In 2022, Steven Spielberg reveals The Fabelmansa film that comes just after West Side Story (2021), or even the very immersive Ready Player One (2018). Broadcast Sunday January 5, 2025 at 9:10 p.m. on France 2, this film is inspired by the personal life of the director, who chooses to tell it through the character of Sammy Fabelman (Gabriel LaBelle), a young American who is passionate about cinema and discovers , inadvertently, that his mother is having an affair. Autobiographical while being fictionalized, The Fabelmans is the most personal work of the director of Schindler’s List (1993). He therefore had to ask for the approval of his mother, the main person concerned, before revealing this terrible family secret to the world.
What did Steven Spielberg’s mother, Leah Adler, think of this film when he told her about it before his death?
“The more I refused to tell my own story, the more I wondered why I was having this conversation with myself over and over again.”. Near the Timein November 2022, Steven Spielberg tells how he managed to convince himself to produce this unprecedented work in his filmography. Because if he waited until the death of his parents to tell this part of their story, above all he had to wait until he was ready. And for good reason, this film revived decades-old memories. It was at the age of 16 that he discovered that his mother (played by Michelle Williams) was in love with a family friend whom he considered an uncle.. When his parents divorced, his mother, Leah, remarried to this famous “uncle”, Bernie Adler (played by Seth Rogen), in 1967. Mother and son are the only ones who know the truth behind the whole story. A truth that he will keep silent until the death of Leah Adler in February 2017, at the age of 97. Before she died, the filmmaker still spoke to the main interested party about his project. Who replied that he “there is a bit of this history in all [ses] films, although he always used metaphors to tell it”. She then gave him permission to carry out his project, on the condition that he be proud of the result.
“It was one of the best moments I’ve ever had.” : Steven Spielberg reveals how The Fabelmans brought him closer to his three sisters
Spielberg therefore embarked on this adventure. Far be it from him to tarnish the image of his parents or to judge them, but to pay homage to them and to pay homage to the seventh art at the same time. In the interview given to our colleagues, the director is also full of praise for the one who gave him life and inspiration. “My mother always compared herself to Peter Pan, a little girl who never wanted to grow up. She loved being part of our lives as a friend more than as a mother”he confides about the one who played the piano, danced and loved to entertain. Since his father, Arnold Spielberg (played by Paul Dano) also died in 2020, at the age of 103, Steven Spielberg was never able to show them his film. It was therefore his three sisters, Anne, Sue, and Nancy, who had the privilege of discovering the images before the rest of the world. “I was sure they would like the movie because they liked the script. They came to the set several times and brought some of my mom’s jewelry for Michelle to wear. But seeing the finished product is different to read a script. […] It was one of the best moments I experienced in my relationship with them. We’ve always been close, but this story brought us together again like we were all back in Phoenix.”he concludes.
