Protesters with Nazi flags march outside community theater production of ‘The Diary of Anne Frank’

A group of masked men were seen waving Nazi flags and shouting antisemitic and racist slurs outside a community theater production of The Diary of Anne Frank Saturday evening in Howell, Michigan.

As dozens of people sat inside the American Legion Post 141 preparing to watch a performance of The Diary of Anne Frank, several people gathered outside, ready to spew hateful rhetoric.

Bobby Brite, a 26-year Army veteran and former post commander, described the audience as “shocked” and “appalled.”

“Everything you would expect,” he told WXYZ.

Brite confronted the group and was met with antisemitic and racist slurs.

The Fowlerville Community Theatre, which put on the production, shared in a statement that “out of an abundance of caution,” they alerted both the audience and cast about the protest outside during the play’s intermission.

“We had 75 people downstairs that watched that play and out of that 75, there were 50 or 60 of them that were afraid to leave this building,” Brite said. “We had to escort them to their cars. No one in America should feel like that.”

Livingston County Sheriff Michael J. Murphy told ABC News the group of protesters left the American Legion’s property when asked, but continued to demonstrate on the opposite side of the road.

“Nothing physical transpired and ultimately the parties involved separated,” Murphy said.

Thankfully, no violence was involved, but Brite still called the rise in hate and hate-filled incidents, a “terrible, terrible thing.”

“I don’t know how we come away from it.”

READ MORE: