Bill Pullman is best known for playing the pep-talkiest American president in movie history, starring as President Thomas Whitmore in Roland Emmerich’s “Independence Day.”
So, naturally, we asked him to weigh in on the current state of American politics when he visited TheWrap’s South by Southwest interview studio in Austin, Texas.
Pullman was in town promoting his new Western “The Ballad of Lefty Brown,” where he plays a lifelong sidekick who must step up when his hero companion (Peter Fonda) dies.
“We’ve been asleep,” Pullman said during a discussion about the Western movie genre and American identity.
“Everybody is accepting these virtues of what we are, who we are,” he continued. “We’ve started on this journey, and it’s a hell hole… but we’re going to get through it.”
Watch the full clip above, and get TheWrap’s complete SXSW coverage here.