- Ari Aster’s Eddington receives 7-minute ovation in Cannes
- Pedro Pascal tells journalists he’s not afraid of re-entering the U.S.
- “**** the people who try to make you scared”
Pedro Pascal had a powerful message to share during the Cannes press conference for Ari Aster’s new film Eddington last night.
The actor opened up about the political climate under the second Trump administration and his own experiences of immigration.
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Eddington stars Pascal alongside Joaquin Phoenix, Emma Stone and Austin Butler, and premiered to a standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival that lasted seven minutes.
The film, which openly criticizes the MAGA movement, is set in May 2020, during COVID-19 and revolves around a standoff between a small-town sheriff (Phoenix) and a progressive New Mexico mayor (Pascal).
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During the press conference, emotions were running high. When the cast were asked if they had any concerns about re-entering the U.S. after making the film, Pascal told journalists bluntly: “**** the people who try to make you scared.”
Pedro Pascal is fighting the good fight
Pascal urged everyone to stand strong and resist fear through the power of storytelling, saying: “Keep telling the stories, keep expressing yourself and keep fighting to be who you are”
He added: “**** the people that try to make you scared, you know? And fight back. This is the perfect way to do so in telling stories. And don’t let them win.”
The Gladiator II actor also spoke candidly about Trump’s immigration policies, drawing from his own personal experience.
“Obviously, it’s very scary for an actor participating in a movie to sort of speak to issues like this. It’s far too intimidating the question for me to really address, I’m not informed enough,” he said.
Pascal shared how he and his parents escaped a dictatorship and found safety thanks to Danish asylum protections before growing up in the U.S.
He said: “I want people to be safe and to be protected, and I want very much to live on the right 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 U.S. after asylum in Denmark. If it weren’t for that, I don’t know what would have happened to us. I stand by those protections. I’m too afraid of your question, I hardly remember what it was.”
Pascal “had to be part of” the film
Reflecting on the themes of Edington, Pascal revealed that after reading the script he “had to be part of” it.
He said: “It felt like the first time that we had a mole, like a whistleblower almost, someone from the inside being like, ‘This is what’s happening.’”
“And that was really powerful to me, and I don’t think I understood that until I saw it,” he added.
Speaking about his inspiration for Eddington, director Aster said he wrote the film “in a state of fear and anxiety about the world.”
“I wanted to show what it feels like to live in a world where nobody can agree on what is real anymore,” he said.
“Over the last 20 years, we’ve fallen into this age of hyper-individualism. That social force that used to be central in liberal mass democracies – and agreed upon vision of the world – that is gone now. COVID felt like the moment where that link was finally cut for good. I wanted to make a film about what America feels like, to me. I’m very worried.”
Although Eddington was filmed during the Biden presidency, it’s being released during Trump’s administration.
It hits theaters on 18 July – watch the trailer below: