Patrick Wilson has declared society seems more obsessed with sex than violence, in relation to the media interest in political scandals.
The 41-year-old Watchmen star plays a hotshot federal prosecutor whose hopes of political success are dashed after he develops a taste for high class prostitutes in new film Zipper.
Patrick attended the premiere of the film at the Sundance festival, where he admitted society seems to have a voracious appetite for the sordid details of political figures’ private lives.
“It is a little pathetic to be quite honest with you,” he said.
“We’re such a patrician society, but we’re more fascinated by sex than violence, which is crazy to me to be honest with you.
“I think we build them up to throw them down, and that’s not excusing it, it is a weird fascination with it.”
And Patrick said playing a disgraced public figure had not given him any sympathy for them.
“I have no sympathy for it. I’m fascinated by it and I think there’s really no easy answer [why it happens]. I think the cool thing about the movie is it presents all these questions without force feeding answers.
“You can’t say the same thing that led Kennedy, Gary Hart, Eliot Spitzer, Anthony Weiner, John Edwards, you’re talking about all different people. So there’s no sort of one – ‘Oh well this is what does it.’
“I think certainly if you have an addictive personality, anything in excess, if it skews this way then it can get dirty very quickly.”
Former Glee star Dianna Agron plays a gorgeous young intern in the film, who sparks Patrick’s character’s desires and causes him to try and satiate his lust elsewhere.
Dianna revealed she thinks it is getting harder and harder for public figures to hide their private affairs.
She said: “I think anybody in a position of power, we love them and we love to bring them down, it’s just part of our society.
“And in the digital age we’re now in a time frame where it’s very much Big Brother and that’s just an ever present thing.”
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