Oliver Stone defends Russia’s ‘anti-gay propaganda’ law and asks Putin to be daughter’s godfather
The filmmaker has been friendly with the Russian president for several years
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Your support makes all the difference.Vladimir Putin is believed to be godfather to Oliver Stone’s 22 year-old daughter, after transcripts from an interview between the pair revealed that Stone had taken advantage of an Orthodox Christian tradition that means no one asked to be a godparent can refuse the honour.
In a transcript of a June interview between the pair that was published this week by the Kremlin, Stone references the tradition and tells Putin that he would like to ask him to be his daughter’s godfather. “Does she want to become an Orthodox Christian?” Putin responded, to which Stone answered: “We’ll make her that [Orthodox].”
The pair did not return to the conversation, leading to the fair assumption that the request was granted.
In the same interview, Stone also called Russia’s “anti-gay propaganda” law, which Putin has claimed protects children from pro-LGBTQ+ influence, “sensible”.
“I don’t know what is going on with the American culture. It’s very strange right now,” Stone said. “So much of the argument, so much of the thinking, so much of the newspaper, television commentaries about gender, people identify themselves, and social media, this and that, I’m male, I’m female, I’m transgender, I’m cisgender. It goes on forever, and there is a big fight about who is who.”
After Putin told Stone that Russia has a law that “[bans] propaganda among minors,” Stone replied: “Yes, that’s the one. It seems like maybe that’s a sensible law.”
Stone and Putin have been unexpected friends for several years, Stone having previously conversed with the Russian president for the 2017 documentary series The Putin Interviews.
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