All language subtitles for The.Last.2019.1080p.WEBRip.x264-RARBG

On the first day
of Rosh Hashanah,

after the afternoon prayer,
we go to a lake, river or sea

and recite the Tashlich prayers.

Wherein, we symbolically
cast our sins into the water

and leave our old
shortcomings behind us.

Thus, starting the New
Year with a clean slate.

So beautiful.

Talk about atonement.

Banner year, huh, you
must have been really

racking up the sins this year.

Was that enough?

Is God going to reincarnate
me into the Book of Life now?

Reinscribe, Jonathan,
not reincarnate.

Nana, are you sure I can't
give you my shawl to wear?

It's getting awfully chilly.

I've never been sick
a day in my life.

Come on, have a heart.

Atone for something.

Josh, Olivia?

Yes, Marin.

What do you need, sweetheart?

Why were your suitcases packed?

Because I am going to live at
my nana's house for a few weeks.

Did you and Olivia have a fight?

No, but they're living in sin.

Jonathan, our rabbi was
uncomfortable with the fact

that Josh and I shared a
bed before my conversion

to Judaism.

So we told him we would live
apart from the day of my mikvah

until the wedding.

So for the next
three weeks, Josh

is spending nights at
our nana Claire's house.

Why don't you just
buy another bed?

Marin and me have two beds.

That is a really good question.

And the truth is that
I need some quiet time

to get ready for my
bat mitzvah next week.

I gotta study up for it.

Where's sin, is it in New York?

I don't want you
to move far away.

We're never going to be far.

Don't worry.

It's all part of the
cleansing process.

Were your sheets really dirty?

He's just going to ask
you more questions.

Modern Orthodox, what
happened to the modern part?

If Olivia had been
Jewish all along,

and your rabbi knew you
shared a home together,

he still wouldn't marry you?

Correct.

But he came up with a loophole.

The conversion was a reboot.

Ladies and gentlemen,
meet the only Jewish woman

who's never sinned.

Immaculate.

I knew her when she was a
mere Catholic degenerate.

The irony was I was ready
to convert two years ago,

but we weren't ready to marry.

I can't wait to be Jewish.

You loved being in love.

Some people convert to marry.

We're getting married
so she can convert.

It's just so much black magic.

On Fat Tuesday, I'm buying
each of them voodoo dolls.

Shush up.

Jimmy crack corn
and I don't care.

It's OK, Jonathan, just a
little family ebb and flow.

Plus deep down on
the high holy days,

he's the guiltiest
Jew I've met to date.

Let us cast away
the sin of deception

so that we will mislead
no one in Word or deed,

nor pretend to be
what we are not.

Let us cast away the sin
of vain ambition, which

prompts us to strive
for goals which

lead to neither true fulfillment
nor genuine contentment.

My first boyfriend, he took
me to synagogue one afternoon.

He just liked to go.

And they sang "Adon Olam."

No one looked alike.

No one sounded alike.

But the look of sheer
happiness and understanding

was shared by everyone.

So this conversion is
something so real and purity

of the highest order.

What is that?

I'm so embarrassed.

Please don't reject me.

Crazy shiksa, I'm
talking about that mole.

You should have it
looked at right away.

The first time I ever attended
a synagogue by myself,

I was so nervous.

I thought everyone will be able
to tell just by looking at me

that I am not Jewish.

I won't know what to
say or what to do.

I won't know what page we're on.

And then I get there,
exactly on time,

and I realize I am the
first person there.

Despite all my worries, I still
felt like I belonged somehow.

I still felt that this
was the right path for me

so I kept pushing
through my nerves,

went back to
different synagogues,

and learned more and
more about Judaism.

Pretty soon, I caught
onto a few things.

I learned to show
up a little late.

That it's perfectly fine
to ask what page we're on.

And that if someone can tell
that I'm not Jewish just

by looking at me, I
don't really care.

Because I know in
my soul that I am.

Jonathan, Elijah wants
to look at your penis.

Marin, stop terrorizing
your brother.

What did your mother
say when you first

told her you were converting?

My mom was never very religious.

But when I told her
I was considering it,

it took months, maybe
years, for her to accept it.

I thought about it for
years before I met Josh.

Judaism was just
something I never

wanted to stop learning about.

Got under my skin, like reading
a great novel over and over

again.

How long did it take
to become a Jew?

About a year.

One full cycle of holidays.

I just had to take a class
at the synagogue once a week,

observe Shabbat, be a regular
attendee at Shabbat services,

and prove I kept a kosher house.

There were five people
in the class with me.

And then the mikvah.

So the bat mitzvah
wasn't compulsory?

No, that was for me.

It was important to me.

Come on, Josh, the truth.

Would you have still married
Olivia if she didn't--

Well, yeah, I love her.

But we did discuss raising
our children Jewish

even before we got engaged, and
well before Olivia definitively

decided to convert.

We don't keep kosher
and we're Jews.

But we're Orthodox,
modern Orthodox.

And you were born Jewish.

That's something that's
never taken away from you.

Catholics, on the other
hand, can be excommunicated.

Does your mother
keep kosher now, too,

in an act of solidarity?

Oh, my god, no.

The first time she came to visit
our apartment, she had a fit.

She'd brought something
from this gourmet food shop

as a gift.

We said she couldn't
bring it into the house.

Yeah.

Her mom loves me.

Christianity always
felt like an exercise

in crime and punishment to me,
with the accent on punishment.

It's drilled into us from birth
that we are all born impure.

I wasn't born impure.

When I was baptized that
made me feel impure.

I was complicit in
a lie, a conspiracy.

And then you have
to confess sins.

And God help you if you
hadn't committed any sins.

We're all sinful.

That was work,
conjuring up sins.

And then someone told me about
Timothy 6:20, "vain babblings."

Vain babblings.

Just the sound of it cracked
me up so I used that for weeks.

Then I threw in adultery one
Sunday as a change of pace.

Got in big trouble for that one.

I love that Jews
don't offer up hell.

It's enough I have
menopause to deal with.

Hot flashes, hell fire.

Potato, potato.

Then you have to do penance.

Just nothing made sense to me.

Everything was
bleak and joyless.

Passover is a holiday
about liberation.

It's a thrilling Hollywood
movie about escape, freedom.

So you're not going to
celebrate Christmas anymore?

I'm a Hanukkah girl now.

Josh, what's modern Orthodox?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, I find conservative
Judaism really a failure,

like--

OK-- like the decision to not
allow Jews to drive on Shabbat,

it decentralized and weakened
the Jewish community.

And without community,
Judaism cannot survive.

And I found no community
of conservative Jews.

Yet when I go to an
Orthodox synagogue, even one

that I don't like, there is
a strong sense of community.

But you don't believe
in God, my friend.

Well, no, but I do believe that
everything in modern orthodoxy

is good without the need
for it to be divine.

Do you believe in miracles?

I'm not sure that I do
believe in divine miracles,

but I believe that
if people think

that there are no limits
on what is possible,

then we can be surprised
by things that are

outside of our expectations.

Yeah, I think miracles happen.

I just don't call
them miracles, and I

don't believe that they happen
because of divine presence.

So no burning bush?

No, I think there could
have been a burning bush.

I just don't think
it was burning

because God made it burn.

I think the sea
could have parted.

I just don't think it parted
because God wanted it to part.

They were like
natural phenomena that

happened at the right time.

Yeah.

And when we say it parted,
I don't necessarily

believe it actually parted.

Like I think there was--

there was a way, there was a
way made for them to go through.

Call it an aberration
of nature, if you like.

But not divinely.

Not necessarily.

Though I'm not opposed
to that philosophy.

Not necessarily?

You're an agnostic.

Like your father.

"The New Yorker Magazine"
is like catnip to that girl.

Your son's playing Candy Crush.

Talk to him.

I just don't feel
the need to ascribe

divine intent to miracles.

Do you believe that Moses
brought down the Ten

Commandments from Mount Sinai?

Does it matter?

Though, I do believe
they're worth following,

the 10 commandments.

Who wrote them?

It doesn't matter
who wrote them.

What matters is that they were
adopted by the Jewish people.

So it renders much or
all of the Old Testament

fiction rather than fact?

Yes.

Doesn't mean I don't
believe in them.

Olivia is the one
who believes in God.

Yes, but I agree with
much of what Josh said.

Do I believe that God
parted the Red Sea

and you could see fishes
swimming right next to you

when you were walking
on the sea bed, no.

But do I believe that we
all have instances of faith

and we're in the right
place at the right time

and this happens?

And we have a path we might not
know about but that God does.

I believe in that.

What about the Jewish rite
of burial versus cremation.

How?

Why?

What is the religious
basis in that?

I don't really have an answer.

I can only tell you
why I believe in it.

It has to do with the natural
progression of things.

I think to be
cremated is unnatural

and we were meant to
nourish the earth.

But we don't utilize that
Earth under which we're buried

for the benefit of mankind.

I don't believe in cemeteries.

I hate cemeteries.

So what should we
do with our corpses?

OK.

Maybe we crossed a line.

I say bury them in the woods
at night with a lantern.

In a box.

No, I'd prefer not to be
buried in a box, but maybe

a cloth bag.

Anyway, the Jewish
preference is not

to be buried in a
casket or a coffin.

Enough with the macabre
shit, Josh, all right?

What about the miracles
in the Old Testament?

Hanukkah miracles,
Passover miracles.

Josh told me he
didn't believe in God

the first day we met at a
Passover Seder at my friend

Andrew's house.

You remember my friend
Andrew, don't you?

Sure.

He plays cello, like you.

He sure does.

Not as good as you.

And he teaches, like you.

He sure does.

What's an "o-bit-u-ary"?

Obituary.

It's something you write
as a tribute to someone

when they die.

Describes all the wonderful
things they've ever done.

All the wonderful
people they ever knew,

and all the wonderful people in
their family, past and present.

So that everyone in
that person's family

knows how many people
will miss them.

It's kind of a mitzvah, even
for people who aren't Jewish.

You guys waiting
for your grandma?

Great grandma.

She's cute.

She really is.

Nana, I knew you'd make it.

You're early.

I'm always early.

It irritates the
hell out of people.

Is it too hot for you?

No, vitamin D is good for you.

Nana, did you
remember sunscreen?

Oh, my doctor, before he
died at the age of 52,

used to scold me for my
Vitamin D deficiency.

Now, you want me
to wear sunscreen?

I'm surprised you've
ever seen a doctor.

It's a miracle.

I've finally surprised you,
finally took your breath away.

Enough with the third degree.

I just came from
the dermatologist.

I showed him my moles.

He likes to look at moles.

He wanted to lance them.

I think he must be
in love with me.

Why else would you
perform such a procedure

on a 92-year-old woman?

I saw doctors when I was
younger, much younger.

Fear not, I will
survive these moles.

There are so many ways to die,
but only one way to be born.

Those were the
first German words

I've spoken aloud
in almost 70 years.

I miss it.

I'm just tired.

Nana, you never
complain about anything.

What's wrong?

What's wrong?

I experienced a momentary
lapse in judgment.

I was seized by a
bout of nostalgia.

The very word is uncouth.

Anyway, at my age, I'm
not supposed to worry.

Worrying takes years off
your life, and, well--

You sure nothing's wrong, Nana?

It's all because
of mahjong and sex.

Knock it off!

Grace, one of the women
I play mahjong with

was visited by her grandson
yesterday, a very uncouth

youth.

He told me I smell.

Oh, wow.

That's it?

That's all he said?

Maybe he meant it
as a compliment.

Maybe, yeah.

Maybe.

Perhaps.

Yeah, but you know it made
me think about papa and sex

and all the places he used
to love to kiss and to lick.

Nana, you're delirious.

The area behind my earlobes,
my eyelids, beneath my breasts.

Now it all smells
like I'm decomposing.

When I was young,
I smelled better

than any woman in Poland.

Nana, you're hilarious,
morbidly funny.

Poland?

What do you think I smell like?

Like my grandma.

And she's the most beautiful
thing in the world after you.

Morbidly funny.

Morbidly funny.

I don't think I've
ever said anything

like that before in my life.

That wasn't me.

Who was it if it
wasn't me, Olivia?

What are some of the things
you're most proud of?

That I'm not a hunchback.

That I'm not a caricature.

How about you, what
are you most proud of?

Wow, me?

I don't know.

What made you think
of hunchbacks?

Oh, dear.

Europe was lousy with hunchbacks
when I was growing up.

Nana, why did your
dad leave your mom?

She left him.

He was a self-made man
and a self-absorbed man.

How did he die?

Natural causes.

Did he die peacefully?

No one dies a peaceful
death, Olivia.

I have an abnormally
low resting heart rate.

It sets off alarms when I go
to the doctor for a checkup.

No one dies a peaceful death.

What?

You went to a doctor again?

Why did you go to
a doctor again?

Why did you go to
the doctor again?

Listen, you used to
tell me ghost stories.

You used to terrify me.

So stop terrifying me.

You have me for
the entire weekend.

Where are you
taking me tomorrow?

Jana's wedding is
next month, remember?

You and me and Jana are going
to sample desserts tomorrow.

And then we're going to choose
our favorite shade of purple

for the bridesmaids dresses.

Our favorite hue.

How many shades of
purple do they offer?

More than varieties of desserts.

Oh, invent one then.

A hue previously undiscovered.

In fact, make it a
contest for your students.

Some of the kids composed a song
for our wedding last semester.

I don't want them
to feel exploited.

Only a song?

Well, why stop there?

That's what slave labor is for.

That's how it starts.

Where are her parents?

Next thing you know, she'll
be walking through plate glass

windows.

I have to confess, I
was a little nervous

when I thought about negotiating
the beach for myself today.

It's a chink in my armor.

Imagine, it's almost
half a century since I

sifted sand between my toes.

Imagine that.

I took the subway to Penn
Station today, too, by myself.

I miss riding the
subway at 7:30 a.m.

and watching those sly
smiles on the faces

of those otherwise
professional career women.

Especially on the days when
they turn the clocks backward

to standard time
and the women get

to spend an extra hour in bed.

What is that?

I have a tiny headache.

Alert the media.

The woman who's never been
sick a day in her life

is battling a headache.

Can I see the pills?

Nana, this is strong.

This is a big pill.

Yeah, well, the
bigger the better.

Chink in your armor, huh?

Here.

You love these.

What are you even doing here?

You shouldn't be here.

We would've come to
pick you up for lunch.

I've never broken my hip.

Ironic if it should
happen today.

What did you say, sweetheart?

I said, what are you doing here?

You shouldn't be here.

We would have come to
pick you up for lunch.

I brought pictures.

You bought a cell phone.

No, I brought pictures.

Pic-tures.

To show you, to give
you, vintage photographs.

I stopped by the bank today.

I've been keeping these
in a safe deposit box.

These photos have
survived three banks--

Lincoln Savings, Chemical,
and now JPMorgan Chase.

Imagine that, I've
survived two banks.

Yeah, and just a
few years back, I

thought for sure I'd
outlive the third.

What does that tell you about
bankers and personal security?

Is that your diary?

No, they're mostly
my mother's diaries.

They've always been
my bedtime stories.

For decades, you paid monthly
rentals for a safe deposit box?

Could have bought
a Maserati by now.

Look at that serrated edge.

Oh, is that you?

No, that's my mother, Marta.

She was the happiest
woman in all of Berlin.

How old is she there?

Fifteen.

Black and white puts a
few years on your life.

Who are these people wearing
swastikas on their sleeves?

The man on the left
is Dr. Carl Clauberg.

Who is the other man?

Dr. Horst Schumann.

I prefer not to discuss him.

I never understood him.

He was evil.

And the woman?

That's me.

Later.

No, not later, Nana,
you're wearing--

A nurse's uniform.

Where was this taken?

Auschwitz.

What?

People today don't
talk about the Germany

from the first part of
the 20th century when--

Germany was utterly beautiful
and musical and happy.

It was all gold and green.

So modern.

Best apples on earth,
better than New York.

I always wondered whether there
was a connection my two lives

where the best apples were.

My mother was born
in 1898 in Hamburg,

but moved to Berlin when
she was two months old.

Her parents had rented
a little two room

flat behind the
Wintergarten theater.

She never knew what her
parents did for a living.

Most days they left
her alone from noon

until well past midnight for
as long as she could remember.

They never sent her
to school and she

didn't learn to read or write
until she was in her teens.

But she understood numbers.

Strange.

And horticulture.

Her mother grew tomatoes on
the window ledge of their flat,

and so every morning when
mama came down for breakfast,

there would be fresh
gooseberries on the kitchen

table.

Next time you're in Germany,
you should try them.

As lonely and solitary
as her early years were,

my mother loved Germany.

This is a full half
century before 'homeland'

became an ugly word.

She writes how her
parents were always

holding each other's hands,
strolling through the Altes

Museum holding hands,
gazing up at the splendor

of the Brandenburg
Gate holding hands.

Picnicking in the Zoogarten,
dining with another couple

holding hands.

And her parents always returned
home from work smiling.

It was as if smiles were
their silent language.

And so, of course, they had
a special smile reserved just

for her the same way that I
have a special smile for you.

And now, of course,
one for you, too.

When my mother was
seven years old,

her parents began staying away
for several days at a time.

By the time she turned eight,
they were gone for good.

Gone.

Simply one day never
returned from work.

But my mother never
ran away from home,

and no landlord ever came
knocking at the door for rent.

There was something
blessed about that hovel.

My mother was almost
a feral child.

But it was the music
that kept her sane.

She especially loved
operas, because they

were sung in so many
different languages

and she understood that the
audiences were responding

not to the words,
but to the humanity.

There was a lot of opera sung at
the Wintergarten in those days.

And my mother
memorized them all.

So one morning a few weeks after
her parents had disappeared,

she left the flat and went
into the back of the theater

while all the porters
were away working,

and she explored every one
of the nooks and crannies

until she could no longer stand.

So she found an
empty dressing room,

and she made herself a bed.

Well, a feather nest, really,
from some discarded costumes

she found.

So she fell asleep.

And she lived in that
theater for a few years.

Like Eloise at the Plaza.

The other things she
loved about the theater,

about everything
on Potsdamerstrasse

about everything in
Berlin, were the buildings.

Carolingian, Romanesque,
Gothic, Renaissance,

she loved the gables,
the gargoyles, the art,

the mathematics of
the architecture.

She thrilled to that.

But architecture took a back
seat to the lure of the music.

In the alley behind
the Wintergarten,

there was another theater.

Well, it's a
cabaret, a nightclub,

more like a burlesque.

It was called Susse Fruchte--

Sweet Fruit.

So a famous teenager
named Claire Waldoff

performed there once.

And after the performance,
she introduced herself

to my mother.

My mother wrote that she was the
only celebrity she'd ever met,

and she was the nicest
teenager she ever met.

That's when she decided to
name her firstborn Claire.

So one day, the manager
of that little club

came to the Wintergarten
to attend a birthday party.

And there was a man
there, an executive

from Deutsche Grammophon
named Herr Sebastian Hennicke.

Lovely mustachioed
larger-than-life

homosexual gentleman.

So only men attended the party.

They all smoked.

And that frightened my mother.

So she did what she always did
when she felt anxious or alone.

She sang.

Her voice moved
Sebastian to tears.

And after that, he
found any excuse

to come to the Wintergarten
just to hear Marta sing.

So Marta was just
13 years old the day

that Sebastian asked his
old friend, the manager

of the Susse Fruchte, if
Marta could be allowed to sing

at his cabaret that evening.

All the other singers, they
were older women in their 20s.

They all wore red
lipstick like a uniform.

My mother thought they looked
like harlots, predators.

But they could sing.

Now, Marta had the
voice of an angel.

But by the time she'd
sung almost 300 smoke

suffused nights in this cabaret,
her voice was deteriorating.

She thought it was
due to puberty,

but Sebastian knew better.

Her vocal chords
were gone, shot.

But he didn't want to
shatter her confidence,

so he told her it was
time to make a record.

So for seven
consecutive nights, they

went to the Deutsche
Grammophon Studio

after it was closed for
the evening, and Marta

and Sebastian and some down
on their luck musicians whom

Sebastian was paying
out of his own pocket.

Sebastian engineered a recording
on state-of-the-art cylinders

of four songs.

It was Marta's first
and only record.

She was about 15 when
it was completed.

She only found out
just before she

died that Sebastian had bought
the only copies, four of them.

Then the war--
World War I began.

Sebastian feared
for her life, so he

arranged for her to
travel to southern France.

The trip took four weeks.

Yeah.

Germany to France, four weeks.

But war is noisy,

And on the way my mother
lost the hearing in one ear.

That's when she decided that
she would never again be ill

a day in her life.

So in France, she
wound up living

in a small town
called Angouleme.

She took odd jobs until she
ended up at a patisserie.

She was 18 years old.

I always wondered if it
had been my mother who

took these photographs.

Ha-ha.

My mother loved bread.

The men called her bread belly.

But she wasn't insulted,
and it wasn't insulting.

When the war ended in 1918,
she stayed on in France.

She didn't want to witness what
had happened to the country she

so cherished.

Especially the Wintergarten.

So by the time she turned
21, she was fluent in French.

She became a little too French.

She was lonely.

Then she became pregnant.

She didn't want to
have a French baby.

She wanted the child
to be born in Germany.

But she became ill during
her second trimester.

All the French
doctors told her she

was too ill to
travel so she finally

found a third doctor who
said she could make it.

She lost the baby along the way.

But she continued on to Berlin.

And she found that
by some miracle,

her childhood flat had
survived the war intact.

She found it deserted.

She moved in.

She was home.

She became a prostitute.

One customer made
her pregnant...

again.

Bruno, funny name.

Once she told him,
he began coming

to see her every day, not for
sex, but to bring her money.

Then he married her.

Funny Bruno.

The marriage lasted two weeks.

She left him.

In her third trimester, she
came down with dysentery.

A friend told her about some
brilliant young gynecology

student at the University of
Bremen named Carl Clauberg.

So she departed for
Bremen that evening.

She wrote two entire
paragraphs about his smile.

She died from complications
two weeks after I was born.

Carl couldn't save her,
but he saved the baby.

Me.

It's all there in her
writings, all of it.

It's what made me want to become
a nurse, the fact that Carl

tried to save my life.

Well, that and I love children.

Carl had promised my mother
that he would place me

in the only decent foundling
home in all of Germany

in Leipzig, and he
kept his promise.

I mean, that alone
was a miracle.

He came to see me every week.

Once, he brought
a record player.

It had a beautiful stylus
and the wooden box gleamed.

He loved to play records for
the children, especially for me.

I remember once when
I was three years old,

I asked Carl how did all these
different voices come out

of the record player?

He explained to me that
there were miniature versions

of all the great singers
living in the compartment

beneath the turntable.

And when it was
their turn to sing,

they all stood in front
of this microphone so tiny

that it was almost invisible,
and they sang exactly the song

that you wanted to hear,
just like a jukebox.

Well, how could it have
been anything else?

But my mother
wasn't in that box!

By the time I was 7, the
Weimar Republic was finished.

And the Nazi party became
Germany's legal government

in 1933.

Carl adopted me legally
when I turned 12,

but I remained in
the home in Leipzig.

This was the safest
place I could be.

I stayed there for
two more years.

I was changing.

Germany was changing.

Then Carl arranged for me
to enter nursing school

when I turned 14.

14, it was unheard of.

Carl was my mentor.

He really wanted nothing
more than to help

women who had been
diagnosed as infertile to--

he was a pioneer in
progesterone studies.

1942, he had the chance to go
to Auschwitz where there would

be an unlimited number of
women he could sterilize

for the purpose of his studies.

He begged me to come.

Of course, I said, yes, it was
the safest place I could be.

I was 16.

It wouldn't have been so
terrible if anesthesia had not

been in such short supply.

It was war!

The SS officers and their
wives and their mistresses,

they all trusted Carl, and
so the women trusted me, too.

What was their alternative?

The only alternative were
Jewish doctors, and soon

Jewish doctors, well--

and Carl made sure
that no one touched me.

I was still a nurse.

I saved Jewish lives.

I really did.

Some.

That part's not in
the history books.

But soon after we
arrived at the camp,

Carl was paired with
that man, that Horst

from the photos, that
man who had no vision.

New Year's Eve 1943.

Remember that date.

There was a ball at the villa
of one of the SS captains.

Everybody drank so much.

Carl made love to
me that evening

in one of the villa's bedrooms.

The first and only time.

The wallpaper was green.

Three weeks later, he
told me I was pregnant.

And I told myself that
I would never allow

another man inside me again.

And I never did.

He knew then that
sometime very soon

that he'd never see me again.

He knew by the spring that
the Reich would lose the war.

So once I made it through
my first trimester,

he made arrangements for me to
flee to France to Marseilles,

and then to Greece.

And from there, to
America where I'd

be known as a Jewish refugee
from the war until the day

I died.

I learned Hebrew, Yiddish,
English in Auschwitz.

Well, I have a
faculty for languages.

I never bothered
to learn Polish.

I don't know why.

Was your daughter a Nazi?

My daughter, Rosalie,
your grandmother,

was born in New York City
and I made her promise never

to tell her children
about my past.

What about Papa Moishe?

My husband, nice man.

He was like me, a
member of the party.

But he escaped Austria
one year earlier.

Ours was strictly a marriage of
convenience, prearranged, never

consummated.

I kept my vow to myself.

Did Harry and Melody
know about this?

Not until last night.

How could you do that to mom?

It wasn't about moles, and it
wasn't about a dermatologist.

And you're so smart, my
beautiful great grandchildren.

I have brain cancer.

And at my age, it's inoperable.

The oncologist says six months.

I say it's more
like a week or two.

And I will not endure pain.

I have a paralyzing
fear of pain.

I am not my mother.

But I can't do it
by myself, alone.

So I met a young
doctor, a female doctor,

last Thanksgiving at a party.

She's from Oregon, Corvallis.

And even though
physician-assisted suicide

is legal in Oregon,
all the physician

can do is to write
you a prescription.

After that, you're on your own.

This woman, this
doctor, she believes

that assisting means assisting.

I'm flying to Oregon.

I'll check into a hotel.

She makes house calls.

I've outlived a
great many people.

And so now I'm back in
control of my own life.

How do you like them apples?

I know you two, you're going
to get pregnant in Israel

during spring break.

I thought of hanging
on for one more

year just so that I could see
my first great-great-grandchild.

But then I remembered
what my friend

Hilda, my first
American friend, she

told me the worst thing
about having cancer

was that she was in so
much pain she couldn't

hold her own grandchild.

Her own grandchild.

I'm coming with you to Oregon.

Do you still hate Jews?

Oh, nonsense.

So much of what happened,
it was personal to me.

It happened to me.

Jews were simply the enemy
of the Germans, among others.

And in war, you eliminate
the enemy, whoever he is.

You vanquish the
enemy regardless

of religion or age or sex.

Are you completely unrepentant?

Seriously, are you
completely unrepentant?

Why did you tell us this...

at all?

The last time I confided in
family just my daughter knowing

what I'd done destroyed her.

Then my son-in-law.

That's what I did to them.

I'm telling you because there
are two sides to every story.

Because I am history.

It's a history that nobody
talks about anymore.

And because you share my DNA.

So I thought it was important
that you know before Corvallis.

I think you're lying.

I'm just not sure why.

There are diaries in there,
along with the photographs,

as well as my own
medical records.

But not the part
about your moth...

about your birth.

Carl contributed the final
chapter and the epilogue

to my mother's diaries.

I keep a diary, also.

It's in there.

Mine starts with
my earliest memory.

I went to see Bambi.

You were sexually
abused by Carl.

Yes?

We never had time to
discuss such things.

There was a World War
going on, remember?

Nobody had personal
problems back then,

certainly not the Naz...

certainly not the Germans.

You'll have to
recompartmentalize

how you remember me, Josh.

How you'll describe
me to your children.

God, you'd let me
stay up late and I'd

sneak down the stairs in
my Luke Skywalker pajamas

and hear mom's choir rehearsal.

And you would put your
hands over your ears

until I made you understand
how angelic Melody's voice was.

Your mother had the voice
my mother never had.

It's all interconnected,
isn't it?

I need you to know that I was
not just a wife, an immigrant.

I need people to know--

I need my family
to know that I was

a member of the Third Reich.

What?

Nana, you're rambling.

She's losing it.

Its third person now, huh?

Is my great grandmother
a Nazi still?

Oh, Josh, yes, no.

I still consider myself
a member of the party.

And like it or not,
you're my blood relative.

We all thought you would choose
to teach American history.

Historians know there are
two sides to every battle.

I am a loose
fragment of history.

So does it really
even matter any more.

How could you afford passage--

safe passage out of Poland?

Carl gave me gold.

There was an abundance
of gold in the camp.

Oh, god, no.

Carl had friends in Vienna who
had been members of the Office

for Jewish Emigration
in the '30s.

They still wielded influence.

They knew sponsors
in New York and...

after I'm gone, study
what's in the bag,

the evidence is in
the photographs.

It's in the notes.

Maybe not every diary
inside still has a spine,

but the contents are still
true, and the photographs.

They're not photoshopped.

They're-- you can have
them authenticated.

May I see your mother's diary?

It's in German.

What happened to him?

Who?

Carl, to Carl.

Carl?

Did you ever contact
him after the war?

Stop it.

That's enough.

Six months to live, you
should just kill yourself now.

That's the plan.

But not now, next
week in Oregon.

No, that's not the plan.

I have a friend who knows an
attorney in Dortsmund, Germany

who used to
investigate war crimes.

I'm going to find out what
our next course of action

should be.

Don't be stupid.

Really?

Really, what?

You'd really have me extradited
to Germany for trial?

Germany, Israel, the Hague.

I've never been so certain
of anything in my life

as I am about this.

Think of the cost, Josh.

There is no statute
of limitations.

Are you going to take me
to Nuremberg, to the Hague?

Honey, what do you
think we should do?

I say we pool your folks'
frequent flyer miles, add them

to my mom's miles and our own,
we buy first class tickets

to Norway for the three of us.

Book hotel rooms nearby a
glacier and Viking totems,

and read books with
Nana until God takes her

from us in his own good time.

I'm not even Jewish.

What are you going to do?

I'm going in for a
swim, or to throw up.

Probably just a swim.

You know that's
not what I meant.

Obviously, I'm going to convert.

Shouldn't take more than a week.

Suppose you could convert.

You were going to
wear a hat and a wig

in public so that only
your husband would

be entitled to gaze upon you.

I changed my mind.

Yeah, but someone as enlightened
as you, you did still

consider doing it
and you considered it

because you believe
in God and you're not

even made in God's image.

In my image maybe,
but not in God's.

Your father-in-law
claims he's agnostic.

Playing both sides of the
fence, that's what he said.

That's what the Jews did in
Germany and Russia and Austria,

they played both
sides of the fence.

I was toilet trained
at 2, reading by 4.

At 6 I kissed a boy
and at 8 I fell in love

for the first time.

Life is short.

And I am enlightened.

When you and Josh returned from
Israel from your honeymoon,

you told us you'd
seen a Jewish woman

being stoned for revealing
too much of her shoulders

in some ultra
Orthodox neighborhood

someplace near Tel Aviv.

That was only a year ago.

Was that when you
changed your mind?

The final solution?

Carl said it was the only
way we could win the war.

The Jews were smarter than us.

Their science was stronger.

Not by much but enough.

He was your Svengali.

He saved my life.

So I fled Poland
a pregnant woman.

I took the train to France.

I arrived on the hottest
day in five years.

And the first thing
I went looking for

was a synagogue, to get the
lay of the land, a head start.

I thought God was making
me burn in hell on earth.

That was before I learned
that Jews don't have a hell.

Score one for the Jews.

Despite the heat, my
hands were trembling

when I walked into the temple.

So it was empty, deserted.

Then a little 6 or
7-year-old Orthodox child

came in, walked right past
me as if I didn't exist,

as if I were a ghost,
and he disappeared.

So I followed him.

So he led me to
a sukkah that was

being built for the holiday.

I heard laughing.

I heard singing.

Made me think about my mother.

And I knew then that
I'd survive the trip.

The boat to Greece left from
Marseilles the following day.

The first thing
I put in my mouth

in the United States of America
was a stick of Black Jack gum

that an Orthodox Jewish boy
sold to me on Ellis Island.

Weren't you taking
a huge risk bringing

those photographs, those
diaries back from Germany?

I mean, who was your sponsor?

I left my Nazi armband behind.

Why did you risk it?

Keeping those
photos for 75 years,

you could just as
easily have been

accused of committing crimes
against humanity if they'd

been found, even
without Josh's help.

Why?

The only photograph
I had of my mother?

The only photograph
I had of Carl?

The actual father of my
daughter, my only child.

You don't have to come with me.

Come where?

I'm going with you.

I don't want to be a burden.

Funny.

I'm going.

You're not making a
case for exoneration.

No.

It was war.

You're not even a
Holocaust denier.

I hate that word.

It's a misnomer.

Holocaust.

It's a bastardization
of the English language.

Once you married Moishe--

Jesus.

I remember the
unmistakable naches

in your voice telling us
about your weekly dates

with him to the automat,
to Horn & Hardart.

Your cream cheese on
date-nut bread sandwiches

and butterscotch brownies
and milk trysts at Chock Full

o 'Nuts.

Sorry.

What about when the war ended
and the '50s came, and films

from the liberation of the camps
began to surface, how did that

make you feel?

That I wished we'd won the war.

So that Carl could have
delivered his own daughter.

So that I could have placed
flowers on my mother's grave.

When you hug your
mother tonight or when

Olivia goes into labor
for the first time,

just think about
what I just told you.

It's too bad your
victims couldn't

bask in those sentiments.

It's always the Jews,
always the Jews.

Where's the compassion for the
5 million Germans who died,

or the 15 million Russians, the
400,000 Americans, 3 million

Japanese, 15 million Chinese?

I'm Jewish!

I'm German!

There are no movies of the
liberators raping and murdering

German women.

I'd have been one of those
women, one of those victims,

pregnant or not, with
your grandmother,

had it not been for Carl.

It took a lot less than an hour
to kill a Jew with Zyklon B.

Took a great deal longer
than an hour to gang rape

a German woman,
shoot her six times,

and then leave her
bleeding to death.

You know the Watergate
expression, follow the money?

That's what Germany did.

Until the Jews and
their money abandoned us

and ended World War I
in a blaze of cowardice.

Jews understand money.

They understand
science and medicine,

but they don't
understand politics.

There will never be
a Jewish president.

They don't understand
American anti-Semitism.

Black Americans get it.

Race hatred.

It's ironic.

Initially, it was the Jews who
were the Holocaust deniers,

even when they were
rounded up in the ghettos,

they refused to believe--

Where should they
have gone, Palestine?

America.

Papa never did kiss you
in those places, did he?

Those sexy hidden--

Yes, he did, each and
every night in my dreams.

What are you doing?

I'm going for a walk.

Across the sand?

Be bold.

Josh, your 92-year-old
great grandmother

has terminal cancer.

Fuck you!

This is where I'm supposed to
say he doesn't really mean it,

but I actually think he does.

Dad, what are you doing?

What is this?

My ship coming in.

I was going to call it
"History Refracted."

It's a classic story
of good versus evil.

I'm going to have
to embellish a tad.

Embellish?

I don't believe half
of Nana's story.

She has photographic evidence.

She's paid monthly rentals on
a safe deposit box since 1949.

She has cancer.

She could be cornering
the market on psilocybin

for all we know.

You're going to make
money from this.

As much as humanly possible.

I'm going to make her
a cottage industry.

I want to see her put
on trial in the Hague--

or Nuremberg, if that's
still a thing but somewhere?

You could call your novel,
"How Do You Like Them Apples?"

Too long.

It's got to be
called "The Last."

The last Nazi?

Sure.

But so much else.

Where's Melody?

Bedroom.

She hasn't come out since--

She hasn't come out in two days.

Her birthday's Friday.

I've known that woman
for over three decades.

Every morning and
every evening since we

met, she flossed her teeth,
even when she was sick.

I kissed her this morning
and I was thinking, foreplay?

I tasted a woman
I had never met.

That's how I knew
she hadn't flossed.

Nana, what are you doing here?

Go back to bed.

I was feeling a
little lightheaded.

What are you playing with?

I have an Instagram
account and so

I'm posting some
images, recent ones.

Nana, you're peeking through.

So the thing about being
hospitalized and bedridden

with tubes running in
and out and bags needing

changing and IV fluids
needing replenishing

is one loses one's natural
predisposition towards shyness

and modesty.

It fades.

Who is she?

Hospice worker.

I need to keep nana alive
the full six months.

She's going to pass
away next week.

Pass away.

Kill herself, you mean.

I'll change her mind.

I'm going to guilt
her out of it.

That's why Bethany is here.

Quash any pain that pops
up, prolong her life.

I stayed up all last night
reading "Mein Kampf."

It's persuasive in
certain respects.

You read "The Satanic Bible?"

A lot of it reads
persuasively, too.

I'm an agnostic.

We're all headed in
the same direction.

The most Jewish
person in our family

is the woman who once would
have had a crucifix carved

into her headstone.

Olivia, here's my
lawyer's information.

You're going to need it.

Ha!

A Jewish lawyer.

Did you know him?

Did you meet him?

Hitler?

Yes, Hitler.

No, but I was in
Nuremberg in 1934

and I was at the nighttime
torch rally outside his hotel.

I saw him standing
on the hotel balcony.

I was only eight years old,
but I remember it to this day

vividly.

It was electrifying.

I felt as if I knew
everyone there personally.

'You must be both
peace-loving and strong.'

I had fallen asleep.

I was so tired amidst those
tens of thousands of people.

And when I woke up, I thought
the torches were fireflies,

like lightning bugs.

And those were the
first words I heard.

You must be both
peace-loving and strong.

That's it.

It's vain babblings.

I shouldn't--

I'm sorry.

Forgive me.

And that rotund teenager
you're drawing now?

It's a graphic novel
inspired by true events.

It's not a biography.

My Claire will be a physical
exaggeration, a Nazi anomaly.

My Claire will be riding down
the Totie Fields highway.

Is that in Germany?

Were it only.

I can never come up with a
superhero or a super villain.

Nana is both, ergo.

Is that me?

You?

No, but I could make
you a character.

No, you can't use
Liv's likeness.

Her name is Heldin.

In the latter chapters she
returns to contemporary Germany

to deal with the refugee
problem of the 21st century.

What does Heldin
mean in English?

Heroine.

One million Muslim refugees are
welcomed in, and 99 % of them

are good, decent souls.

That leaves 10,000 bogeymen.

Math is exact.

Terrifying.

Leaves no margin for error.

So this woman will be doing
battle with 10,000 monsters.

Monsters trying to
bring down her homeland.

Don't excoriate me for this.

Consider it war reparations.

This family was
struggling for survival

the first time your Nana
unburdened herself to her kin.

And your mother was still
fresh from a miscarriage--

your sister-- and
she always will be.

Your mother will always
be seeking closure.

Nobody ever finds closure.

It's a myth, like religion.

Sorry, Olivia.

So Nana's found a way to
provide reparations through me.

It's only logical.

She worked at Auschwitz.

She's a mass murderer.

How privileged are we?

We will never again know
an actual mass murderer so

intimately.

Few people ever do.

But through "The Last," your
nana's going to make amends.

She will find ways to atone,
to right 6 million wrongs.

Reparations.

Our black friends
want reparations, too.

Jews went running off
to Israel after the war.

But African-Americans,
descendants of slaves,

they wanted nothing
more to do with Africa

apart from adopting
tongue-twisting African

surnames.

And for wealthy
African-Americans,

a birthright sightseeing trip.

A very expensive safari.

In "The Last" my Jewish
superhero, my Heldin,

will attempt to bring
blacks and Jews together.

So you see it's as much
fiction as it is fact.

I provide the fictions.

Nana provides the facts.

Yeah, European
Jews were cowards.

They abandoned Germany
in World War I.

And the Bolshevik
Jews in America,

they didn't even recognize
what was going on

with their brethren.

What are you picking
on black people for?

Don't worry.

Spoiler alert.

Superhero Nana will
fail in her quest

to unite blacks and
Jews, Asians and Latinos.

Best ending since
"Planet of the Apes."

Native Americans will reclaim
this country for their own.

Talk about your reparations.

I got your vengeance right here.

Your nana's pretty
remarkable, though.

Almost a century old and
a photographic memory.

She can remember
the minutia of 1944,

and she can tell you what
she ate for lunch yesterday.

Nana, Jews weren't
responsible for Germany

losing the first World War.

That train, looks like
something out of 19th century

New Orleans, not
20th century Europe.

I went on a train to Auschwitz.

It was beaten up.

The wooden floorboards, they
were no better than tinder.

But still, it was the
Orient Express compared to--

see, I was imagining
the trains delivering

the Jews were the same as--

it wasn't guilt,
it wasn't shame.

Sanity, maybe.

I don't know.

All I know is that it was one
of the few times in my life

when I felt like I
was out of control.

You know what I learned today?

Israel is the first
country to ban commercials

starring underweight models.

It's number two in the
world in book publishing.

The USB stick is an
Israeli invention.

Israeli women hold more
academic degrees than men do.

Highest concentration of start
ups in the world, outside

of Silicon Valley.

Solar energy water heater
was invented there.

Cherry tomatoes
were invented there.

Auschwitz is now a
tourist attraction.

Josh, even you
went to Auschwitz.

I remember I had so
many questions for you

when you came home.

Ask me now.

Now there's not
nearly enough time.

Maybe I should call
it "The Pious Piper,"

and the Jews will be her rats.

Fear not, it's all allegory.

Dad, please, find someone
else's black sheep.

Harry?

Harry?

I never had bad
dreams, and now I

have every night the
same dream, same dream.

Josh and Olivia have a baby.

Please don't dream
about our baby.

Olivia, are you pregnant?

Soon.

Nana, is Carl dead?

Funny you should mention Carl.

You know, there's
this website that

posits the theory that Carl--

forgive the informality, but
he feels less venal to me

if I refer to him
by his first name--

that Carl, who was shipped off
to Ravensbruck concentration

camp after his
experiments at Auschwitz,

after he made provisions
for your great grandmother

to flee Western Europe, he
was arrested by the Russians

and then later
released when it was

discovered he was the father
of artificial insemination.

And then turned over his
records and his samples,

including the sperm of Herr
Hitler to his Russian captors.

And that's not the fantastical
part of the legend.

That comes when
Russian doctors then

made Carl bring Gretl
Braun, Eva's younger sister,

to communist East
Germany to be inseminated

with her former
brother-in-law's sperm.

An experiment that in
fact produced a child.

And that her name
today is Angela Merkel.

Chilling.

Is that going into
your novel, too?

Chilling but hilarious.

Too imaginative.

My story is poignant
and all too plausible.

Your nana's the real deal.

I'm going to milk her
for everything I can.

I've already got
calls out to friends

at Vanity Fair and People.

I should've mentioned
that earlier.

You don't need the money, dad.

No, I don't, but you never got
anything from your grandparents

and I'm going to make
sure that doesn't

happen to your children.

I'm the only one
in the family who

always laughs at
your little jests,

even when I'm the butt of them.

Now, I know what the expression
I wouldn't want to be there

when the laughter stops means.

Olivia, do you remember on
your birthday two years ago,

I told you that no
one had ever made

my son as happy as you had?

That I'd do anything for you.

I'm doing this for you.

And for Josh.

Why does it have to
be autobiographical?

It's biographical.

And all great writing
is autobiographical

to some extent, even
the best science fiction

is neither all science
nor all fiction.

Dr. Clauberg was a pioneer
in artificial insemination.

Nana.

No, it's the only part of
his comic book that's true.

Answer the question,
is Clauberg even--

I mean, gerontologically
speaking it is possible.

Is Clauberg even dead?

Yes, he's dead.

He died in 1957.

Thirteen years after Auschwitz.

Great fodder for numerologists.

Yeah, and Gretl died in 1987.

Peacefully, no doubt.

There really was a Gretl?

Nazis who survived
their captors, who

survived the Nuremberg
trials and their verdicts,

they all lived long lives.

I would think that
warrants somebody's thesis.

Why do you have Heldin
lurking around each frame?

She's like some spy
in Mad magazine.

What are these little
things she's dropping?

Gooseberries.

Sometimes she sings.

And then there will be no
words in the frame, only

musical notation.

I would like you to help
me with that, Olivia.

Other times, she smuggles
anesthesia into the surgical--

You said the camp was
depleted of anesthesia.

It's all rubbish, Josh.

It's actually an
anesthetic placebo.

Emollient or
psychological warfare.

Everything she does
is out of love.

Josh, don't stop thinking
about me as your family.

So what do you reckon?

Is Nana an anti-hero
or an anti-villain?

I want her out of my house.

I can't sleep while
she's in my house.

I took two Ambien,
I still can't sleep.

I want her out of my house.

Melody, come on,
let's go for a drive.

You outlived your own
daughter by almost 35 years.

You committed infanticide.

35 happy years.

How is that even possible?

My daughter died
of breast cancer.

Of stress.

Stress.

And my father died of
heartbreak, you told me that.

Your father died from
eating too many Pop Tarts.

You need to be fed to the dogs
and have your entrails ripped

from your carcass.

She needs to be tried in a court
of law by a jury of her peers

in Germany or Israel.

She needs to go, Josh.

Melody, come on, now, let's go.

That's perfect.

That's perfect.

Seriously, it was quite
the unexpected summer.

We spent three weeks
in Haifa, Israel,

where I attended a panel
on stochastic music.

I know.

What's stochastic music?

Well, when I was a
student at Columbia,

we used to play blackjack
every Friday night.

Some of the math heads
could count cards.

Pretty well, too.

And some of them were cute.

Very cute.

You girls know what
I'm talking about.

So I devised a cheat,
whereby, I would

reinsert a card we'd already
played back into the shoe.

But this summer, I
learned for the first time

what I had stumbled
onto way back then.

A stochastic process, a
series of random variables.

It has applications
in so many fields--

biology, chemistry, ecology,
computer science, cryptology,

and music.

So I began listening
to the results,

and it's a little
bit mind blowing.

So I'm going to partner
with an MIT professor

to further explore
this process and how

it applies to music to see
if there is an end game that

is important to us.

If anyone wants to assist, if
you have the time, let me know.

Who's that woman?

Pass this around.

I want all cell phones, iPads,
you can't hold onto your PDAs

right down.

I'm serious.

It's not obligatory, but if you
insist on holding onto them,

you'll have to spend the
period in the student lounge.

I'm serious.

That woman's name is Claire... I
don't even know what her last

name is.

She's my great
grandmother by marriage.

She's 92 years old, and
she's complicit in the deaths

by genocide of tens of thousands
of Jews in 1943 and 1944.

And she's directly
implicated herself

in the murders of scores of
Jewish and gypsy children.

Nothing neo about her.

Nothing stochastic about her.

She's an original.

She's singular.

The real McCoy.

She is history.

Was Hitler the worst
human being ever born?

No.

I call bullshit.

Guilty by word but not by deed.

I'm not a philosopher, but--

History refracted.

Hey, how's it going over there?

Where are you now,
you still at school?

Nana's taking a bathroom break.

My kids not so much.

Bathroom breaks, that is.

They're riveted.

And I'm not so sure
that's a good thing.

Where are you?

At school.

Hey, so do you miss anything--

anything at all about
being a Catholic now?

Yeah, one thing, the
pealing of church bells.

It's what first made me
fall in love with music.

That's not even a
Catholic thing, is it?

Baby, why are you
still at school?

I was fairly dark today.

My mood, somber.

And after lunch one
of the kids brought me

an apple dipped in honey
because he said I was sad.

Three years I've been
teaching special needs kids.

I guess today, I was
a special need kid.

Eat it.

You're sad.

I love you.

Hey.

Flavorless, right?

Yeah.

Yeah, my bad.

Where are you going?

See my parents.

No, no, no, no, no,
you're too upset to drive.

I'm not driving.

I don't even know
where my keys are.

Melody?

You were the product
of an unclean man.

An uncircumcised man.

You know,
in my entire life,

I've never seen an
uncircumcised penis.

Did you?

It never occurred to me to
ask you that before now.

Would you have
told me the truth?

I'm in rhapsody with
the music of Israel,

harmonizing with other
voices who support

the vocal talent you gave me.

Mom, when I was
11 years old and I

went to Jewish
sleepaway camp, I got

lost with a couple of
girlfriends, two other campers

in the woods, really lost.

And I had to go to
the bathroom so bad.

And you had so
obsessively admonished me

growing up about washing
my hands after every bowel

movement, cleanliness
is next to--

well, maybe it was next to
the business end of your belt.

Yeah.

Daddy, she did it once.

Not bad, but in
front of my friend?

Where was I?

Oh, yeah, humiliation.

You made me so anal
I soiled myself

while I was running because
I couldn't find a bathroom.

And the thought of
squatting outside

in the middle of nowhere and
taking a dump, of shitting,

and of you finding out and
of me having to tell you I

didn't wash my hands.

We were on our way
to a make out session

with a couple of
other boys from camp

so I couldn't tell my
friends, and I definitely

couldn't tell you, and there
wasn't any toilet paper.

So I called Daddy
and I barked at him

to come get me out of camp.

Daddy came right away with
a clean set of clothes,

even though I had
plenty in my bunk.

And he drove me directly
to the local synagogue

and to Rabbi Fuchsberg, an old
friend of Daddy's, Rabbi Sara

Fuchsberg, so we could
talk about the incident.

And she told me I should
own it, that I should

go right back to camp
and tell everyone

I knew exactly what
had happened to me

and ask them if anything
humiliating had ever

happened to them.

So I did.

Make an unexpected doody, make
some new, unexpected friends.

She actually said that.

So I marched right
back to camp and I

told everyone exactly
what happened,

and I became one of the
most popular kids at camp

in a matter of what
seemed like mere hours.

Good popular.

And I counseled
other kids and it

made me brave enough to
sing in the camp pageant.

Singing in public for the
very first time and all

because I took a
dump in my pants.

So I guess I owe it all to you.

And I wanted you there
so badly to hear me sing.

You and Daddy drove up
and you came backstage.

And I had all this
impeccable stage makeup on.

And you took one look
at my red lipstick

and told me I looked
like a prostitute.

I was still 11 years old.

So the next year when
I got my first period,

I denied you that
information as punishment,

but I couldn't
wait to tell Daddy.

And that betrayal left a hole
in my stomach to this very day.

I betrayed you, Mommy.

But I never soiled
myself ever again.

Then taunting you became
a favorite game of mine.

I would leave the kitchen
faucet running, loud, hard.

You threatened to
put me into therapy.

Then I stopped
flushing the toilet.

You went into therapy.

Then I started really
crushing it at school.

You?

Couples therapy.

Why?

Why, Mom?

I was getting As.

Now I know why.

But why didn't
you confide in me?

Tell me it wasn't my
fault. Worry killed you.

Stress killed you.

Nana killed you.

It wasn't breast cancer.

So who's more
responsible, me, grandma?

I've never written
fiction, ever,

in my life, not even in school.

And I won't start now.

I wrote grandma's
obit eight years ago.

The best writing I've ever done.

Pure,
biographical, family fiction,

as fabricated by--

I gotta remember to add that
little codicil to my byline--

as fabricated by.

Well, I can't write
the real one now.

I won't.

It would take too long
and it might drive me to--

There's such charm and humor
in the story of grandpa's candy

shop and grandma's meat market.

And how they traded
their kiosks the very day

they exchanged rings,
engagement rings.

Lies.

Lies.

Lies.

I read the obit to Harry
once, aloud in our backyard.

I placed a bowl of peaches
on the picnic table.

It was warm, humid.

There were fireflies.

There was so much
love that night.

Harry loves that obit.

Harry loves me.

I could make money penning
a revised obituary,

sell them both to
"The New Yorker."

I always wanted a byline
in "The New Yorker."

In the print edition
of "The New Yorker."

They could run them side by
side, point, counterpoint.

You knew.

You knew.

Who should I tell?

What should I say?

She doesn't even
want to be forgiven.

We can't even bury her here!

What am I supposed
to do about that now?

What were you thinking?

I'm coming back
for you next week.

The only thing I can
keep down is ice cream.

Sorry.

That was never my
desert island food.

That was pizza.

It's very good.

You haven't lost a single
ray of your genius.

But if you move forward with
it, we'll have problems.

Come on.

Take me to bed.

Make love to me.

If we were
conservative Jews, we'd

simply allow her to kill herself
and burn the evidence, right?

You can't erase knowledge.

You can't burn what
we already know.

Time would take care of that.

Do it for us.

We don't tell our children.

We die of old age.

The secret dies with us,
the knowledge, that is.

Then justice isn't
served and dad's cash cow

provides no milk,
and mom continues

to blame God for her
mother's breast cancer.

Josh?

Olivia, may I come in?

Yeah, Mom, come in.

Olivia is just taking a bath.

No.

I'll be uncomfortable.

Today.

This makes you uncomfortable?

You know my
grandmother would never

let my grandfather buy a
Mercedes or a BMW or anything

German.

He was so pissed.

About the war.

It's ironic, huh?

So you're really
escorting her to--

What about you?

Will you go, too?

I can't.

I'm getting
circumcised this week.

Again.

Honey, I was there at your bris.

And you know I gotta tell you
I know there's no foreskin.

No, it's just a drop of blood
that's necessary this time.

Really?

Josh doesn't want to go.

I can understand that.

You'd think keeping
a secret for 75 years

would be life-shortening.

She made it to 92.

She could still make it to 93.

Yeah.

Consider the possibilities.

Like torturing a POW.

3,000 miles to try to
talk her out of it.

So, Olivia, how
does it really feel

to be a member of the most
oppressed tribe of people

in history?

I was looking at the obit I
pre-wrote for Nana earlier.

Now, it will never be printed.

Now, it'll never be read.

And it's the best
writing I've ever done.

You're not going to update it?

I also found the first
obituary you ever wrote.

You, too?

The glue that keeps this family
together is saturated in death.

Mom, don't, please.

Now, Josh was only seven
years old when he wrote this.

Bear that in mind.

The obit is for the
late great Donald Duck.

Mr. Duck is survived by his
nephews Huey, Louis, and Dewey.

Dumbo was supposed
to read the eulogy,

but he couldn't come because
he had an ear infection.

The surprise of the day was
when the ugly duckling arrived,

since Mrs. Duckling
had proposed marriage

to Mr. Duck as a
much younger mallard,

but the proposition
was rejected.

Walt Disney had promised to
engrave Donald's final words

on his headstone
but, sadly, no one

could understand
Donald's final words.

Not even his nephews.

I love you, Josh.

Hey.

Why have you stopped
talking to me?

Olivia?

There's a disdain
for me in your gait.

You've begun
walking ahead of me.

Slow down.

How do you know my
disdain's for you?

How do I know Superman can fly?

Sorry I'm going
to miss the bris.

Piece of cake.

Better be.

Me like cake.

I texted you the address.

Should we expect the feds to
come crashing through the door

just before Nana bites
the poison apple?

Call me.

We still have to figure out
the burial arrangements.

Harry will still
have a story to sell.

Your mom needs you.

I need you.

What if she changes her
mind at the last minute?

Be well.

Be safe, my love.

Be a good Jew.

Take care of that
baby maker for me.

I just wanted a few days by
myself with my own thoughts,

with no thoughts.

I'm cursed with
too many thoughts.

Sorry.

No, no, no.

I want to see a different ocean.

I'm glad you're here.

You know, at first I
thought I didn't want anyone

to watch me die.

But now I wish--

I will call him right now.

No.

He would want you know
what you just told me.

What you just thought.

No, no, no, please don't.

Why, Nana?

Because the three happiest
things in Josh's life

are his family, his
faith, and his Olivia.

And I don't want to
make him unhappy.

And I-- let me out of the car.

Let me out of the car.

OK.

Let me out of the car.

Let me out of the car!

My oncologist said to eat
just a little bit of it...

Ladies and gentlemen, from
the flight deck, First Officer

Rodriguez.

Once again, we have
begun our final descent

into Portland, which means
unfortunately the seat belt

sign's going to have to remain
on for the rest of the flight.

If you're up and
about, I'd like to ask

you to return to your seats
and fasten your seat belts

in preparation for landing.

On-board computer says we're
just about 80 miles northeast

of the airport.

We should be on the ground
in about 10 to 15 minutes.

We'll be parking at Gate B76.

Right now, the weather in
Portland, they've got--

OK.

'Twas noontide of summer,
And mid-time of night;

And stars, in their
orbits, Shown pale,

thro' the light Of the
brighter, cold moon,

'Mid planets her slaves,
Herself in the Heavens,

Her beam on the waves.

I gazed awhile On her
cold smile; Too cold-

too cold for me-

Their pass'd, as a
shroud, A fleecy cloud,

And I turned away to
thee, Proud Evening Star,

In thy glory afar, And
dearer thy beam shall be;

For joy to my heart
Is the proud part

Thou bearest in Heaven at night.

And more I admire
Thy distant fire,

Than that colder, lowly light.

This is the first piece
of jewelry I ever owned.

My father gave it to me
for my eighth birthday.

I want you to have it.

I want you to wear it.

But why wouldn't you
continue to wear it?

It's inappropriate.

OK.

Hello.

This is a sedative.

Calm your belly.

It's not necessary.

Nana.

OK.

Half now and half
after Scrabble.

Nana, did you ever want
to have more children

after you arrived in New York?

Married Papa.

No.

Why?

Well, it took me a few
years to feel safe.

And I already had
one child to protect.

Olivia, how many children
do you plan to have?

Five, maybe six.

Seriously?

I'm really sorry.

I have an Instagram account.

Did I ever tell you that?

Yes, you did.

I don't.

When I came to Oregon last
month for my first appointment,

I spent two days in Portland.

I attended a magic show.

The magician's name was Bill.

Just Bill.

He was a magician
and an escape artist.

Quirky fellow.

I never liked quirky.

After the show, I went
backstage to meet him,

something my mother would
have done in another world,

in another time.

Anyway, I told him
why I'd come to town

and he promised that he
would come here to see me off

when that day came.

And on that day, he would reveal
to me his secrets, his tricks,

about performing.

How's that for distrust?

He said it would be a great
relief to him to finally tell

someone his secrets with the
absolute certainty knowing

that that woman would carry
those secrets to her grave.

Oh, I don't know how
I feel about that.

I've got to let my friends
down at security know

and then Claire.

It's time.

We have to wait
for the magician.

Have you changed your mind?

You still can.

It's all right, you know.

No, it's just that
it's a bit of a shock.

I've never been stood up before.

Sit tight.

I'll be right back.

You don't want to play anymore?

There's a beautiful
yellow meadowlark perched

on the limb of that tree.

I think that's the
state bird of Oregon.

Really?

Well, what time is it?

Maybe Bill will still show
up in the nick of time.

You posted his picture
and some drivel about him

on your Instagram page.

I tracked him down last week.

I told him you weren't
coming to Oregon after all.

What are you talking about?

Vain babblings.

Nana, you really are a coward.

Olivia, stop it!

Listen!

I changed my mind.

I don't want to die.

Think of Josh!

Olivia--

Baby, you OK?

Yes.

Long night.