Media mogul Shari Redstone's new venture seeks to tell authentic stories about Israel

Billionaire says work with documentary about Nova music festival massacre led her to see that Israeli production company is aligned with family foundation to combat antisemitism

NEW YORK — Shari Redstone’s exit from the media world was decidedly brief.

Within a month of the sale of the family’s stake in Paramount Global, Redstone in September was named chair of the Israeli entertainment company Sipur, whose projects match the media mogul’s passion for telling stories that authentically portray Israel.

“There is a side of Israel people don’t know,” Redstone said at the Reuters NEXT conference in New York on Wednesday. “My dad always said, ‘Content is king.’ I always say content creates conversation that leads to change.”

Redstone’s father, billionaire media mogul Sumner Redstone, died at age 97 in 2020.

Shari Redstone said the studio initially approached her as its “last stop” in an effort to fund the documentary “We Will Dance Again,” about the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel.

Thousands of young people were partying in the dawn hours of October 7, 2023, when armed Hamas terrorists swept in and shot, bludgeoned, or burned to death 360 people, while sexually assaulting some. The attack, part of the Hamas-led invasion of southern Israel that killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, triggered the Gaza war as Israel fought to wipe out Hamas. A US-brokered ceasefire largely halted the fighting in October this year.

The film won the Outstanding Current Affairs Documentary at the 46th Annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards in June this year.

Through her involvement with the film project, Redstone came to recognize the studio’s storytelling as aligned with the philanthropic efforts of the Redstone Family Foundation, which works to combat racism and antisemitism through education.

Sipur is able to tap into Israel’s fertile creative community, developing a rich slate of film and television offerings, including the Netflix series “Bad Boy,” and an Israeli romantic comedy, “Noa,” featuring pop stars Noa Kirel and Agustin Bernasconi.

The company, whose name means “story” in Hebrew, has developed a business model of producing modestly budgeted shows, financed in partnership with international backers.

“In spite of the fact that people kind of want to boycott [Israeli] content, I actually believe that having this content out there can lead to conversations,” said Redstone. “It can bring people together.”