George Clooney has always been one of those “bleeding heart liberals” you hear through the gin-saoked spittle of right wing t.v. and radio personalities. Raised in Kentucky, Clooney’s family has always been left-leaning liberals. He’s has supported humanitarian causes and Democratic political candidates and organizations for most of his adult life. In an interview with The Daily Beast’s Marlow Stern, published on Friday, Clooney is asked a wide-ranging set of political and social questions, and does not hold back one bit. He talks about Hillary Clinton’s campaign faults and the obstacles she faced, he touches on the Confederate Flag and how as a child growing up in Kentucky it didn’t occur to him what the flag actually symbolized—but how any adult should understand it only symbolizes “hate.” When being asked about Steve Bannon, Clooney—who has been publicly and sufficiently hostile to Bannon to deserve his own Daily Kos account—had these choice things to say.
Steve Bannon is a pussy. Steve Bannon is a little wannabe writer who would do anything in the world to have had a script made in Hollywood. He wrote one of the worst scripts I’ve ever read—and I’ve read it. His fake Shakespeare-rap script about the L.A. riots. Oh, you’ve gotta read it! It’s just fuckin’ terrible. But here’s the truth: if Steve Bannon had Hollywood say, “Oh, this is really great, and a really good script,” and had they made his movie, he’d still be in Hollywood writing his fuckin’ movies and kissing my ass to be in one of his fuckin’ films! That’s who he is. That’s the reality. It’s almost like someone in Hollywood should’ve given him a script—or approved one of his scripts—just to keep him out of the right wing.
If you want to learn more about Steve Bannon’s failed script you can read about it over at Daily Kos community member ursulafaw’s account of the project. When Marlow asked Clooney about the right wing, and Trump’s use of Hollywood as the poster child for “coastal elitism,” Clooney broke things down in the kind of beautiful Shakespearian monologue Steve Bannon wishes his decrepit lack of inspiration could grasp.
Here’s the thing: I grew up in Kentucky. I sold insurance door-to-door. I sold ladies’ shoes. I worked at an all-night liquor store. I would buy suits that were too big and too long and cut the bottom of the pants off to make ties so I’d have a tie to go on job interviews. I grew up understanding what it was like to not have health insurance for eight years. So this idea that I’m somehow the “Hollywood elite” and this guy who takes a shit in a gold toilet is somehow the man of the people is laughable.
People in Hollywood, for the most part, are people from the Midwest who moved to Hollywood to have a career. So this idea of “coastal elites” living in a bubble is ridiculous. Who lives in a bigger bubble? He lives in a gold tower and has twelve people in his company. He doesn’t run a corporation of hundreds of thousands of people he employs and takes care of. He ran a company of twelve people! When you direct a film you have seven different unions all wanting different things, you have to find consensus with all of them, and you have to get them moving in the same direction. He’s never had to do any of that kind of stuff. I just look at it and I laugh when I see him say “Hollywood elite.” Hollywood elite? I don’t have a star on Hollywood Boulevard, Donald Trump has a star on Hollywood Boulevard! Fuck you!
I will paraphrase Mr. Clooney’s answer to the right wing hypocrisy machine: Fuck you. Fuck you very much.