Woody Harrelson’s a pretty kooky guy. We mean that in a good way. Example: Back in February, the beloved actor and Cheers vet delivered a rambling, epic monologue while hosting SNL. It was endearing, except for one bit, which was simply odd: He told a story that smacked of anti-vax hysteria. He saved it with a decent punchline, but the anti-vax part got him trending. Does that bother Harrelson that he freaked out a lot of people? Apparently not at all.
In an Esquire profile of his new Watergate show White House Plumbers — he plays E. Howard Hunt, one of the burglary’s masterminds, who was also, weirdly, a prolific crime and spy genre novelist — Harrelson was asked about his relation to the internet. His answer: He doesn’t have one.
“I don’t read it. It’s like when reviews come out for movies. I don’t look,” Harrelson explained. He even describes reading a pan of his performance of a play he did with Sean Penn back in the year 2000. “It f*cked me up for at least two, three performances. It’s a poison pill.”
But what about the furor over his SNL monologue?
“Well, people told me it was, shall we say, trending,” he replied. “No, I don’t look at that sh*t. I feel like, ‘I said it on SNL.’ I don’t need to go further with it…other than to say—well, no, I won’t. Never mind. That’s enough.…But it don’t change my life one bit. Not one bit, if the mainstream media wants to have a go at you, right? My life is still wonderful.”
His Plumbers co-star Justin Theroux — who plays mustachioed lunatic G. Gordon Liddy, who also served time before winding up on Miami Vice, twice — chimed in, saying, “I’ve had some real goes at Woody, and I can tell you, he doesn’t give a sh*t.”
So if you were one of those who got mad over the erstwhile Woody Boyd maybe being anti-vax — or if you wrote an article about same — then don’t worry: He’s just going to keep living his nice life.
