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Sean Penn Faces Backlash Over Controversial Film Direction

Sean Penn now stands accused of 'wokemaxxing,' over news he is writing and directing a movie about US Capitol riot on January 6, 2021. Negotiations are underway...

Bintano News

June 17, 2026

now stands accused of 'wokemaxxing,' over news he is writing and directing a movie about US riot on , 2021.

Negotiations are underway for to star as a real-life policeman whose identity remains undisclosed, but who is said to be involved with the project.

In 2022, Penn made waves by unexpectedly attending one of the hearings about January 6 and sitting amongst Capitol Police.

He was glimpsed speaking to Michael Fanone, a cop who had previously testified that he was beaten and tased by a mob during the storming of the Capitol, in an assault so brutal he suffered a heart attack, a traumatic brain injury and a concussion.

Insiders would not disclose whether Fanone - who bears a distinct physical similarity to Cooper - is the policeman profiled in Penn's movie, per Deadline.

As word of the movie spread, fans poured scorn on the idea, with one X user snorting: 'Guaranteed to suck and tank, but these retards will still throw money at it to keep the “insurrection” mythology alive.'

Sean Penn now stands accused of 'wokemaxxing,' over news he is writing and directing a movie about US Capitol riot on January 6, 2021; pictured in February

Jacob Chansley, who became known online as the 'QAnon Shaman,' is pictured outside a Senate chamber during the storming of the Capitol

Invoking Penn's character in the 1982 film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, that X user added: 'It’s been downhill for Jeff Spicoli since high school if we’re being honest.'

Penn is developing his new movie at Warner Bros, the studio behind One Battle After Another, which netted him his third acting Oscar this March.

Negotiations are underway for Bradley Cooper to star as a real-life policeman whose identity remains undisclosed, but who is said to be involved with the project

Insiders would not disclose whether the film is about Washington, DC cop Michael Fanone, who is pictured at the CNN Heroes: All-Star Tribute in December 2021 in New York

As word of the movie spread, fans poured scorn on the idea, with one X user snorting that the film was '[g]uaranteed to suck and tank'

The January 6 movie's plotline is said to involve an unexpected friendship, and to follow the main character's journey to becoming a figure who is regarded in some quarters as an American hero, sources told Deadline.

Fanone, a former Trump supporter who spent 20 years as a policeman, wrote a New York Times bestselling memoir about January 6 called Hold the Line.

Penn is no stranger to the grand political gesture, having taken several trips to wartime Ukraine and posed for photos with its president Volodymyr Zelensky, to whom he quipping that it could be 'melted down to bullets.'

When he won his latest Academy Award this March, he was absent from the ceremony because he was once again traveling to Ukraine, where he met with Zelensky and toured the war-ravaged Donetsk oblast in the east.

Kieran Culkin, who was presenting the Oscar, announced: 'Sean Penn couldn't be here this evening - or didn't want to - so I'll be accepting the award on his behalf.'

News of Penn's latest foray into politics comes after he set off an online furor by bringing up the Holocaust unprompted while inveighing against selfies.

'People should not do selfies ever with anyone. It’s bad for you; it’s bad for everyone. It’s a soul-sucker,' he said in an onstage interview, via Variety. 'It’s the Holocaust grandmother and her six-year-old paraplegic wheeling over? It’s a hard no.'

Social media users took immediate offense, with one fulminating on X: 'No surprise from the biggest dirtbag in Hollywood,' as another snapped: 'He really is an insufferable a**hole… @SouthPark needs another episode dedicated just to this.'

Penn has directed several films, beginning with the 1991 crime drama The Indian Runner, an adaptation of Bruce Springsteen's song Highway Patrolman starring Viggo Mortensen, Patricia Arquette, Dennis Hopper and Charles Bronson.

More recent efforts include the 2021 drama Flag Day, starring Penn with his daughter Dylan, 35, and a 2023 documentary profile of Zelensky called Superpower.

Sean Penn Faces Backlash Over Controversial Film Direction

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