Sarandon: Speaking out because she can

Uninvited by the United Way, Susan Sarandon talks about her surprise over the controversy and explains her obligation to give a voice to worthy causes.

By DAVE SCHEIBER, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 10, 2003

[AP photo] Susan Sarandon flashes the peace sign as she arrives at the 75th annual Academy Awards in Los Angeles.

Susan Sarandon was vacationing with longtime partner and fellow actor Tim Robbins in Mexico two weeks ago, when she learned of the storm swirling far to the east on the other side of the Gulf.

She was stunned to find herself in the eye of it.

"We kept seeing all these little bits and pieces in Spanish," she says. "I'd get the newspaper and have to get somebody to translate it for me. And I'd see my picture in the paper, and I'd say, 'What's happening now?' "

What happened is well-known to residents in the Tampa Bay area: The Academy Award-winning actor and social activist was un-invited by the United Way to speak at a $75-a-plate women's leadership event in Tampa after the organization received three dozen complaints from donors about her antiwar stance.

Sarandon would have been in town Friday, the featured speaker at a forum designed to promote volunteerism.

Instead, she spoke by phone two days ago from her New York City office about her feelings surrounding the turn of events: the decision by Robin Carson, chairwoman of the United Way of Tampa Bay board, to scrap the event because Sarandon's presence could prove "divisive," followed by the resignation of a board member -- Marty Petty, executive vice president of the St. Petersburg Times, a major sponsor of the program -- and a wave of sharply worded letters to the editor on both sides of the controversy.

"It was really quite shocking, because it was such a small, kind of humble venue that had nothing to do with the war," says Sarandon, 56. "And I had specifically said I wasn't even going to be giving a speech. I just wanted to do a Q&A. I wanted to talk with the women there. It was about grass-roots activism and the importance of being involved in your community. I think I was there because of my experience in hunger and housing and education in this country.

"I guess it's flattering that they felt I could be that divisive in that benign a situation."

It took several days for Sarandon to get past the jolt of the news. But she says she was encouraged by letters of support she has received.

"People have responded to the censorship notion and to the irony of fighting a war to liberate a people, yet not letting anybody here have an opinion."

What bothers Sarandon most about the episode is what she views as an increasing lack of tolerance in the United States for dissenting points of view.

"Somehow, there's this notion that being a patriot means being quiet, and that if you speak up, you're anti-American," she says. "I mean, I remember saying to somebody that democracy is messy. The only thing that's really clean is fascism or a dictatorship. Then you don't have to deal with all those messy debates and things.

"So I'm just dumbfounded by the assumption that a patriot is somebody who is unquestioning. I believe that debate is at the very heart of what keeps a democracy healthy and vital."

"What's been really good about this," she adds, "has been that people will maybe say, 'I don't necessarily agree with all your politics, but I really was offended by what they (the United Way) have done.' "

Though she was shunned by one charity, Sarandon remains immersed in many others. Her causes include Heifer Project International, whose aim is to provide food and income-producing farm animals to poor families in the rural United States and more than 100 other countries; Madre, a human rights organization supporting women and families in conflict zones worldwide; the Raul Julia Ending Hunger Fund; Help a Parent Save A Child, which helps struggling, young mothers and fathers become better parents; Housing Works, which provides relief to the homeless; and UNICEF.

She views her work as an actor and movie star as a responsibility -- a platform for helping others.

"I'm not any different than most people, but the job that I'm in really demands empathy and imagination, which are really the heart and soul of activism," she says. "Because once you empathize with a mother whose child is at risk, for instance, and you can imagine the loss, then how can you not extend yourself to prevent something from happening?"

Sarandon feels similarly obliged to speak out due to her place in the public eye.

"I try to be as informed as I can be, because I'm in position to give that information to the public and help the heroes who slave day in and out to try to change things," she says. "I can give them the air time when they don't get it. I'm really just a tool, a little flashlight for people who are working much more bravely than I am, but don't have the funds."

As much attention as Sarandon has gained for airing her views publicly, speaking out has always been something she struggled with. She grew up in New York the eldest of nine children. Debate and dissent were a daily part of family life. "We always just thought of it as chaos," she says.

Sarandon did not take naturally to speaking out and challenging authority. But she did anyway, and often paid a price with the nuns who taught at her small Catholic grammar school.

"I remember asking questions that did not go over very well," she says. "I was a very timid kid. I wasn't ever somebody who was trying to make waves. I was a very good Catholic girl, and yeah, I was made to stand outside the classroom because I asked a question that the nuns got really angry with. But I didn't do it as a rebel. I did it because I really wanted to know."

The question?

"They were explaining that unless you were married in the Catholic church, you weren't really married. And I said then how were Joseph and Mary married, since Jesus didn't come up with it till later? Which is a valid question, but they got really angry and told me I had an overabundance of original sin."

To this day, Sarandon says she struggles with speaking out.

"I'm not comfortable with what I've turned into in terms of my persona," she says. She recalls an Academy Awards ceremony when she used her place on stage to talk about the plight of Haitian refugees.

"That was an issue of life and death," she says. "The aftermath was very upsetting to deal with, the hate mail and everything. And I could barely breathe when I was standing up there, going against the program and then going back to my seat and nobody would meet our eyes.

"I'm not comfortable disrupting things. But the problem is, when you have an opportunity and there's a life and death situation, and you don't take advantage of it, having to live with yourself the next year is even less bearable."

"My mother said to me, 'Oh come on, you're used to it, that kind of thing.' In fact, I'm not used to that kind of thing. And each time is very, very difficult for me."

Sarandon decided to do something more subtle at the March 23 Academy Awards. She wore a peace pin and flashed the peace sign on stage. "Everyone knew my stance, and some people were disappointed that I hadn't been more disruptive," she says.

The images of Sarandon's peace sign apparently proved disruptive enough to various donors of the United Way. The controversy over Sarandon's appearance ballooned the next day.

Sarandon says she still would have come to Tampa Bay to speak but was told that the logistics made it impossible without the United Way's mailing list of attendees.

She still plans a visit to family members in the area, including her brother Terry Tomalin, the Times' outdoors writer, and mother Lee Tomalin of Lakeland -- a staunch conservative and Bush supporter.

How do mother and daughter work through their political differences?

"We don't talk about it," Sarandon says. "We just kind of avoid it. If a person doesn't want any information, you can't really go anywhere from there."

Sarandon's next project is a TV movie on CBS April 20 at 9 p.m. called Ice Bound: A Woman's Survival at the South Pole, in which she stars as Dr. Jerri Nielsen. The movie deals with the issue of breast cancer.

Sarandon plans to use the press junket tied to the movie to discuss another topic as well -- budget cuts in veterans' benefits.

"I know about this from my work with veterans groups, and if more people knew, I bet they'd be as outraged as I am," she says.

"So that's what I do. I just facilitate other people who have something that I feel the American people should know about -- and then they can make up their own minds."

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