At the Oscar awards show Sean Penn said - clearly referring to Alejandro Gonzaelez Inarritu, the director of "Birdman": "Who gave this son of b****h a green card" . This comment caused a massive controversy and internet frenzy yesterday.
During the awards night of the Oscar show Penn had been tasked with revealing to the awards show audience who would be the winner of the award for "Best Picture".
As he came to the podium to reveal the winner of the "Best Picture" Oscar award Penn first said, clearly referring to Inarritu: "Who gave this son of a b***h a green card?"
Penn then went on to reveal that "Birdman" had won the award for "Best Picture".
A lot of people, especially amongst the Latino and Mexican-American community took offense, reported NBC News. Journalist Nina Terror tweeted: "The problem with Sean Penn's statement is that it limits what #Latinos are entitled to - certainly nothing which belongs to whites."
However, Inarritu himself was reported by Variety magazine as having found Penn's comments hilarious. The director was quoted as having said: "I found it hilarious. Sean and I had that kind of brutal relationship where only true friendship can survive. When I was directing him in '21 Grams,' he was always making jokes ... I made a lot of very tough jokes (to him) that I will not tell you."
The Latin Times had an editorial on this matter drawing attention to the long history of close collaboration between the two artists. They argued that there was no basis for artists like that to be targeted needlessly.
One may recall that "Birdman" won four Oscars at the academy awards this year, including one for Inarritu in the category of "Best Director".