On the sidelines of the 73e Berlinale, where he presents his documentary “Superpower”, the actor-director returned to an improbable anecdote involving the Russian president.
By Philippe Guedj
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Dyears an interview granted this Thursday to The Independent, Sean Penn remembered a memory as improbable as it was painful in his eyes: a car trip with Vladimir Putin and Jack Nicholson, in 2001, in Moscow. At the time, the two actors had made the trip to present his feature film The Pledge at the city’s international film festival. After the screening, the duo was taken with the Russian president in a convoy en route to the dacha of director Nikita Mikhalkov (one of Putin’s most fervent supporters), where a party was being held.
Sean Penn describes the trip in these terms: “We knew that Putin was going to be the guest of honor, we accepted the invitation. They were driving at breakneck speed, not paying attention to the danger that this could represent in the villages we were passing through. When farmers tried to pass with their cart, the security people in our vehicle would lean out of the window and beat them with sticks. It was unnecessarily aggressive. »
A “bad feeling”
Calling Putin a “sinister little strike” in the columns of The Independent, Sean Penn says he kept a “bad feeling” from this trip, during which Putin would also have congratulated Nicholson for his role in Flight over a cuckoo’s nest. In return, according to an article published at the time in the site pagesix.com and picked up by The Guardian, Jack Nicholson would have discussed with the Russian president the possibility of entrusting him with a future position as a producer.
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Way back in time! Sean Penn has just presented, in preview at 73e berlin film festival, his documentary Superpowerabout the Russian invasion of Ukraine and in the context of which the actor-director met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.