Please rise. The not-so-honorable Admiral General Aladeen has a message for the Oscars.
Controversy-magnet Sacha Baron Cohen couldn’t ask for a better chance to promote his new film “The Dictator,” in which he plays the Middle Eastern tyrant Aladeen, dictator of the fictional Republic of Wadiya. When the Academy Awards so rudely revoked Cohen’s ticket to the Oscars, the British comedian took to the interwebs to issue this statement, in-character.
As he did with Ali G, Borat, and Bruno, Cohen is taking the method approach to his Aladeen character, and the dictator’s controversial political views, which may have scared off the Academy in the first place, are in full view in the funny clip above.
In the video, Aladeen refers to the Acad as the “Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts and Zionists,” complains about the organization’s failure to recognize such Wadiya-submitted films as “When Harry Kidnapped Sally” and “Planet of the Rapes,” and hilariously reveals that he’s friendly with director Brett Ratner (another Hollywood player shut out of this year’s Oscars for using his big mouth). Aladeen also makes reference to Hilary Swank’s recent political gaffe in attending the 2011 birthday party for Chechen president Razman Kadryov (accused of multiple human rights violations). Cohen’s dictator claims he paid the Oscar-winning actress $2 million to be his date at Sunday’s ceremony, and now she won’t refund his money.
Oscar Host Billy Crystal also gets a shout out, and it will be interesting to see how he responds in his monologue.
“The Dictator,” also starring Kevin Corrigan, J.B. Smoove, Megan Fox, Ben Kingsley, Anna Faris and John C. Reilly, opens May 11.
The Oscars air live on ABC this Sunday at 7 pm ET/4 pm PT.