‘I converted to Judaism when my son got cancer’
Touching new film tells the story of a father's spiritual journey in search of a deeper connection
Francine Wolfisz is the Features Editor for Jewish News.
Lawrence Vincent won’t ever forget the moment when a doctor told him his filmmaker son Kit, then 24, had a terminal brain tumour. Within seconds of hearing this life-changing news, he dramatically dropped onto the hospital floor with a heart attack. Thankfully he made a full recovery, but Lawrence realised he still had to face the emotional turmoil of handling Kit’s devastating diagnosis.
“Time stood still,” explains Lawrence over a Zoom call from his home in West Lulworth, a little fishing village on the Dorset coast. “In that moment, I had two choices. One was to push on and carry on as normal – or I could accept that something profound was happening and begin to change direction.”
He sought solace by immersing himself in all kinds of new interests – cold-water swimming, birdwatching, abstract painting, growing medicinal cannabis – and even Judaism.
Over the next four years, Lawrence – who was raised in Leeds by a Christian family and once considered himself “quite the opposite” of a religious person – embarked on a deeply spiritual journey that started with a Chabad discussion about the soul and led to his eventual conversion with Bournemouth Reform Synagogue two years ago.
Incredibly, the whole process has been captured on camera by Kit, who also felt compelled to do something in the wake of his diagnosis by documenting how he and his loved ones were coping with the news.
The resulting film, Red Herring, is a touching and at-times surprisingly humorous exploration of how Kit, his parents – who divorced during his childhood – and supportive girlfriend seek to navigate the uncertainty of months and years ahead.
Each reacts to his diagnosis in a different way. There are a few tense moments between Kit and his mother, Julie, with whom he was close as a child but in recent years became more distanced from. We see her preferring to tend to her chickens or home-grown vegetables rather than face Kit’s at-times intimate questions about how she is feeling. He seems puzzled by her reticence, given that as a community nurse for the terminally ill, Julie has more exposure to this scenario than most, but somehow she cannot cope with her own son’s diagnosis.
His girlfriend Isobel is equally reserved about playing out her feelings on camera.
As for Lawrence, being filmed during “my most intimate moments” caused strain between the otherwise close father and son. “I’m just too private, too shy,” he acknowledges, though after time he came to realise how much making this film meant to his son and he began opening up more. That included showing his deepening embrace of Jewish life. In the film we see him donning a kippah, delving into Jewish texts, attending a Chanukah lighting ceremony, dressing up as Einstein for Purim and celebrating his bar mitzvah.
So what was it about Judaism that particularly chimed for Lawrence, a former principle of Bournemouth and Poole College? “I’m an academic, so when I’m in pain I read and study,” he explains. “I already had a knowledge of the world’s religions, but I decided I needed a deeper connection in everyday life.
“So I got my books out and the more I got into ancient Jewish philosophy, the more I became intoxicated by it, particularly all the human values of compassion, justice and kindness.”
As the film goes on, we see Lawrence’s commitment to becoming Jewish, culminating in him learning Hebrew and reading from the Torah at his bar mitzvah, with a smiling Kit looking on proudly at his father.
Lawrence chose the Hebrew name Ezra on his conversion, because “he was a learned scribe and I like to think I’m that as well”.
He smiles. “I feel Jewish now, but I’ve always felt Jewish. I was brought up in the Jewish quarter of Leeds and my father always spoke very highly of Jewish people.”
In a strange twist of fate, Lawrence reveals he was not the only one in his family who felt his connection to the tribe – and with good reason. After the film was completed, his ex-wife Julie, who was adopted, looked into her birth family and discovered she is in fact Jewish. So too then are Lawrence and Julie’s three children, including Kit.
He laughs: “My rabbi says there’s no such thing as a coincidence.”
Since the revelation, Kit is “proud to have found out” but is “not embracing a Jewish life as such”.
Kit’s sister Maya, however, is. “She always wanted to be Jewish and then she finds out she is.” Lawrence smiles at the unexpected irony, adding that his daughter comes over for Friday night dinner and goes to synagogue with him.
Judaism has impacted his life in many religious and cultural ways, but for Lawrence it also brought comfort at a moment when the rest of his life had been upended by Kit’s diagnosis.
“It broadened my thinking really as to these things which cannot be controlled, that these things can happen in life at any time.”
For now, Kit is doing well and “his health is far better than any of us could have hoped,” though there is always anxiety for the family ahead of the results of his latest scan. “I’m doing a lot of work to avoid living my life where all I do is count down the clock to the next scan.”
As for the release of Red Herring, Lawrence says he feels a “strange mixture of pain and pride” whenever he watches his son’s “remarkable piece of work”, and despite his initial reservations he is ultimately glad to have shown his journey towards a more meaningful life.
“Becoming Jewish helped me to connect with the things that matter,” he reflects. “It’s taught me to not get too far ahead of myself and to accept that I can’t control what is out of my control.”
Red Herring is in select cinemas and on demand from 3 May
Thank you for helping to make Jewish News the leading source of news and opinion for the UK Jewish community. Today we're asking for your invaluable help to continue putting our community first in everything we do.
For as little as £5 a month you can help sustain the vital work we do in celebrating and standing up for Jewish life in Britain.
Jewish News holds our community together and keeps us connected. Like a synagogue, it’s where people turn to feel part of something bigger. It also proudly shows the rest of Britain the vibrancy and rich culture of modern Jewish life.
You can make a quick and easy one-off or monthly contribution of £5, £10, £20 or any other sum you’re comfortable with.
100% of your donation will help us continue celebrating our community, in all its dynamic diversity...
Engaging
Being a community platform means so much more than producing a newspaper and website. One of our proudest roles is media partnering with our invaluable charities to amplify the outstanding work they do to help us all.
Celebrating
There’s no shortage of oys in the world but Jewish News takes every opportunity to celebrate the joys too, through projects like Night of Heroes, 40 Under 40 and other compelling countdowns that make the community kvell with pride.
Pioneering
In the first collaboration between media outlets from different faiths, Jewish News worked with British Muslim TV and Church Times to produce a list of young activists leading the way on interfaith understanding.
Campaigning
Royal Mail issued a stamp honouring Holocaust hero Sir Nicholas Winton after a Jewish News campaign attracted more than 100,000 backers. Jewish Newsalso produces special editions of the paper highlighting pressing issues including mental health and Holocaust remembrance.
Easy access
In an age when news is readily accessible, Jewish News provides high-quality content free online and offline, removing any financial barriers to connecting people.
Voice of our community to wider society
The Jewish News team regularly appears on TV, radio and on the pages of the national press to comment on stories about the Jewish community. Easy access to the paper on the streets of London also means Jewish News provides an invaluable window into the community for the country at large.
We hope you agree all this is worth preserving.
