assertion that claims of modern antisemitism are exaggerated. \u201cIt\u2019s not for anyone outside of our community to tell us whether we\u2019re overreacting to antisemitism,\u201d the federation leader said.<\/p>\n
The marquee was later reportedly altered, with a reference to the navigation app Waze replacing \u201cThe Jews\u201d \u2014 a possible joke about the meandering nature of Odysseus\u2019s journey, though Horenstein noted the app was also created by Israelis. <\/p>\n
Eventually the messaging was removed altogether, replaced with a simple advertisement for the film.<\/p>\n
Eve Posen, a rabbi at Conservative Congregation Neveh Shalom in Portland, wrote on Facebook before the revelation of Perry\u2019s motives that the marquee had distressed her. She saw it as of a piece with the recent U.S. House of Representatives vote on ending military aid to Israel, which none of Oregon\u2019s five Democratic members of Congress voted against, as well as a recent account of a local Jew whose car was recently been vandalized with swastikas.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt raises a painful question: why invoke Jews at all?\u201d Posen wrote. \u201cIn a moment when antisemitism is already at historic levels, casually inserting Jews into a narrative where we do not belong doesn\u2019t feel harmless.\u201d<\/p>\n
The theater\u2019s peculiar sense of humor has raised eyebrows in the past. Upon the recent release of the Michael Jackson biopic \u201cMichael,\u201d the marquee made a reference to the singer\u2019s child sexual abuse allegations. And earlier this year a marquee message about the First Lady documentary \u201cMelania\u201d led that film\u2019s distributor, Amazon Studios, to pull the film from the theater.<\/p>\n
This story has been corrected to reflect that historians trace the existence of Jewish communities in general, rather than in Greece, back to ancient times.<\/p>\n