Winona Ryder said Mel Gibson once asked if she was an 'oven dodger'

• Winona Ryder told The Times of London that Mel Gibson once asked her at a party whether she was an "oven dodger."
• "We were at a crowded party with one of my good friends, and Mel Gibson was smoking a cigar, and we're all talking and he said to my friend, who's gay, 'Oh wait, am I gonna get AIDS?'" Ryder said.
• The actress continued: "And then something came up about Jews, and he said, 'You're not an oven dodger, are you?'"
• "Oven dodger" is a derogatory term for Jewish people alluding to the crematoria used to burn bodies at Nazi concentration camps.
• Ryder also said she was once told she looked "too Jewish" for a movie: "There are times when people have said: 'Wait, you're Jewish? But you're so pretty!'"

Winona Ryder says that Mel Gibson once asked her at a party whether she was an "oven dodger."

In an interview with The Times of London, Ryder described experiencing antisemitism in the film industry and gave an anecdote about meeting Gibson at a party.

"We were at a crowded party with one of my good friends, and Mel Gibson was smoking a cigar, and we're all talking and he said to my friend, who's gay, 'Oh wait, am I gonna get AIDS?'" Ryder said.

"And then something came up about Jews, and he said, 'You're not an oven dodger, are you?'"

"Oven dodger" is a derogatory term for Jewish people alluding to the crematoria used to burn bodies at Nazi concentration camps.

Ryder told The Times that Gibson tried to apologize to her for these comments afterward. She told The Times she was "not religious" but did identify as Jewish.

"It's a hard thing for me to talk about because I had family who died in the camps, so I've always been fascinated with that time," she said.

The actress also told The Times that she was once told she was "too Jewish" to be cast for a movie.

"There are times when people have said: 'Wait, you're Jewish? But you're so pretty!'" Ryder said. "There was a movie that I was up for a long time ago, it was a period piece, and the studio head, who was Jewish, said I looked 'too Jewish' to be in a blue-blooded family."

Gibson has a history of making antisemitic remarks, and he faced major scrutiny after a leaked recording of him making antisemitic remarks during a DUI arrest in 2006 came to light. While being arrested, Gibson said: "f---ing Jews ... the Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world. Are you a Jew?" The party described by Ryder apparently happened in 1995.

Gibson told Variety's "Playback" podcast: "It was an unfortunate incident. I was loaded and angry and arrested."

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