Who says Hollywood doesn’t care about politics? No, seriously, who says that anymore — because post-“Scandal,” having a working knowledge of the goings-on in Washington is right up there with having a good British accent. Proving that résumé bullet point a necessity on Saturday night, actors Christoph Waltz, Jonathan Banks, Tichina Arnold, Harry Hamlin and Evan Handler lent their collective star power to the District’s continued fight for statehood at a dinner hosted by D.C. “shadow senator” Paul Strauss in West Hollywood.
“Celebrity support for Washington has been overwhelming,” said Strauss, adding that “full federal representation for D.C. residents is vital.”
The point of all that hobnobbing way out in Hollywood? Strauss and the Creative Coalition, one of the entertainment industry’s political advocacy groups, want the big names to use their platforms (we’re guessing Twitter et al) to tell Congress that Washington deserves to be the 51 state in the union.
Somehow we doubt that Waltz, the Oscar winner who holds Austrian and German passports, will have as much sway as the rest of the A-listers, but one never knows! His bad-guy character in “Spectre” was pretty scary.