It was a heart-wrenching story that bitterly divided Catholics and Jews in Italy and provoked an international scandal more than 150 years ago.
Edgardo Mortara, a Jewish boy from Bologna, was secretly baptized by a maid when he fell ill and then forcibly removed from his family in 1858 at age 6 and raised as a Catholic with the blessing of Pope Pius IX.
Now Academy Award-winning director Steven Spielberg is making a film about the ill-fated battle by Mortara's parents for the return of their son, who eventually became a priest. Oscar Isaac will play the adult Mortara and Mark Rylance has been cast as Pius; Tony Kushner wrote the screenplay.
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