As a Jew with a big nose and even bigger mouth, I have some thoughts. …

But although Cooper’s critics have a point, their proposed solutions would actually make the situation worse. Our cultural conversation is enhanced, not diminished, when diverse performers inhabit other communities and humanize them for audiences. And Jews should know this better than most. After all, though they comprise just 2 percent of the American population, Jewish actors have been able to portray a wide variety of non-Jews on-screen, to the great benefit of both American Jews and American culture (just ask fans of Harrison Ford, Daveed Diggs, or Natalie Portman). Insisting that Jewish roles go exclusively to Jews could constrict rather than broaden the space for Jewish performers, and relegate aspiring Jewish actors to a narrow niche.

The truth is, just as it’s possible for Jews to sensitively portray non-Jewish characters, it is possible for non-Jews to empathetically embody Jewish ones. The merit of Cooper’s portrayal will be determined not by the nature of his nose but by the quality of his performance. The real question is not whether non-Jews can play Jews, but whether they can do the Jewishness justice. To take one example, the problem with the 2018 Ruth Bader Ginsburg biopic, On the Basis of Sex, is not that the trailblazing Jewish judge is portrayed by the non-Jewish Felicity Jones. It’s that the feminist jurist’s deep and abiding Jewish identity was almost entirely effaced from the story.

[As Laurence Olivier once reportedly said to Dustin Hoffman, “It’s called *acting*, dear boy.” The nose controversy is silly, but Rosenberg’s concerns are not. The test of the film is not hiring actors for “representation” or dealing with prosthetics to match the physical attributes of a well-known public figure. It’s whether the film does justice to the truth and to the person. So why not wait until we see what Cooper does with the role? Unlike others, he’s not going out in public trying to rewrite history for his own political agenda and to scold people over their attachment to a previous version of a film. Bernstein’s family says they trust Cooper and have no problem with the prosthetic or his Gentile identity, so maybe everyone else can take a deep breath. — Ed]