00:00I think Sharon kind of set me up here. I'll do my best. I'm honored to be here for this
00:08event,
00:09and it is a testament to Sharon Stone's power as a woman. I was supposed to be out of town,
00:18and she said, no, you're going to do this for me. And I said, yes, Sharon, I am going to
00:25do
00:25that for you. It's weird to be here, and it's weird to be in this business where it's at now,
00:30because literally three of the honorees came to my garage in Highland Park to be interviewed by me,
00:38and now I'm here, and it's incredible. Yeah, well, okay. I know there's still a vibe in the room of
00:46like, all right, and here we go. Sharon Stone is a brilliant, intelligent, passionate, engaged,
00:57creative, but more importantly, a very fucking pissed off woman.
01:06And it's intense, and it's proactive, and she uses her platform and her position in the world to
01:13raise awareness of political action that needs to be taken, and attention to global health crisis,
01:20to art. She's amazing. She's an Oscar-nominated actress. She's won an Emmy and a Golden Globe,
01:26but more importantly, she is a United Nations Global Citizen Award winner, and also the Nobel Peace
01:38Summit Award winner, and on some level, I think that has to be more important than an Emmy.
01:46Just sounds more important, but she's an amazing person, and I do want to tell a personal story,
01:54because she's also a magic person, and there's a lot of magic in this room, but this is a personal
02:01story for me. When I had Sharon on my podcast, we connected, but it wasn't until, and a lot of
02:08you
02:08know the story about my partner, Lynn Shelton, who was a brilliant woman, an amazing director who passed
02:14away, you know, during COVID, and Sharon, who I didn't know, you know, reached out to me to be
02:23supportive and offer me, you know, some love during that very difficult time of grief, and then several
02:29years later, this is, I'm going to try to get through this, several years later, I was in a scene
02:34with Sharon in a movie, and it was one scene, I was intimidated, I'm not a great actor, I think
02:40I'm
02:40okay, but I was in this scene with Sharon Stone, so I was like freaking the fuck out, and I
02:47get to
02:47this scene, and during this scene, we, you know, we have to cry, and that's difficult, you know, and she
02:53goes, well, I said to her, I don't know if I can cry, I like to, she goes, well, what
02:58makes you cry?
02:59I'm like, I'm an old man, everything, and, and she goes, no, but I mean, I think you can do
03:05this, and I'm
03:05like, I just don't know if I can, she says, that's fine, but let's talk about it, you know, I,
03:10she says, I
03:10think I know what makes you cry, and I said, are you talking about Lynn, and she goes, yes, and
03:15I, and I
03:16said, well, I've been kind of thinking about that, but I really don't know, you know, how to access that
03:20for
03:20performance, and Sharon Stone says to me, she says, look, you do the scene to Lynn, and I'll make sure
03:28she's
03:28here, and, and, and she was, she, she summoned the dead in the best way possible for us to get
03:37through that scene, and we couldn't stop crying, so that was my personal experience with, with her
03:43commitment to, you know, just to people, and, and, and she has a lot of love, and the ACLU is
03:49a great
03:50cause, and, and I, and I love Sharon Stone. Please welcome Sharon Stone.
