Jamie Lee Curtis says her reaction to Charlie Kirk’s death was ‘mistranslated’
Jamie Lee Curtis. (Michael Kovac/Getty Images for AFI)
Jamie Lee Curtis. (Michael Kovac/Getty Images for AFI)
Jamie Lee Curtis says she believes her controversial Charlie Kirk comments were “mistranslated”.
In an interview with Variety, Curtis clarified her comments about Kirk’s death after the right-wing pundit was shot in the neck during an open-air debate at Utah Valley University on 10 September.
The actress, 66, previously spoke about the incident during an appearance on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast, sharing that although she disagreed with his “abhorrent” ideas, she hoped he “felt connected with his faith” when he died.
She told Variety that she received rife backlash to her comments, perhaps because she is a staunch LGBTQ+ advocate, while Kirk was well-known for his anti-LGBTQ+ views.
‘In the binary world today, you cannot hold two ideas at the same time’
Curtis explained: “An excerpt of it mistranslated what I was saying as I wished him well — like I was talking about him in a very positive way, which I wasn’t; I was simply talking about his faith in God. And so it was a mistranslation, which is a pun, but not.
“In the binary world today, you cannot hold two ideas at the same time: I cannot be Jewish and totally believe in Israel’s right to exist and at the same time reject the destruction of Gaza. You can’t say that, because you get vilified for having a mind that says, ‘I can hold both those thoughts. I can be contradictory in that way.’”
The Halloween star hit back at being told she must be careful about what she says, quipping: “I don’t have to be careful.”
Curtis, who is mother to two children including trans daughter Ruby Guest, has frequently used her platform to hit out against anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric.
The actress stars in this year’s Freaky Friday 2 alongside Lindsay Lohan. In the film Lohan and Curtis reprise their mother-daughter dynamic as Anna and Tess, respectively. Freakier Friday will be available to stream exclusively on Disney+ in the UK from the 12 November 2025.
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