A new Easter-season episode of “Martin Scorsese Presents: The Saints” places Israeli actors at the center of one of Christianity’s most enduring stories—a decision its Jewish creator, Matti Leshem, said was deliberate.
The episode, “Mary,” premieres on March 27 on FOX Nation and explores the life of the Virgin Mary through a dramatized retelling. The docudrama series, created by Leshem and narrated and executive-produced by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Martin Scorsese, examines the lives of major Christian figures throughout history.
Leshem said FOX Nation supported the decision to cast Israeli actors.
“All the actors who play Mary, young Mary, older Mary, Jesus and Joseph are Israeli,” Leshem told JNS. “There’s a kind of authenticity that you get.”
He said the portrayal intentionally departs from traditional European depictions of Jesus. “He’s not the blond-haired, blue-eyed Jesus that has been portrayed for years,” Leshem said. “He seems like he’d be at home in first-century Judea.”
Leshem described Jesus in the episode as “very much a Jew in the spirit of a rabbi who is questioning the environment that he’s in. To me, that feels very Jewish.”
“Mary herself is simply a young Jewish woman who is confronted with a mystery that she doesn’t really understand, but has a deep and abiding belief in God, so she knows that she has to go with it,” he said.
The focus on Mary is an “unusual choice” ahead of Easter, which is more commonly associated with the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, Leshem said. “We are telling the story of Jesus through his mother’s eyes.”
Off-screen, Leshem has been active in pro-Israel advocacy following the Hamas-led attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, helping bring hostage families to Los Angeles and supporting the Hostages and Missing Families Forum. “I am unabashedly pro-Israel,” he told JNS.
Leshem, 63, the son of an Israeli diplomat, grew up moving between countries and attending both Jewish and Catholic schools, including the Ramaz School in New York City. He said his early exposure to Catholic teachings and stories of saints later inspired the series.
While living in California years later, he said he woke up in the middle of the night and told his wife, Lynn, “I’m going to do a series about the saints, but I’m only going to do it if I can do it with Martin Scorsese. Her response: “Stop waking me up in the middle of the night with your harebrained schemes.”
But after years of trying to meet Scorsese, Leshem said a scheduled 30-minute meeting stretched to more than two and a half hours, at the end of which the director said, “We’re partners.”
“These are the greatest stories about humanity ever told,” Leshem told JNS. “Whoever you are, whatever religion you are, take the time to watch.”
