Billy Bob Thornton Talks Hollywood, Politics With Joe Rogan

Actor Billy Bob Thornton is one of many who believes celebrities should stick to talking about entertainment and stay out of politics.

The 70-year-old star said as much during a recent appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, referencing Ricky Gervais’ infamous monologue at the 2020 Golden Globes.

“It’s like Ricky Gervais said … ‘Look, come up here, accept your little award, and f*** off.’ First of all, unless you’ve really studied stuff and know about a subject fully, who the hell would want to listen to a musician or an actor talk about politics?” Thornton said. “It’s like, ‘Are we supposed to follow this?’ If we are, what if they lead you down the wrong road?’”

The “Sling Blade” actor went on to describe himself as a “radical moderate.”

“I’m very strong in my opinions, but my opinions don’t belong to any political party. I just look at what makes sense, and I think we need a common sense party in this country. That’s actually what I think we need. Just figure it out. It’s pretty easy to figure out what this is all about.”

Thornton also said he doesn’t really “care about awards anymore,” because he’s “got plenty of them” and had won those “under the wire, when awards were kind of real still.”

“I’ve won a couple recently,” the actor added. “But these days I just look at it as like, ‘Oh, OK, we’re gonna go over here and, you know, have some dry chicken breast and green beans, you know, and we’ll listen to people get up there and pontificate about how awesome they are.’”

Thornton said awards show stages should not become soapboxes for bringing awareness to different causes, either.

“There is a time and place for that,” he said, adding that at awards shows, “you should just stick to what it is.”

“Don’t go up there and talk about saving the badgers in Wisconsin or something, you know what I’m saying?” he told Rogan. “And people would argue and say, ‘Well, no, because I have a voice and because everybody knows me. This is a great platform for me to put this out there.’”

“Well, how about this? If you have a billion dollars, and you want to save the badgers, f***ing save them,” he added. “I mean, you got plenty of money to save the badgers, trust me. That is not, that’s barely gonna cut into your budget.”