Based on the acclaimed book Denial: Holocaust History on Trial, Denial recounts Deborah E. Lipstadt’s (Academy Award® winner Rachel Weisz) legal battle for historical truth against David Irving (BAFTA nominee Timothy Spall), who accused her of libel when she declared him a Holocaust denier. In the English legal system, in cases of libel, the burden of proof is on the defendant, therefore it was up to Lipstadt and her legal team, led by Richard Rampton (Academy Award® nominee Tom Wilkinson), to prove the essential truth that the Holocaust occurred.
Panel discussion and Q&A to follow.
Seating is first-come, first-served. The film screening is free of charge, open to the public, and no ticket is necessary.
Lindsey Spindle is President of The Jeff Skoll Group. Working for renown entrepreneur Jeff Skoll, Lindsey helps oversee and connect Mr. Skoll’s network of philanthropic, commercial, and personal interests including Participant, Capricorn Investment Group, The Rise Fund, and the Skoll Foundation where she also serves as a Board director.
Lindsey has dedicated her career to shaping progressive organizations that improve people’s lives, particularly women and children. She was Chief Communications and Brand Officer of Share Our Strength, a nonprofit focused on ending childhood hunger in America through its groundbreaking No Kid Hungry campaign. Under her leadership, the campaign won PR Week’s prestigious Non-Profit Campaign of the Year in 2015.
Before focusing on hunger alleviation, Lindsey spent nearly 20 years in healthcare communications, policy, and government relations. She has directed daring national campaigns that curbed youth smoking by 30% in one year, increased patient safety through reduced medical errors, defended vaccine safety, and secured bipartisan Congressional funding for improving healthcare quality.
Lindsey was a pioneer member of the first class of girls to attend the Lawrenceville School and is a graduate of the University of Michigan. She is on the Board of Trustees at the Viewpoint School in Calabasas, California; advises the Rise Fund; and serves on the Next Generation Council of the Shoah Foundation.
Lindsey and her husband David are proud parents to two children ages 19 and almost 12. She is a book-a-week reader (recommendations all available on Instagram!), avid hiker, and adventurous cook. Lindsey mentors mothers in the workplace, particularly in their first year returning to work when the concept of work/life balance seems particularly difficult.
David Linde is CEO of Participant, the leading global media company dedicated to entertainment that inspires and compels social change. Linde is responsible for leading the Company’s overall strategy, content creation, advocacy, operations, strategic investments and acquisitions. Participant’s content and social impact mandate speaks directly to the rise of today’s “conscious consumer,” representing over 2 billion consumers who are compelled to make impactful content a priority focus. Noteworthy films from Participant include Oscar® Best Picture winners Spotlight and Green Book, Oscar® winner ROMA; Oscar® winner for Best Documentary Feature An Inconvenient Truth, Oscar® winner for Best Foreign Language Film A Fantastic Woman, as well as acclaimed, award-winning long-form content including Steve James’ docuseries America To Me and Ava DuVernay’s When They See Us.
Linde’s background spans production, global distribution and building multiple companies from the ground up. Linde has served as chairman of Universal Pictures, where he successfully championed a broad outlook regarding international productions, animation and family entertainment, and distribution. He was co-founder of acclaimed specialty film studio Focus Features formed from Universal’s acquisition of the acclaimed independent production company Good Machine, of which he was a partner. Prior to Participant, Linde was the CEO and owner of Lava Bear Films, where he produced the Best Picture Academy Award®-nominated Arrival, from director Denis Villenueve.
Linde currently serves on the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Board of Directors of Film Independent and is on the Board of Trustees of New Roads School.
Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish History and Holocaust Studies, Emory University
Dr. Deborah E. Lipstadt is Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies at Emory University, Atlanta. Her most recent book, HOLOCAUST: AN AMERICAN UNDERSTANDING (2016) explores how America has understood and interpreted the Holocaust since 1945.
Her previous book was THE EICHMANN TRIAL, (2011). The New York Times Book Review described Lipstadt as having “done a great service by… recovering the event as a gripping legal drama ….in the world’s delayed awakening to the magnitude of the Holocaust.”
Her book HISTORY ON TRIAL (2005) now entitled DENIAL: HOLOCAUST HISTORY ON TRIAL (2016), is the story of her libel trial in London against David Irving who sued her for calling him a Holocaust denier and right wing extremist. The Daily Telegraph (London) described David Irving v. Penguin/Deborah Lipstadt as having "done for the new century what the Nuremberg tribunals or the Eichmann trial did for earlier generations." The Times (London) said "history has had its day in court and scored a crushing victory." According to the New York Times, the trial "put an end to the pretense that Mr. Irving is anything but a self-promoting apologist for Hitler." The movie, DENIAL, starring Rachel Weisz, Tom Wilkinson, and Timothy Spall depicts the trial. With a screenplay by Sir David Hare, DENIAL was produced by BBC Films and Participant Media. The film was nominated for a BAFTA as one of the best British films of the year.
She has also published DENYING THE HOLOCAUST: THE GROWING ASSAULT ON TRUTH AND MEMORY (1993) and BEYOND BELIEF: THE AMERICAN PRESS AND THE COMING OF THE HOLOCAUST 1933-1945(1986).At Emory she directs the website Holocaust Denial on Trial/ www.hdot.org ] which contains a complete archive of the proceedings of Irving v. Penguin UK and Deborah Lipstadt. At Emory Lipstadt has won the Emery Williams Teaching Award given by alumni to the teacher who had most influenced them. She was an historical consultant to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Assistant Professor, UCSF; CEO & Co-founder, Institute for Applied Neuroscience
Melina is an Assistant Professor in the Dept of Neurology at UC San Francisco, leading the department’s educational neuroscience efforts as Director of Education for Neuroscape, a new center that aims to bridge neuroscience and technology. Melina has spent 15 yrs at the forefront of learning neuroscience, and now applies research to solving real-world problems in education and technology. Education: Melina leads a multi-university National Science Foundation-funded network studying how executive function contributes to academic achievement. She co-founded and is CEO of a nonprofit that arms educators and students with practical tools based on learning science, Institute for Applied Neuroscience (scienceforgood.org). Technology: Melina leads an NIH-funded research program that investigates whether technology use is associated with neurocognitive changes. She co-chaired a 2015 National Academy of Sciences conference on children and technology, and sits on the board of the Institute of Digital Media and Child Development. She also holds an affiliation with Stanford’s Psychology Department and is a MacArthur Scholar. Her work has been highlighted in media outlets such as the New York Times, PBS, and Frontline. Her science outreach work includes serving as Script Supervisor on the Emmy-nominated PBS TV series The Brain with David Eagleman, and as scientific advisor on an award-winning short film about the brain.
