Here are some photos of Sean Penn on his book tour. He looks… bad. I mean, he always looks like HAM to me, but he’s just seemed particularly out-of-it during his promotional appearances. He’s also seemed… like he’s trying? By that I mean, Sean Penn used to be a relevant person. He used to be an in-demand and respected actor. But he’s bored with acting and Hollywood is sort of bored with him too. So he’s spent the past five years or so trying to do other things, like be a fake journalist interviewing El Chapo, or what he’s doing now, writing stupid books and mocking the #MeToo movement. But when I say he’s “trying,” I mean… it feels like the world has passed him by a bit, right? He doesn’t “get” what’s happening in pop culture anymore. After years of seeing himself as a rebel outsider, he’s now so far outside what’s happening in culture that he doesn’t really know what to do. Which brings me to this People Magazine story, which tries to make him sound like the OG Rebel Without a Cause.
Sean Penn’s bizarre late-night appearance this week might have surprised some fans, but those close to him say his unpredictable behavior is actually par for the course.
“His mind doesn’t quiet down,” a source close to the actor tells PEOPLE. “So he can seem erratic to people who are not used to his energy.”
“He can get in an agitated state, but he’s extremely smart and very funny,” says the source, who notes that Penn compensates for some of his bad habits by eating well and getting lots of exercise. “He actually eats well. He works out — he’s jacked! He goes to holistic doctors. But it’s a dichotomy. He drinks and smokes and doesn’t sleep.”
Penn is not concerned with the public’s reaction to him, according to another source. “Sean doesn’t care at all what people think,” a source previously told PEOPLE. “He likes controversy and debate and doesn’t mind shocking people.”
According to a third source, “Sean is a one man band, always has been. He loves the fight.”
Meanwhile, Penn has been busy promoting his new novel, Bob Honey Who Just Do Stuff, and spending time with his kids with ex-wife Robin Wright, Dylan, 26, and Hopper, 24. “He’s very interested in his kids,” says the first source. “He’d drop everything for them.”
As for his love life, Penn told Marc Maron that he hasn’t given up on finding the right person. “I’m never going to take a position that I’ve closed off to love,” he said. “I think people falling in love with each other is a great, great thing.” He was recently spotted on a dinner date with Amber Heard, but the first source says the two are not in a relationship. “Amber and Sean are friends, but they’re not dating,” says the source. “They’ve gone out to dinner.”
He’s also “still very close with” his ex-wife Madonna, adds the source.
Basically, Sean Penn wants you to know that he’s moody and edgy and his brilliant mind can’t calm down because he’s so brilliant and you know he’s cool because he smokes and drinks and lives at the gym and also he’s got a line of women waiting to bang his hamface OKAY? That’s basically it. I mean, part of this is for Robin Wright’s sake – he’s still irritated that she’s moved on completely and is currently banging some younger man. But part of it is for our benefit too, because Sean Penn rather desperately wants us to know that he’s still a cool, edgy outsider. Is he? Or is this just kind of sad?
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
So basically he is psychotic or on drugs. Or both.
Steroids at the very least.
As my grandmother used to say: looks like 40 miles of bad road.
HE’S A MEAN DRUNK. Couldn’t be more ordinary or more sad. I feel for his family. Explains everything.
@Velourazure-
I love your grandmother’s quote! I’m gomna remember that!
Hahaha! Stealing it!
He was on a talk show a year ago or so and he looked awful and he was so shaky. I don’t think he’s going to live long, no matter how well he eats.
Right? Folks—-eating right and going to the gym will not balance out all the drugs and booze or the two packs a day smoking habit.
All that smoking made him look much older. Maybe it will cause him to have a MI. He is such an awful person that I wouldn’t feel bad if he did.
I get tired just looking at him. He hardly oozes health and vitality, even if he “eats well.” 🙄
his hands are young and his face is….well, look at him.
usually its the hands as the 1st indicator or someones age.
Sean has never gotten over Robin divorcing him. She was Sean’s gorgeous,responsible, dutiful doormat for about 20 years and gave Sean a family.
Sean has been a mess since Robin stood up for herself, resurrected her career, and remarried. Very pathetic. I will never understand why Sean is so hateful towards Robin.
Sean will never, ever have a woman of Robin’s calibre ever again. Robin just amazes me.
His fingers look swollen and his hair is ALMOST as bad as Donald trumps.
Now, let’s play, ‘If this was written about a female actor’…..
If a female actor went on Tv to smoke and wrote a terrible novel her career would be over.
No female actor could behave this way and still have a career. He’s hateful, he’s lazy, he can barely fucking spell and he not only has a novel out, he gets to go on Late Night talk shows to promote it. This is White Male Privilege at its finest.
It’s precisely because of gendered double standards that it isn’t an equivalent comparison. Women and/or POC would never be allowed out and about in the industry looking or acting like this. It is 100% a study in white male privilege.
Veronica, I did not think of that. Thank you.
I will like to change it to, ‘Now, let’s play ‘If this was written about anyone who was not a white actor’.
His arms are pretty jacked, but not in an attractive way. More like someone took the arms off a Ken doll that didn’t pass inspection so they gave them to Sean Penn. I’m also getting Popeye vibes.
Those super veiny arms are grossing me out.
hilarious (and true – I scrolled back up to check).
Is Sean Penn the final evolution of Justin Theroux, the edgiest Pokémon?
This made me laugh out loud!
Best comment of the day, @deets. Nearly spit out my tea. Happy Friday!
He’s an incredible actor. I loved The Thin Red Line. But his whole approach right now is gross and cringe-worthy. He’s treading into Mel Gibson territory.
He’s extremely overrated as an actor.
Disagree, I can think of several great performances right off the top of my head–Mystic River, Falcon and the Snowman, Milk. And I’m not a fan of his.
The one thing that can’t be denied about Penn is that he is a very good actor… Watch I am Sam, Casualties of war ( as not to mention the ones already said by Minx) you’ll see brilliant acting there.
Sean is an outstanding actor. Watch 21 Grams. Sean seems devastated, strung-out, arrogant, and sleepless.
He cheated on Robin for years, and he never expected her to divorce him & remarry.
All this awful behavior is Sean acting out like a chain-smoking, smug toddler, because Robin has moved on.
“He’s very interested in his kids.”
*in Chris Rock voice* What you want, a cookie?
He and Justin Theroux should hang out and be edgy with each other and gruffly respond to each other when they work out together listening to some indie music.
He would consider Justin milquetoast. Justin once said he didn’t write scripts for his dark TV show because they don’t want fart jokes, or something like that. He wasn’t trying to sound like he is some highbrow screenwriter.
Justin doesn’t always try to be edgy. He has some gaming buddies, some actor friends. Will Arnet is one of them. I can’t see Sean hanging with the guys playing Call of Duty. LOL
“The Girl on the Train actor explained that although he and his friends may not be physically together, he frames the video game session as a boys’ night. “You know, girls go on girls’ nights, and so you kinda gotta pitch it like, ‘Oh, by the way, the guys are getting together tonight,’ and she’s like, ‘Oh cool, where are you going?’ and I’m like, ‘To my office.’ In my ear, we’re all together and we’re all having fun and we’re murdering 11-year-olds,” he joked. “She comes to my office and looks in the door and kinda goes, like, ‘You’re just sitting there laughing and howling and screaming.’ She just sees blood going across the screen and she doesn’t understand that I’m actually having a bros night.”
Theroux previously opened up about his obsession with Call of Duty in 2015. “Jen still doesn’t see it as a social app,” he told E! News. “She knows that I love it, so she’s very tolerant.”
Justin Theroux never beat the shit out of his spouse, either.
You know I never appreciated a resemblance till now.
This guy hangs out with the narcissist Brad Pitt. They hang out and complain about how evil their ex wives are for leaving them. They complain because those women didn’t want to put up with their abuse.
So Brad Pitt is a narcissist now? Lol.
He’s always been one. Lol he’s also an abuser who doesn’t have custody of his own kids. At least Sean never lost his children, I guess, but he does trash his ex wifes parenting style. I doubt his son learned to be a violent racist from his mom. 🙄
“The face you have at age 25 is the face God gave you, but the face you have after 50 is the face you earned.” – Cindy Crawford
Eh. In some cases. But if you had breast cancer or lost a child and that shows on your face, you earned it? Some people have hard lives unearned and undeserved. I don’t think Cindy Crawford’s privilege allows her to see that.
@india rose…yes.
So you are watering-down the concept of privilege to nitpick a saying that Cindy Crawford didn’t even originate. It all seems even more absurd to someone who is an atheist, arguing over which face you ‘deserve’ or what face/life your god wants you to have or thinks you have earned.
@ohreally I have deep respect for the concept of privilege. I apologize if this sounded dismissive.
Privilege also has to do with socioeconomic class. When you’re surrounded by make-up artists, stylists, high end products and skin procedures, you can cover blemishes, wrinkles, lines, etc.
I’m in my early 40s and trying to embrace the changes I see in my face. Some of them come from laughter & joy and some from profound sorrow & loss. Some come from pain too deep to talk about.
The faces of people who live in poverty or in developing countries often show premature aging from tragedy and extreme conditions. I’m agnostic, and would never, ever believe in a God who created suffering to teach lessons or because “you’re only given what you’re strong enough to handle”. That’s abusive theology.
Again, apologies if my use of the word privilege sounded dismissive. I’m an activist in movements for POC, LGBTQ and women’s rights. That’s not who I am or what I believe. Peace.
Actually Coco Chanel first said that. And I think her point was that when you’re young you can get by on beauty, but when you’re older you need intelligence and charm. People weren’t getting face lifts in Coco’s day.
Also, as India Rose said, tragedy and illness can do a number on anyone.
SOMEONE here will know this — what’s that piece of hair in the very front/center/top of his head?
I’ve noticed in several interviews that it is surrounded on all sides by scalp — somewhat concealed scalp because the area in question is very bushy.
But from side of top angles, it’s definitely an archipelago of hair off an Island of head.
Is it a botched transplant? A wacky weave? A porcupine copulating with a hedgehog?
Someone please explain! Thank you.
I call it a “cow lick”. That’s what I grew up calling it.
I know “cow licks” — but do you think it’s natural? Maybe it is — I just can’t quite fathom the visible scalp around the clump in the front/middle.
Thanks, Swack.
Well, he is in great shape. I will give him that.
I think he needs a woman to stabilize him a bit. He seemed downright happy (for Sean) when he was in love with Charlize. He also came across less manic, less agitated, a little less grumpy. It was still there, just not as pronounced as right now.
Don’t you mean he needs therapy and/or proper medication to stabilize him? He is an abusive pos, women cannot and should not fix that!
Cannot imagine waking up to cigarettes, narcissism, rage, and boiled ham.
Agreed. For some reason I am now imagining Sean Penn making Hot Ham Water for breakfast. Also, he is such a Gob, without the pathos.
Yes, Gob without the pathos is perfect!!
A smack of ham! Oh I love that show.
He’s an angry GOB with either a steroid or cocaine problem. Maybe both?
This will sound mean, but he might need a woman, but no woman needs him. Being sucked into his sleepless vortex of nicotine-tinged moodiness seems scary.
So true. I can’t imagine what any woman sees in Sean, but he does get them, even in his 50s, and will again. It’s one of the great mysteries of the universe.
Seriously. Let men fix him.
Women who go for him need therapy too, full.stop.
I remember clearly an episode of violence against a fan (he smashed the fan’s phone for asking for a picture at some SF hotel, if I recall) WHILE he was dating Charlize: so no he did not change a bit during their relationship.I also have to remember that strange episode with her small child reported to the police. I think the only one who managed to help him become a more socially functioning adult and tame him little bit was Robin during their happy years in Northern California. I don’t remember any violent behaviour reported when he was married to her. He was a functioning yet absent father and respected actor and while with Robin he peaked career wise. He delivered his best work as an actor during that time. All the violent episodes in his life are before their marriage and after their divorce.
And no, is not a woman’s task to keep a man stabilized. It may come with family life and bliss but when a man is an *sshole is not a woman’s job to calm him. Simply because nobody changes at their core.
I saw his interview on Stephen Colbert …and he really did remind me of his character in Fast Times at Ridgemont High..I do know he is a respected actor but his life or lifestyle today is more like the Ridgemont High guy with a bit of Dazed and Confused thrown in.
A few of these explains why he looks so much older…
Man, I can practically smell him through my phone screen. Dirty ashtray. Barf.
He looks like Hoggle from Labyrinth.
No thank you!
Steroids?
He doesn’t look “fit”; he looks and acts like he’s on ‘roids. Go away, Penn. Btw, he and DeNiro are looking like face twins nowadays.
He’s a long time buddy of Charlie Sheen. That should explain most of everything about him.
Just go to A.V. club and read the excerpts from his “novel”. His mind is gone.
He looks like a jack-o-lantern that got left out in the rain.
Typical white male. Whoever gave those quotes is trying to find a nice way to say raging asshole.
I don’t think he deserved an Oscar for mystic river. Pedestrian performance.
That face though… My father is 71 almost, has smoked his whole life, still does and not the packed cigarettes but the open ones. He rolls them himself so we lost count of how many he smokes in a day. My father doesn’t go to the gym but trust me when I say his face is 30 years younger than his. This guy here looks…deranged.He is doing something wrong with himself.
Um, he sounds manic.
Sorry, but if you smoke, eating well and working out will do f#ck-all for your health. You’re inhaling 140 toxins with every breath – most of which you can find in various cleaners and poisons under your kitchen sink.
Could be worse. He could be a registered Republican.