Now that Theo James and Shailene Woodley are done with Divergent series, they have been committing a lot of their time to activism. With the refugee crisis and oil companies trying to lay pipelines across sacred land, the movie actors have realized that they want to put their fame and influence toward good causes.
Shailene Woodley is one of the few celebrities that went to Standing Rock in North Dakota to protest the pipeline. She recorded moments from the protest on Facebook Live, documented the scene on her Instagram, and even got arrested for her work.
Immediately, she wrote about her experience at Standing Rock for Time , using her popularity to turn Hollywood’s attention on the fight that environmentalists, Native Americans, and others were fighting against the oil companies.
“I was arrested on Oct. 10, on Indigenous Peoples’ Day, a holiday where America is meant to celebrate the indigenous people of North America,” the actress wrote. “I was in North Dakota, standing in solidarity, side-by-side with a group of over 200 water protectors, people who are fighting the Dakota Access Pipeline.”
The Divergent actress has been known for getting herself politically involved even before the Standing Rock protests. She was one of the celebrities endorsing Bernie Sanders, one of the Democratic presidential candidates, traveling all over the country to vouch for the politician. Even after Donald Trump got elected, she continued to speak about the election season and how people have to react.
“It’s hard to talk about politics in a Hollywood world. I learned that really quickly,” she said according to Just Jared . “But after the California primaries, when Bernie Sanders lost — and I’m not saying he should have won — I knew that Trump was going to win.
“Because I’d been on the ground for months, and we would be in small cities in America and big cities in America, and Bernie would get tens of thousands of people at his rallies,” she added. “And then Trump would come and he’d get the same numbers. But Hillary would only have a few hundred people at her fundraisers.”
As for Theo James, he is using his roots to raise awareness about the refugee crisis. As the grandson of a Greek immigrant, he worked with Syrian refugees to show that new homes have to be found for those who are displaced .
“Theo James wants to help share the stories of Syrian refugees who have been displaced from their homes,” reported Time Magazine . “The British actor, known for his work on The Divergent Series and the Underworld movies and currently starring in the London play Sex With Strangers , says he is driven by a personal connection to their plight: his Greek grandfather Nicholas Taptiklis fled Athens during World War II, eventually making it to Damascus, Syria.”
This is a very important and personal cause for the 32-year-old actor, who likes to keep things to himself when it is not about political activism.
“It made me think of how quickly we are able to forget recent history,” the Divergent actor said. “Because it is so recent, but now, it seems so far away. It rammed home the fact that the situation we’re in at the moment is the biggest humanitarian crisis since then.”
A good example of Theo James keeping his personal matters to himself is that he rarely talks about his long-term girlfriend, Ruth Kearney. He has been with her for years, but has never spoken about her. When he was asked if he has popped the question to Ruth, he answered curtly and to the point.
“I was never engaged,” he said to Entertainment Tonight .
Do you think Theo James and Shailene Woodley will fight together for a cause that they believe in the near future? Let us know in the comments below.
[Featured Image by Markus Schreiber/AP Images]