The Holocaust loomed large on TV this past weekend, with the premiere of heavily promoted films like the ABC miniseries "Anne Frank" (Sunday and Monday, 9-11 p.m. ET) and HBO's "Conspiracy" (Saturday, 9-10:45 p.m. ET, check listings for rebroadcasts).
     If anything, the weekend serves as a microcosm for 2001 in general, which is proving to be a banner year for Holocaust programming on TV.
    All three sweeps periods, which are crucial for amassing high ratings, feature a Holocaust film, beginning with February's "Haven" on CBS and ending with November's "Uprising," an upcoming NBC miniseries about the Warsaw ghetto uprising. Showtime also joined the trend with "Varian's War" in April.
    Five films about the Holocaust in one year is a lot, and that's not including rebroadcasts like last month's PBS presentation of "Schindler's List" or the voluminous documentary footage on cable networks like the History Channel, which has a six-hour miniseries, "Hitler's Holocaust," scheduled in June.
    Whether documentary or dramatization, most Holocaust programming is truly outstanding. It's not difficult to imagine why, considering the material; no producer would approach the Holocaust without the utmost sensitivity and depth.
    But perhaps there should be cause for concern regarding the number of programs devoted to the subject.
    It isn't simply a matter of overexposing the Holocaust, although one has to wonder whether the public will get jaded by too many of these films. Movies are America's primary means of encountering history, and all too often representation and reality are hopelessly confused.
    The anxiety is more directed at the motivation for their sheer number. 
    Has this trend really arisen due to any kind of artistic or commemorative imperatives, or is Hollywood just capitalizing on the genre's commercial clout by distributing enough of them to risk exhausting viewers on a very important subject?
    For all the critical acclaim Holocaust films like "Schindler" and "Life is Beautiful" have garnered, don't forget their box-office power. 
    Not only did "Schindler" gross $321.2 million worldwide, but its 1997 rebroadcast on NBC was seen by 65 million viewers--twice the number of people who saw it during its theatrical run. 
    Even more people tuned in for what is considered the genre's mainstream breakthrough: the 1978 miniseries "Holocaust," which was seen on NBC by over 100 million Americans.
    "Life is Beautiful" grossed $229 million, making it the most successful foreign film in the American market before "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" came along.
    And wouldn't you know it: the film is now the subject of a bitter lawsuit between Miramax and Fox Family Channel, which claims Fox was supposed to carry "Beautiful's"  television debut.
    Miramax tried giving the film to NBC instead, spurring the suit in January.
    Holocaust dramatizations are a powerful tool for promoting messages of tolerance and unity to a country that could certainly stand to learn a thing or two on those subjects. 
    But they also can be ratings-grabbers that give off airs of integrity and gravitas that are essentially false.
    Is there really much of a difference between the Holocaust boom and the reality TV boom? Both are being driven by Hollywood's oldest trick: Send in the clones until the public tires of them.
     "Schindler" has become the "Survivor" of the Holocaust genre, doomed to be copied endlessly. It can't be a coincidence that CBS's "Haven" and Showtime's "Varian" are also both about individuals who dare to rescue hundreds of survivors.
    Hollywood needs to show some self-restraint here because the consequences are more than just low ratings. Over-saturating the market with these programs runs the risk of desensitizing the public to the Holocaust itself.

May 21, 2001 © 2001 Media Life

-Andrew Wallenstein is the television critic for Media Life.

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