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Matthew Broderick, the actor who shot to fame as Ferris Bueller in the 1986 film, has said he’s nervous to bring up politics with both his friends and passing strangers in the current global climate.
The Ferris Bueller’s Day Off star, now 63, admitted he’s reluctant to discuss politics at any dinner parties he attends in New York in case other guest’s views differ from his own.
Broderick showed support for the Democratic party in the 2020 presidential election, with his wife, Sex and the City actor Sarah Jessica Parker, 60, publicly endorsing Kamala Harris in 2024.
Speaking to Jessie and Lennie Ware on their Table Manners podcast, Broderick said it’s “scary” bringing up politics at dinner parties because the “feelings are so...” before trailing off.
“In New York, we’re all the same,” he said of the area where Harris beat Donald Trump by a narrow margin of 12 per cent in 2024 and Joe Biden beat the Republican by 23 points in 2020.
“Every now and again, someone isn’t the same [as you] and you don’t want them to feel horrible,” Broderick said.
Broderick also told a story to illustrate how cracking jokes with people, even if they may share the same views as you, is now more risky.
This March, Trump upended the US’s trade relationships and introduced sweeping import taxes on goods from America’s biggest trading partners: Mexico, China, and Canada (as well as the UK, leaving Prime Minister Keir Starmer scrambling for a deal).
In the wake of the tariffs, Canadians began a Trump-inspired US travel boycott, with 35 per cent fewer Canadians driving to the US compared to April last year, and 20 per cent fewer flying to the country.
Fewer Americans also traveled to Canada last month, with car trips decreasing 11 per cent and air travel 6 per cent, Statistics Canada data showed.
“We were at a baseball game and there was a guy with a Canada hat,” said Broderick. “I love Canada and I said, ‘I wonder if they’re still going to let us into Canada with the big tariffs.’
The man did not take Broderick’s “crack about tariffs” well: “The guy said, ‘I understand them but there’s a better way to say it,’ like, he wouldn’t have been mad if it had been said more nicely, I guess,” he said.
Broderick continued: “That’s the kind of thing that happens [now]... We had a long subway ride [home] jammed face to face.”
English (US) ·