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Pedro Pascal had some choice words to share when asked about the current political upheaval in the US.
The Last of Us actor, 50, made the comments during a press conference for his latest movie Eddington.
The new film from Midsommar director Ari Aster is as a state-of-the-nation comedy that riffs on Covid and cults. Pascal stars alongside Emma Stone and Joaquin Phoenix.
Eddington received a seven-minute standing ovation when it premiered at Cannes Film Festival on Friday (16 May).
Asked whether the cast were concerned about reentering the US after making a film with a strong political message, Pascal replied: “Fear is the way they win. So, keep telling the stories. Keep expressing yourself and keep fighting to be who you are.
“F*** the people that try to make you scared… And fight back. This is the perfect way to do so in telling stories. And don’t let them win.
Earlier in the conference, in footage shared by Variety, Pascal was asked for his thoughts on US president Donald Trump’s approach to immigration, which has seen his administration call on the Supreme Court to let officials cancel humanitarian protections for tens of thousands of people in recent weeks.
“Obviously, it’s very scary for an actor participating in a movie to sort of speak to issues like this,” he acknowledged. “It’s far too intimidating the question for me to really address, I’m not informed enough.”
He continued: “I want people to be safe and to be protected and I want very much to live on the right [side of] history. I’m an immigrant. My parents are refugees from Chile. We fled a dictatorship and I was privileged enough to grow up in the US after asylum in Denmark.
“If it weren’t for that, I don’t know what would have happened to use. I stand by those protections. I’m too afraid of your question. I hardly remember what it was.”
Last month, Barack Obama-appointed District Judge Indira Talwani in Massachusetts temporarily blocked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s order, which would have ended legal status for more than 530,000 people admitted to the program within weeks.
The judge’s order maintained temporarily legal status for roughly 110,300 Cubans, 210,000 Haitians, 93,100 Nicaraguans, and 117,300 Venezuelans.
Ending the program would force targeted immigrants to “choose between two injurious options: continue following the law and leave the country on their own, or await removal proceedings” that put them “at risk of arrest and detention” and effectively kill any chances of “receiving other forms of immigration relief in the future – potentially permanently”, Judge Talwani wrote.
Trump is separately calling on the Supreme Court to let the administration end temporary legal status for roughly 600,000 Venezuelans, after a federal judge warned that Noem’s attempts to cut humanitarian protections for fleeing immigrants will “inflict irreparable harm on hundreds of thousands of persons whose lives, families, and livelihoods will be severely disrupted, cost the United States billions in economic activity, and injure public health and safety in communities throughout the United States”.
Read The Independent’s four-star review of Eddington here.
English (US) ·