Who’s Who in Green: Woody Harrelson

You won’t find Woody Harrelson living in a huge mansion in Beverly Hills with a garage full of SUVs. It’s not his style. This actor lives perhaps the greenest life of any celebrity around – a simple, easygoing life in a sustainable solar-powered community of 200 on the island of Maui.

Harrelson, a vegan raw foodist who has been arrested in the past for his environmental activism, credits his Cheers co-star Ted Danson with getting him interested in environmental issues. But, the self-described “Hollywood Hippie” has had environmental leanings for as long as he can remember. As a child, Harrelson got beat up by other kids for defending a pile of ants.

As he told SF Gate, “…what really kinda kicked me over into another gear,” he says, “was in 1992 when I read in the L.A. Times — way back in the end of the paper, you’d think it’d be front-page news — that Congress was trying to pass a law to make six million acres available to extractive industries — timber and mining. And it was wilderness, you know? They aren’t making any more of those ancient trees — we’re down to a very small percentage of what there was.”

That spurred a series of changes in his own life, and a desire to help out with green causes. In 1996, Harrelson climbed the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco with the Rainforest Action Network to protest logging of ancient redwoods. Of the public reaction to this arrest and another one in Kentucky for planting industrial hemp seeds, Harrelson expresses a bit of frustration about the fact that his celebrity tends to outshine the issues themselves. But, he has also embraced the platform that his fame gives him to raise awareness.

Harrelson started a number of projects to help spread the word about sustainability, like launching the website ‘Voice Yourself’ with wife Laura Louie, which is dedicated to spreading the word about sustainable living. He also embarked on a biodiesel and pedal-powered tour of the West Coast with a group of friends to promote the sustainable lifestyle, an experience that was documented in the film ‘Go Further’. An accompanying book, ‘How to Go Further’, aims to show people how easy it can be to live a peaceful green life.

Perhaps you’ve wondered why Harrelson hasn’t yet appeared in any green-themed films. He was just waiting for the right kind of script to come along. Once it did – in the form of eco-thriller 2012 – he finally agreed to mix his two passions. The film will premiere on November 13th.

Woody Harrelson’s Green Score: 49,435

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