Guilty Pleasures
By Associated Press
Sean Penn accuses Academy Awards of cowardice at Marrakech
Film Festival
MARRAKECH, Morocco | Sean Penn on Tuesday blasted the organizers of the Oscars for being cowards who, in effect, limit the kinds of films that can be funded and made.
The 64-year-old actor said at the Marrakech Film Festival that he gets excited about the Academy Awards only on the rare occasion that films he values are nominated.
“The producers of the academy have exercised really extraordinary cowardice when it comes to being part of the world of expression and, in fact, have largely been part of limiting the imagination and limiting different cultural expressions,” Penn said at the festival, where he received a career achievement award this week.
“I don’t get very excited about what we’ll call the Academy Awards,” he said, noting exceptions when certain films grace the ceremony, including Sean Baker’s “ The Florida Project,” Walter Salles’ “I’m Still Here” and Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Perez.”
Penn’s remarks dovetail with longstanding criticisms of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for lacking diversity within the ranks of its members and the films that they celebrate with awards.
It has in recent years taken steps to reform and rebrand itself, but has faced criticism for not going far enough. The academy did not immediately respond to request for comment on Tuesday.
Penn also lauded Iranian-Danish director Ali Abassi and his latest film “ The Apprentice “ about President Donald Trump. It faced difficulty finding an American distributor in the lead-up to the U.S. election in November.
“It’s kind of jaw-dropping how afraid this ‘business of mavericks’ is when they get a great film like that with great, great acting,” he said. “They, too, can be as afraid as a piddly little Republican congressman.”
As part of a career tribute, the Marrakech Film Festival is screening four of Penn’s films this week in Morocco’s tourism capital. Local media in Morocco reported several audience members exiting a screening of “Milk” during a scene that depicted two men in bed. Homosexuality is illegal under Morocco’s penal code, although cases are not frequently prosecuted.
The actor, whose 2023 film “ Superpower “ documents war in Ukraine, also voiced support for President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and called himself a “patriot in crisis” in response to a question about the American political landscape.
Kendrick Lamar and SZA announce 2025 North American stadium tour
NEW YORK | “Not Like Us,” it’s like them — Kendrick Lamar and SZA will hit the road together in 2025.
On Tuesday morning, Lamar and SZA announced the Grand National Tour, which will hit 19 stadiums across North America next spring and summer.
The news arrives less than two weeks after Lamar released his latest album, “GNX,” which features SZA on two tracks: “Luther” and the closer “Gloria.” In a review, AP described the album as leaning into the same creativity-juicing pride, self-righteous anger and supreme confidence that fueled the Grammy-nominated “Not Like Us” and won his feud with Drake: “I kill ‘em all before I let ‘em kill my joy.”
The tour kicks off on April 19 in Minneapolis, then hits Houston; Arlington, Texas; Atlanta; Charlotte, North Carolina; Philadelphia; East Rutherford, New Jersey; Foxborough, Massachusetts; Seattle; Los Angeles; Glendale, Arizona; San Francisco; Las Vegas; St. Louis; Chicago; Detroit; Toronto; Hershey, Pennsylvania; and Washington.
Tickets go on sale Friday. A presale for Cash App Visa Card holders will launch Wednesday.
Artist Jasleen Kaur wins Turner Prize for work exploring her Scottish Sikh identity
LONDON | An artist whose work exploring her Scottish Sikh identity includes a vintage Ford car draped in a crocheted doily won the U.K.’s prestigious Turner Prize on Tuesday.
Jasleen Kaur was awarded the $32,000 prize by actor James Norton during a ceremony at the Tate Britain gallery in London, where works by the four finalists are on display until February.
A jury led by Tate Britain director Alex Farquhar praised the way 38-year-old Kaur “weaves together the personal, political and spiritual” through “unexpected and playful combinations of material.”
Her winning exhibition mixes sculpture, print, everyday items – including family photos, a Ford Escort car and the popular Scottish soda Irn Bru — and immersive music to reflect on her upbringing in Glasgow’s Sikh community.
Three other finalists – Pio Abad, Claudette Johnson and Delaine Le Bas – received $12,670 each.
Named for 19th-century landscape painter J.M.W. Turner and founded in 1984 to reward young artists, the prize helped make stars of shark-pickling artist Damien Hirst, potter Grayson Perry, sculptor Anish Kapoor and filmmaker Steve McQueen.
But it has also been criticized for rewarding impenetrable conceptual work and often sparks debate about the value of modern art, with winners such as Hirst’s “Mother and Child Divided,” which consists of two cows, bisected and preserved in formaldehyde, and Martin Creed’s “Lights On and Off” — a room with a light blinking on and off – drawing scorn from sections of the media.
In 2019, all four finalists were declared winners after they refused to compete against one another, “to make a collective statement in the name of commonality, multiplicity and solidarity.”
In 2021, all five finalists were collectives rather than individual artists.
The award was initially open to artists under 50 but now has no upper age limit.
—From AP reports
