Right after Alicia Vikander, the second main guest of the evening, actor Russell Crowe, arrives for the award. “I wrote a speech, but I have it on my phone and it would look stupid, so I improvise,” he says.
He admits that he had not heard of the festival until recently. “And I’ve been to so many terrible festivals in different parts of the world that I have to congratulate the organizers in Karlovy Vary, everything runs like clockwork here. I deeply appreciate that,” says Crowe.
In his speech, he recalls that he started acting as a six-year-old in the TV series Spyforce from 1972. “And fortunately, I still enjoy it. I still enjoy waking up every day and thinking about what scenes await me tomorrow. Maybe it’s the movies I choose , that I always have to relate to them. It never happens to me that I get up at four in the morning and don’t know why. The older I get, the deeper I relate to the film. And I would like to say to all the filmmakers in the room that even a single voice can do something change. So let it be yours,” he says, drawing applause.
“I won’t keep you any longer because this prize is quite heavy,” he says, pointing to his Crystal Globe. “But I’m mainly here for the music. Don’t go to bed too early, see you at the concert,” adds Crowe. With his band Indoor Garden Party, he will play in front of Thermal at a quarter to eleven in the evening.
Jiří Bartoška and Russell Crowe. | Photo: CTK
