Sean Penn goes off on the Will Smith Oscars altercation, noting that he too slapped someone and was jailed for it

Sean Penn is an Oscar-winning actor and director, and over the last few years, he has seen himself as a bit of a global policy advocate, raising funds for earthquake-struck Haiti, infamously meeting with drug lord El Chapo, and even traveling to war-torn Ukraine to support President Zelenskyy.

In a new interview with Variety, he takes his reputation as one of Hollywood’s most outspoken and eyebrow-raising figures three times around the dancefloor. In the piece, he gives his unfiltered opinions on *checks notes* AI hypothetically sexually assaulting women, how he could have changed 9/11, President Zelenskyy, and the Will Smith-Chris Rock Oscars altercation.

To put it mildly, the interview is bonkers.

In the Variety interview, when the topic of Will Smith’s Oscar slap comes up, the “Mystic River” star says, “I don’t know Will Smith. I met him once. He seemed very nice when I met him. He was so f***ing good in King Richard.”

He continued, "So why the f*** did you just spit on yourself and everybody else with this stupid f***ing thing? Why did I go to f***ing jail for what you just did? And you’re still sitting there? Why are you guys standing and applauding his worst moment as a person?"

In 1986, Penn was charged with assaulting two photographers, per The LA Times . In 1987, Penn was sentenced to 60 days in county jail after punching a movie extra and then in 2010 when he was sentenced to three years of probation for attacking another photog.

In addition, it must be said that allegations have dogged Penn for decades that, whilst married to pop queen Madonna, he physically and sexually assaulted her in 1988. Gawker has done an in-depth dive into the allegations, which aggregate several interviews with both Penn and Madonna, seemingly confirming certain details of the incident, including that she fled the house, stumbled into the Sheriff's office, clearly beaten, and asked to press charges. Police came to their home, but Madonna eventually asked that all charges be dropped.

It is important to note that in 2015, Madonna signed a sworn affidavit denying that her husband ever assaulted her, but with the mountain of evidence from 1988 to the contrary, including previous interviews with the pair and with police enforcement who dealt with the case, and a police report, many are finding Penn’s comments about Will Smith to be hypocritical and ridiculous.

The Variety interview doesn’t end there. Of his impression of Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, he curiously says, “His brain is fully oxygenated. His eyes are clear and he’s warm. I knew I’m either going to feel nothing or I’m going to let myself love him.” 

Ummmmmm, okay.

He also says that, because of the Will Smith altercation, he wants to melt down his Oscars and give them to Zelenskyy. “I thought, well, f**k, you know? I’ll give them to Ukraine. They can be melted down to bullets they can shoot at the Russians.” 

“I told him to keep it and bring it to Malibu after all this is over and his country is safe,” he says, admitting that he already gave one to Zelenskyy. 

But wait, there’s more. Doing his best Mark Wahlberg impression, he shockingly has the hubris to assert that he could have changed the course of 9/11.

“I’d have let White House counsel know that they are on vacation. I’m not consulting with them. If I have to go to prison, I’ll go, but I’m going to kill them,” he said. “I’m killing everyone that did this. But only them. And we know where the f**k they are.”

One of the most head-scratching momemts of the interview involves his vocal support for the SAG-AFTRA strikes, saying that the studio’s use of AI is wrong, but how he turns that into the sexual assault of women is… something. 

“So you want my scans and voice data and all that. OK, here’s what I think is fair: I want your daughter’s, because I want to create a virtual replica of her and invite my friends over to do whatever we want in a virtual party right now. Would you please look at the camera and tell me you think that’s cool?” 

What – and we cannot stress this enough – the actual eff?

He then goes on a bizarre rant about those who criticize his involvement in the Ukrainaian war, saying, “‘Don’t encourage these Ukrainians or support them to win this thing we all say we stand for because you might create problems for us that are nuclear.’ It’s saying, ‘OK, I’ll be your bitch. You want my daughter as your sex slave?’”

WHAT WHAT WHAT?

Read the entire Variety interview here.