Ben Platt, 'Parade' producers address antisemitic protests

Star Ben Platt and the producers of "Parade" are each speaking out about the neo-Nazi protesters outside the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre Tuesday night before the first preview performance of the Broadway musical revival.

“If there is any remaining doubt out there about the urgency of telling this story in this moment in history, the vileness on display in front of our theater last night should put it to rest," read a statement Wednesday from the producers of the show about the antisemitic lynching of Leo Frank in 1915. "We stand by the valiant Broadway cast that brings this vital story to life each night.”

In a video shot by an audience member and tweeted by Jake Wasserman, engagement editor of the 125-year-old Jewish newspaper The Forward, a white man wearing a dark toboggan cap and a neck gaiter covering all of his face except the eyes walks through the crowd on the sidewalk in front of the theater, holding a leaflet in his hand.

"You want to learn about the truth about who you're going to see tonight?" he harangues. "You're paying 300 bucks to go … worship a pedophile," referring to Jewish Frank's controversial conviction in Georgia of the murder of a 13-year-old girl. After enough evidence of his innocence surfaced, the governor commuted the sentence from death to life imprisonment — an unpopular decision that led a mob to break Frank out of prison and lynch him.

Wasserman retweeted another commenter's photos of the flyer, identifying the protesters as the neo-Nazi group Empire State Stormers, whose logo is a skull-and-crossbones wearing a neckerchief mask bearing the "SS" logo of the dreaded World War II Nazi paramilitary organization the Schutzstaffel.

"Dear Evan Hansen" Tony Award winner Platt, 29, who plays Frank in this revival of the 1998 production, took to social media after returning home from the preview.

"For those who don't know," he said in part in an Instagram video, "there were a few neo-Nazi protesters from a really disgusting group outside of the theater, bothering some of our patrons on their way in and saying antisemitic things about Leo Frank, who the show is about, and just spreading antisemitic rhetoric that led to this whole story in the first place."

Calling the protest "definitely very ugly and scary," he added it was nonetheless "a wonderful reminder of why we're telling this particular story and how special and powerful art and particularly theater can be. And [it] just made me feel extra, extra grateful to be the one that gets to tell this particular story and to carry on this legacy of Leo," whose lynching sparked the formation of the Jewish advocacy organization the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).

Among those posting supportive comments were pop star Ariana Grande, Oscar-winning actor Julianne Moore and cookbook author Jessica Seinfeld, wife of Massapequa-raised comedy legend Jerry Seinfeld.

"Parade" is scheduled to open March 16 for a run through Aug. 6.