LONDON: Israeli actress Gal Gadot has blamed the failure of the film “Snow White” on “pressure on celebrities to speak out against Israel.”
Co-star Rachel Zegler made a point of supporting the Palestinian cause during the movie’s promotional period.
After the trailer for the film was released, Zegler posted on X: “i love you all so much! thank you for the love and for 120m views on our trailer in just 24 hours! what a whirlwind. i am in the thick of rehearsals for romeo + juliet so i’m gonna get outta here. bye for now. and always remember, free palestine.”
It led to a face-to-face meeting with the film’s producer, Marc Platt, whose son Jonah blamed Zegler’s remarks for the film’s poor reviews, calling her “immature.”
Gadot served as a fitness instructor in the Israeli military for two years, including during the 2006 war against Lebanon.
She told Israeli TV show “The A Talks” that she had expected “Snow White” to be a success, but “then Oct. 7 happened” and there was “a lot of pressure” on Hollywood figures “to speak out against Israel.” The film, she said, was “greatly affected” and “didn’t do well” as a result.
The “Snow White” remake had already faced criticism after actor Peter Dinklage called it “backwards” for its depiction of dwarves.
It grossed $205 million worldwide from a budget of around $270 million, and critic reviews were broadly negative.
In 2024, Gadot addressed the Anti-Defamation League in the aftermath of the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, saying: “Never did I imagine that on the streets of the United States, and different cities around the world, we would see people not condemning Hamas, but celebrating, justifying and cheering on a massacre of Jews.”
