![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.zombietime.com\/zomblog\/wp-content\/images2010\/IMG_3594.JPG\")
\nAt the intersection of College and Derby are two buildings: On the left is the Julia Morgan Theater<\/a>, a popular performance space for plays, musicals and concerts; and on the right is Chabad House<\/a>, the East Bay headquarters of the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement, which also functions as a local Jewish community center.<\/p>\n
The buildings have been standing across the street from each other for decades, without the slightest whiff of controversy or animosity.<\/p>\n
But as you can see from the photo, the current production at the Julia Morgan Theater is Oliver!<\/i><\/a>, the musical based on Dickens’ Oliver Twist<\/i>, and to advertise the show, the producers placed a huge banner out front depicting Fagin, one of the lead characters.<\/p>\n This wouldn’t be particularly noteworthy except that Fagin is considered to be an insulting anti-Semitic stereotype<\/a>, and the banner was positioned to face directly toward Chabad House across the street. When the Chabadniks look out the building’s front windows, they have to gaze directly at a 10-foot-tall image of a stereotypical “greedy Jew.”<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.zombietime.com\/zomblog\/wp-content\/images2010\/IMG_3594detail.JPG\")
\nHere’s a split-screen closeup, showing the Fagin banner more clearly on the left, and the Chabad banner more clearly on the right.<\/p>\n