Ben Stiller, Sean Penn and Volodymyr Zelensky are three actors who are usually not appreciated by the Kremlin. The primary two for his or her activism in favor of Ukraine; the final, for heading a authorities that determined to remain in Kyiv and resist an armored offensive on three fronts. Now, months after they met with the Ukrainian president, the Russian International Ministry has positioned each Hollywood actors on its sanctions record. They’re banned from setting foot in Russia, the place Western manufacturing firms are already avoiding displaying their movies at film theaters or streamed on computer systems to keep away from being singled out.

“It’s an incredible honor for me, you’re my hero!” the Zoolander actor advised Zelensky in Kyiv on June 20. Ben Stiller, 56, was obtained by the Ukrainian president after visiting Irpin, one of many locations that has suffered essentially the most from the conflict. “What you’ve achieved, the way in which you’ve handled the nation, the world, is basically inspiring,” added the star of There’s One thing About Mary.

Days later it was Sean Penn, 61, who traveled to Ukraine to shoot a documentary. Each actors are outdated acquaintances: their first contact was a Zoom interview made through the pandemic, and by likelihood they met once more on February 24, the day that Putin ordered the advance of his troops on Ukraine. The American filmmaker, who in 2016 brought on rivers of ink to circulate in Russia for his seven-hour interview with Mexican drug trafficker El Chapo Guzmán, proposed of their third assembly that Zelenski take part within the Academy Awards gala.

The Ukrainian president was a well-liked comic earlier than profitable the 2019 elections in a rustic exhausted by corruption, the ability of the oligarchs and the conflict within the Donbas area. Apparently, as a member of the well-known Kvartal group, he made quite a few appearances in Russia over time, a few of them earlier than Kremlin propagandists who in the present day accuse Kyiv of being “a Nazi regime” to justify an offensive that has value hundreds of deaths and has no clear finish in sight.

Different American actors might endure the identical destiny as Stiller and Penn and get banned by Russia. Zelensky additionally obtained Liev Schreiber and Jessica Chastain, whereas Angelina Jolie, actress and particular envoy of the UN Refugee Company (UNHCR), paid a shock go to to Lviv in Could.

And it’s not solely Hollywood or musicians just like the members of Think about Dragons who’ve proven their help for Ukraine. The style agency Balenciaga was one of many first multinationals to place itself clearly in favor of the attacked nation and its artistic director, Georgia-born Demna, traveled there two weeks after the combating started. Since then, the designer has campaigned to remind the general public that the battle continues to be ongoing, and launched a style line with the blue-yellow flag, an emblem of the sky and the Ukrainian cereal fields. “I do know very properly and really feel the ache that Ukrainians are going via. I’ve been pondering so much about how I may help Ukraine and all of the refugees who need to return house. That’s the reason I targeted on the humanitarian path ‘Ukraine Restoration’, he wrote on July 29 on his Instagram profile.

Movie star chef José Andrés has been notably concerned in serving to the nation. He traveled to the border with Poland in March to distribute meals to hundreds of fleeing refugees, and his group World Central Kitchen (WCF), based in 2010 to assist populations in peril, went to the entrance strains to assist. In April, a missile hit their kitchens in Kharkov, a Russian-speaking metropolis that’s nonetheless a Kremlin goal greater than half a yr later.