Politics

Drop What You’re Doing And Watch This Beautiful Speech From Mahershala Ali

"What I've learned from working on 'Moonlight' is, we see what happens when you persecute people."

by Meg Watson  30 January 2017

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I could preface this with some background about Donald Trump’s executive order banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries entry to the US, or the resulting pain and unrest it has caused. I could also talk about Moonlight — a new film which is being universally praised as one of the most groundbreaking and heartfelt films in recent memory.

Instead of doing any of that, I’m just gonna ask that you stop what you’re doing, find a cosy little spot where you can be alone for a second, and watch this speech from one of the film’s stars, Mahershala Ali.

After winning a SAG Award for his role as Juan — a drug dealer who comes to the aid of a young gay kid and his drug-addicted mother — Ali took the opportunity to broadly reflect on the recent political climate.

“I think what I’ve learned from working on Moonlight is, we see what happens when you persecute people,” he said. “They fold into themselves. And what I was so grateful about in having the opportunity to play Juan was playing a gentleman who saw a young man folding into himself as a result of the persecution of his community. [He takes] that opportunity to uplift him and tell him that he mattered, that he was okay, to accept him. I hope that we do a better job of that.

“When we get caught up in the minutiae — the details that make us all different — I think there’s two ways of seeing that. There’s the opportunity to see the texture of that person; the characteristics that make them unique. Then there’s opportunity to go to war about it. My mother is an ordained minister, I’m a Muslim. She didn’t do backflips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago. But I tell you now, we put things to the side and I’m able to see her, she’s able to see me, we’re able to love each other. The love has grown, and that stuff is minutiae. It’s not that important.”

In what’s already proved to be an incredibly political awards ceremony, this is proving to be the highlight of the night.

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Same.