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Multiple Oscar win for Milk
Milk
Sean Penn wins Best Actor as Milk picks up two Oscars
"Penn used his acceptance speech as an opportunity to speak up for gay rights, in particular same-sex marriage"
Sean Penn has been awarded the Best Actor Oscar for his role in Harvey Milk biopic, Milk at the 81st annual Academy Award ceremony.
Penn, who previously won an Oscar for Best Actor in 2003’s Mystic River, used his acceptance speech as an opportunity to speak up for gay rights, in particular same-sex marriage. Penn stated:
“I think that it is a good time for those who voted for the ban against gay marriage to sit and reflect and anticipate their great shame and the shame in their grandchildren's eyes if they continue that way of support.
"We've got to have equal rights for everyone. And there are, and there are, these last two things. I'm very, very proud to live in a country that is willing to elect an elegant man President and a country who, for all its toughness, creates courageous artists.”
The film, which follows the life of the first openly gay politician, also picked up an award for Best Original Screenplay. Writer Dustin Lance Black described Milk as a ‘life saving story’ and thanked his mother, who ‘has always loved me for who I am even when there was pressure not to’. Black continued:
“When I was 13 years old my beautiful mother and my father moved me from a conservative Morman home in San Antonio, Texas to California and I heard the story of Harvey Milk and it gave me hope. It gave me hope that one day I could live my life openly as who I am and that maybe I could even fall in love and one day get married.
“If Harvey had not been taken from us thirty years ago I think he would want me to say to all those gay and lesbian kids out there tonight who have been told that they are less than by their churches or by the government or by their families, that you are beautiful wonderful creatures of value and that no matter what anyone tells you, God does love you and very soon I promise you to you that you will have equal rights federally across this great nation of ours. Thank you and thank you God for giving us Harvey Milk.”
Harvey Milk was a gay rights activist and the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.
His political career was cut short when he was assassinated by fellow San Francisco Supervisor Dan White, only eleven months into his elected term in office.
