By Jill Serjeant
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Catholic actor and director Mel Gibson's latest project -- a TV movie set against the backdrop of the Holocaust -- is raising eyebrows before a single scene has been shot.
Gibson's production company Con Artist Productions and two others are developing a miniseries for ABC television based on a memoir by Dutch Jew Flory van Beek, whose Catholic boyfriend hid her from the Nazis.
Gibson, whose film "The Passion of the Christ" was seen by some critics as anti-Semitic and whose father is on record as doubting the Holocaust, may not take an executive producer credit on "Flory." But his attachment to the project has attracted the attention of some Jewish groups.
Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Los Angeles said the project would give "Gibson a chance to redeem himself from the controversy over 'The Passion of the Christ,' which did not portray Jews fairly."
Hier said the project would also "provide a first-class education for his father, who is a Holocaust denier."
Gibson's ultraconservative Catholic father, Hutton Gibson, is on record as doubting the Holocaust, describing it last year as "maybe not all fiction, but most of it is."
Mel Gibson has denied blaming the Jews for the death of Jesus Christ and has made clear he believes the Holocaust happened. The actor is in Mexico filming a Disney movie and his representatives could not be reached for comment.
Quinn Taylor, vice president of television movies for ABC, described "Flory" as a love story and said critics should "shut up and wait and see the movie, and then judge."
"I'm not about to rewrite history. I'm going to explore an amazing love story that we can all learn from and hopefully be inspired by," Taylor told the show business trade newspaper Daily Variety.
Several observers said Gibson might be trying to repair his image in the Jewish community. But Deborah Cohn, assistant professor of marketing at New York's Yeshiva University, said Gibson may have other intentions.
"I think his aim is to portray Catholicism in the best possible light and to show the good deeds of Catholics in those times.
"Families did step up and those stories should be highlighted. I think this film is not going to address the things his father is denying," Cohn said.
The project has not yet been given the formal go-ahead and a broadcast date is more than a year away.
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