Hindus Ask Barbra Streisand To Donate Some Gypsy Film Profits To European Gypsy Causes

Hindus have urged Hollywood and pop culture icon Barbra Streisand to donate some percentage of profits from her upcoming musical film Gypsy to European Gypsy causes.

Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that it was a sin to watch European Gypsies (Roma, Travelers) suffer apartheid conditions day after day and not do something about it.

Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, and who frequently takes up European Roma causes, also urged Universal Pictures, Oscar winner screenwriter Julian Fellowes (Gosford Park) and producer Joel Silver connected to this Gypsy film to support the Gypsy causes in Europe.

Rajan Zed stated that shocking maltreatment faced by about 15-million European Gypsy brothers and sisters was a social blight for Europe and the rest of the world as they reportedly regularly faced social exclusion, racism, substandard education, hostility, joblessness, rampant illness, inadequate housing, lower life expectancy, unrest, living on desperate margins, language barriers, stereotypes, mistrust, rights violations, discrimination, marginalization, appalling living conditions, prejudice, human rights abuse, racist slogans on Internet, etc.

This memoir Gypsy, written in 1957, has already been adapted into a Broadway musical (1959), an Oscar nominated film (1962) with Rosalind Russell and Natalie Wood and a television version (1993) with Bette Milder; besides various other Broadway revivals including 2008 with Patti LuPone. Oscar winner Streisand (Funny Girl), 69, besides co-producing this movie, will also play a major role in the project.