00:00Thank you for the kind introduction. Thank you. Okay, I'm a wee bit shorter. Greetings and salutations.
00:20Those were the three words that introduced me to Christian Slater. Delivered with his signature
00:25crooked smile and that gleam of mischief in his eyes, Christian didn't just enter the pop culture
00:31conversation, he kicked down the door. I had never seen a performance like his JD. It defined the Gen X
00:39counterculture. It was the anti-John Hughes protagonist, a villain I couldn't help but be
00:44fascinated by. Needless to say, there was more than one Christian Slater poster hanging in my teenage
00:51bedroom. Sorry if I just made that weird, Brittany. I'm not going to list every amazing performance
00:57of his career, because we'd be here all day and someone else just did a much better job than I
01:02would, but please indulge me in a few of my favorites. As a pirate radio DJ in Pump Up the Volume,
01:10his character was all about challenging conformity and igniting suburban teen rebellion.
01:16Talk hard, he said. And we listened. As Clarence in True Romance, Christian struck the perfect balance
01:23between gentle lover and reckless outlaw. That movie was full of big stars like Christopher Walken,
01:29Dennis Hopper, Brad Pitt, but Christian as Clarence carried the emotional weight of that film.
01:36Christian kept making more big movies with huge stars, but he also started bringing his immense
01:41talent to the small screen. In series like Dr. Death, we saw him as a cocky champion of patients' rights,
01:48and in Dirty John, he played a husband so nuanced, so real, that you're never quite sure if he's the
01:54villain or not. In Mr. Robot, he became the voice of a whole new generation, the digitally alienated.
02:01Not many actors can claim to have been culturally significant across four decades.
02:05I consider myself incredibly lucky to be in the list of people who have had the pleasure of working
02:12with Christian, and honestly just as lucky to be one of the millions who has been moved by and
02:17represented in his incredibly diverse body of work. Most actors can only dream of having a career as
02:24long as yours, Christian. And the truly amazing part of it is that you continue to redefine how we see you.
02:30You are an actor with multiple legacies who will feel like just as fresh of a discovery to teenagers
02:36watching you for the first time 20 years from now as you did when I first saw you. Let's just say it
02:43was 20 years ago. I mean, I'm an actor, you know, we don't all have to be good at math. All of this to say,
02:50fair is fair. The honor is richly deserved a dozen times over, and I am so proud to be here celebrating
02:57with you. Congratulations.
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