Paul Laverty, Cannes Jury’s Harsh Attack on Hollywood: Shame on You

According to the Life of Media, Paul Laverty ended the Cannes Film Festival’s press conference by attacking Hollywood for boycotting actors like Susan Sarandon who spoke out against the war in Gaza

Oscar-winning actress Susan Sarandon, whose character in “Thelma & Louise” is on the official poster for the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, lost her Hollywood representation last February after publicly calling for a ceasefire in Gaza

Laverty said at the end of the press conference: “Can I just make a little point? The Cannes Film Festival has a great poster.Yes, and isn’t it interesting to see some of them, like Susan Sarandon, Javier Bardem, Mark Ruffalo, being boycotted for their views on the killing of women and children in Gaza? Shame on those people in Hollywood who do that. I have complete respect and solidarity with them. They are the best of us, I am proud of them”

“I was fired by my agency specifically for the march and the comments about Gaza and for calling for a ceasefire,” Sarandon said in Spain earlier this year, according to the Guardian, before receiving the Goya International Lifetime Achievement Award

“It became impossible for me to even be on TV. I don’t know if that has changed recently. I couldn’t do any big movies or anything related to Hollywood. I finally got agents in England and Italy and I work there.I recently did a film in Italy and had a play at the Old Vic Theatre for a few months. I know the Italian director who just hired me, they told him not to hire me, but he refused”

Earlier in the meeting, Laverty quoted Shakespeare and referred to the famous line from King Lear: “It is the bane of the times when madmen lead the blind”

Paul Laverty is an Irish screenwriter who rose to fame for his collaboration with Ken Loach on the Palme d’Or-winning films The Wind in the Grass (2006) and I, Daniel Blake (2016)