Robert Downey Jr. pleads with Hollywood to forgive Mel Gibson

During last night’s 25th Annual American Cinematheque Award Ceremony, actor Robert Downey Jr. gave attendees a bit of a shock when he asked everyone in attendance to forgive Mel Gibson for his transgressions.

“I asked Mel to present this award for me for a reason,” Downey Jr. said after Gibson presented him with the American Cinematheque award. “When I couldn’t get sober, he told me not to give up hope and encouraged me to find my faith. It didn’t have to be his or anyone else’s as long as it was rooted in forgiveness. And I couldn’t get hired, so he cast me in the lead of a movie that was actually developed for him. He kept a roof over my head and food on the table and most importantly he said if I accepted responsibility for my wrongdoing and embraced that part of my soul that was ugly – hugging the cactus he calls it — he said that if I hugged the cactus long enough, I’d become a man.”

Afterwards, he pleaded for forgiveness for Mel Gibson, saying “So anyway on this special occasion and in light of the recent holidays including Columbus Day, I would ask that you join me, unless you are completely without sin in which case you picked the wrong f—ing industry, in forgiving my friend his trespasses and offering him the same clean slate you have me, allowing him to continue his great and ongoing contribution to our collective art without shame. He’s hugged the cactus long enough.”

Gibson recently came under fire when it was revealed he was working on a film about Judah Maccabee, the famous Jewish hero whose story inspired Hanukkah. Rabbi Marvin Hier of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles considers Gibson’s involvement “preposterous”, saying:

“I think it’s, quite frankly, preposterous,” he said. “Judah Maccabee is one of the greatest heroes in Jewish history. Mel Gibson is an anti-Semite. He has made anti-Semitic remarks in the past. I don’t know what Warner Bros. was thinking.”

Do you think Mel Gibson deserves a second chance?

Source: Entertainment Weekly

[Image: AP Photo/Chris Pizzello]