Brad Pitt insists that while his longtime pal George Clooney is a man of many talents, the one thing his “Ocean’s Eleven” co-star can’t do is bust a move on the dance floor.
Pitt’s cheeky jab at Clooney was read aloud by actress Laura Dern at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival as she was presenting Clooney with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the event’s opening night ceremony Wednesday.
“[Clooney] can do, perform, accomplish, compete at most anything and does it better than any of us, but please, keep him off the dance floor,” Dern said, reading Pitt’s playful message to the audience. “He doesn’t know. And now, this pigeon-toed kid from Kentucky, elder statesman, who when you can’t get Brad Pitt you know Clooney will show up because he never met an award he wouldn’t run to, is getting a lifetime achievement award? So why? Why do we love George Clooney?”
Pitt then answered his own question in the message read by Dern.
“He’s a rogue, a prankster, an altruist, an actor, an athlete. The only guy you’d want in a crisis. A father, a husband, a global citizen, a defender of justice, and … a really bad dancer,” he added, People reports.
Pitt teasing Clooney comes after the Hollywood duo starred together in the 2024 thriller “Wolfs.” The film, which marked their first appearance on screen together since 2008’s “Burn After Reading,” also premiered at the Venice International Film Festival in 2024.
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Dern shared some of her own words about Clooney.
Calling him a “man of the deepest kind of humanity and integrity” and someone “who lives for service and truth,” she praised him for telling stories within his films that “move us to be better.”
Dern added, “Oh, and all while he’s, you know, doing that stuff — actor, writer, filmmaker, producer and activist — he happens to be the best friend you could ever have and the funniest person you will ever meet, and yes, he was voted [People’s] ‘Sexiest Man Alive’ two times. Two times!”
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Clooney and Pitt have publicly, lightheartedly roasted each other on multiple occasions.
After Pitt, who was also twice crowned People’s “Sexiest Man Alive,” named Clooney as one of the most handsome men in a 2022 Vogue interview, Clooney joked that he wasn’t buying his buddy’s compliment.
“I will say that I think his first answer was himself, and then somebody said, ‘Let’s [film] that again. Don’t say yourself,’” Clooney joked on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” in September 2022.