Our fall film series concludes with From Darkness to Light on Monday, December 1, at 6:00 p.m. ET. Join us for an in-person screening, introduced by IIJS Film Programmer Stuart Weinstock and followed by a Q&A with IIJS’s own Jeremy Dauber.

In 1972, movie legend and comedy auteur Jerry Lewis gambled his career and his own money to direct and star in a Holocaust film called The Day the Clown Cried. A series of troubles ensued and the film never saw the light of day, becoming an object of fascination for 50+ years. The documentary From Darkness to Light chronicles the doomed production comprehensively (including new interviews with Lewis before his death) and breaks new ground in film history by including fully-edited scenes from The Day the Clown Cried -- the first time they have ever been publicly seen. Was Lewis' film ahead of its time or a fool's errand? See From Darkness to Light and decide for yourself.
(108 minutes; English and French with English subtitles)

Jeremy Dauber is the Atran Professor of Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture and, for a decade, directed the Institute of Israel and Jewish Studies at Columbia University, where he also teaches in the American studies program. For twelve years, he co-edited Prooftexts: A Journal of Jewish Literary History with Barbara Mann. His books include Antonio's Devils: Writers of the Jewish Enlightenment and the Birth of Modern Hebrew and Yiddish Literature (Stanford University Press, 2004); In the Demon's Bedroom: Yiddish Literature and the Early Modern (Yale University Press; 2010); The Worlds of Sholem Aleichem (Schocken Books, 2013); Jewish Comedy: A Serious History (W.W. Norton, 2017); American Comics: A History (W.W. Norton, 2021); and Mel Brooks: Disobedient Jew (Yale University Press: 2023). His most recent book, American Scary: A History of Horror from Salem to Stephen King (Algonquin: 2024), was named a best book of 2024 by the Boston Globe.

Watch the trailer for From Darkness to Light here.

*Guests must register by Wednesday, November 26 to be approved for campus access; unregistered guests will not be permitted on campus.

Supported by the generosity of the Radov and Kaye families.

While all IIJS events are free and open to the public, we do encourage a suggested donation of $10.

IIJS Film Series: "From Darkness to Light"