Libel by “Buddy Comedy”

From yesterday’s Complaint in Spatz v. Stewart & TheaterMania (S.D.N.Y.):

This is an action for libel per se, and false statements causing special damages. Defendant Zachary Stewart, a theater critic writing for Defendant TheaterMania, authored and published a review of a theatrical production written and presented by Plaintiff. The production was a serious, historically grounded drama confronting the Holocaust, the founding of the State of Israel, the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the tragedy of a miscarriage, and the racially motivated execution of a Black man for loving a white woman. Yet it was deliberately, falsely, and maliciously described that production as a “buddy comedy.” …

Plaintiff believes and therefore alleges that Defendant Stewart’s false and injurious characterization was not an act of good-faith criticism, but rather an act of ideological sabotage, motivated by Stewart’s known and documented hostility toward the State of Israel and the Jewish people, and his sympathies with the Palestinian and Gaza cause….

The Play is, in all respects, a serious drama. It does not contain comedic plot lines, comedic characters, physical comedy, comic timing, comic volley, or any other element associated with the buddy comedy genre or any comedy genre.

Rather, the Play examines, with gravity, emotional depth, and historical fidelity, the following subjects:
(a) The Holocaust—the systematic genocide of six million Jewish people—and its shattering impact on Jewish identity, memory, and historical consciousness as addressed by one of the characters and the death of his wife and two children in Auschwitz;
(b) President Harry Truman’s role in the founding of the modern State of Israel and the political, moral, and historical forces that gave rise to it;
(c) The 1948 Arab-Israeli War, including its causes, conduct, and consequences;
(d) The racially motivated execution of a Black man, Mr. Willie McGee, whose appeal was handled by Bella Abzug in real life. He was put to death for engaging in a loving, consensual interracial relationship with a white woman—an actual historical injustice representing the brutal reality of American racial violence;
(e) A devastating miscarriage suffered by Bella Abzug (one of the referenced “buddies” and Truman’s attorney in the Play) suffered just after the McGee hearing, presented with honesty and emotional weight;
(f) The dropping of two atomic bombs on Japan, three days apart; …

The review is reproduced at pp. 15-17 of the Complaint, and the title is “Review: Truman vs. Israel, the Harry Truman-Bella Abzug Buddy Comedy Nobody Asked For.” I’m pretty skeptical about the case, since in context “buddy comedy” appears to be an opinionated characterization, which can’t be proved true or false. You can read the rest of the review there and see for yourself.

Also, the allegedly false allegation focuses on the qualities of the play, not the qualities of the playwright, so the proper claim would presumably be trade libel, not ordinary defamation. (I oversimplify the inquiry slightly here.) And the headline is a “fair index” of the contents of the article, which is part of the test for libel-by-headline under New York law.