Steven Spielberg’s Righteous Persons Foundation, founded in 1994 with the bulk of the profits from Schindler’s List, has awarded over $160 million to projects that preserve Jewish heritage and foster inter‑cultural dialogue.
The idea crystallised when Spielberg, after seeing the global impact of his 1993 film, decided to channel every dollar he earned from it into a charitable organisation. He announced the move in August 1994, and the foundation’s first grants focused on Holocaust education and support for American Jewish communities.
Over the past three decades the foundation has broadened its scope, backing arts, culture, documentary filmmaking and media projects aimed at building understanding between diverse groups. The Media Fund for Co‑existence, seeded with $5 million from profits of Munich (2005), has financed initiatives such as the Arab Labor sitcom and the Israel Story radio‑podcast.
Funding has flowed to both well‑established institutions and emerging projects seeking new ways to engage audiences with history and contemporary social issues. The cumulative grant total now exceeds $160 million, with a significant share earmarked for outreach to younger generations and for fostering dialogue across religious and cultural divides.
In 2024 the foundation committed $30 million over six years to the USC Shoah Foundation’s endowment, an independent institute that records and preserves Holocaust survivor testimonies. The grant is earmarked to expand recording opportunities for survivors and liberators, and to strengthen the foundation’s educational programmes, ensuring that these voices remain accessible to future generations.