Laurence Dollimore
RICHARD Gere has branded Donald Trump a ‘thug’ and a ‘bully’ while accepting his award at the ‘Spanish Oscars’ in Granada.
The Pretty Woman star, 75, was picking up his International Goya at the Palacio de Congresos on Saturday night when he launched his verbal attack.
It comes after he moved to Madrid with his 41-year-old wife Alejandra Silva last year.
Gere told the crowd: “I’m coming from a place now… we’re in a very dark place in America, where we have a bully and a thug, who is the president of the United States.”
He paused as the crowd of Spanish stars began applauding.
He continued: “But it’s not just in the US, it’s everywhere… I read a really moving letter in the New York Times by a gentleman in Hungary, and he said it’s a slippery slope as to how this happens everywhere, authoritarianism takes us all over.
“We have to be vigilant, we have to be alert, we have to be energetic, we have to be brave, we have to be courageous, and everyone who is watching in the Spanish-speaking world and elsewhere, we have to be willing to stand up, tell the truth, be honest.
“There’s a place in all of our lives for basic kindness, for basic love and understanding, and to embrace each other.”
The International Goya was first awarded in 2022 with the previous three winners being Cate Blanchett, Juliette Binoche, and Sigourney Weaver.
It was created to recognise personalities who contribute to cinema as an art that unites cultures and spectators from around the world.
The Goya jury said it awarded Richard Gere for ‘his extraordinary contribution to cinematographic art, starring in some of the most iconic films in the history of cinema, and his social commitment developed over decades’.
Days of Heaven, An Officer and Gentleman, American Gigolo, and The Cotton Club are some of the other movies that Gere has starred in.
He received the International Goya in a year that marks the 50th anniversary of his debut on the big screen.
Over 30 years ago, he founded the Gere Foundation to channel his intense activism in favour of Tibet’s independence and the preservation of Tibetan culture championed by the Dalai Lama.
Gere has been a practising Buddhist since he since he was twenty years old and has also supported the rights of indigenous peoples, refugees and the homeless.
His foundation also supports an ambitious natural conservation project, Sierra a Mar, in Mexico.
