Vote for Sean Penn? Not anytime soon

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Coping with the loss of his brother
Part of a show business family that includes brother Michael, a musician, Penn and wife Robin Wright Penn have two children and live in Northern California, far from the celebrity-mad crowds he contended with in his first marriage to Madonna.

Penn and his family have been coping with the loss of his brother, actor Chris Penn, who died last January of an enlarged heart. Penn quietly and tersely handles questions about how it has affected the family.

“A good friend of mine described it best when I saw him. He came over. He said, ‘It’s a stinker. It’s a stinker,”’ Penn said. “That’s what it is.”

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Like Eastwood, Penn loves to direct. He previously made the sobering dramas “The Indian Runner,” “The Crossing Guard” and “The Pledge,” the latter two starring Jack Nicholson. Penn now is directing “Into the Wild,” starring Emile Hirsch in the true story of Christopher McCandless, a young idealist whose journey to Alaska ends in tragedy.

Penn said he wishes he could give up performing and remain behind the camera full time, but he needs the acting income because he’s a soft touch for charitable causes.

“Let me tell you what happens. You go public politically on anything, you start getting phone calls from everybody who needs money for various things,” Penn said. “You get not rich real fast.”

In the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the U.S. war in Iraq, Penn said filmmakers have become energized to take on political subjects again, as they did in the 1960s and ’70s amid the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal.

“It’s not surprising. It’s their daily life and conversations over coffee. It’s affecting everything we do. It’s been the history of film in the past every time we suffer,” Penn said.

“The biggest problem is, when we have a choice of being comfortable or not, we choose comfortable all the time. It’s overrated. And it certainly doesn’t allow for much art. And now we’re uncomfortable, so more art’s going to come out of it.”

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