In his post "On Heath Ledger" Hilton Als denounces the activist-actor:

When an actor’s charming, vulgar, and childish desire to be seen and felt by a large number of people becomes perverted by self-seriousness, the performer slips into insipidness, thus deadening the carnival spirit that should inform his theatricals.

And if an actor forsakes greasepaint and sparkles to make public pronouncements about the evils of the media, Hollywood, the red carpet, or certain Third World countries, pomposity is never far behind.

Simply put, the craft of acting can’t bear the weight of ideas. Nor can the actor. Acting is thought in action; the character is merely a figment of the script and the director’s imagination. We’re interested in an actor’s personality, not his Op-Ed-informed mind. And when a performer asks to be taken “seriously