Sydney Morning Herald

December 3, 2007

Emily Dunn and Louise Schwartzkoff

 

No feat shunning meat ... Hugo Weaving says he followed his children into vegetarianism.
Photo: Peter Morris

 

Hugo Weaving wears leather shoes, owns a cat and is partial to a fish dinner, but the actor is also a passionate advocate of animal rights.

Alongside Abbie Cornish, Weaving is an ambassador for Voiceless, the animal rights organisation run by Brian Sherman of Sherman Galleries.

With Cornish out of the country because of film commitments, Weaving will be the star guest at a vegan lunch at Guillaume at Bennelong today to announce grants for groups working to protect animal rights. Among the nominees that impressed Weaving are a group working towards a ban on duck shooting in Victoria, another pursuing a ban on the use of animals in circuses and a lawyer publishing a biannual journal for fellow lawyers on developments in animal law.

Although he doesn't consider himself one, Weaving admits celebrities are easy targets for animal rights groups. In 2005 Toni Collette was forced into an embarrassing backdown after she was enlisted by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals as a spokeswoman against the mulesing of sheep.

"I take my hat off to those people … but I often think it does the organisation a disservice because celebrities are easy targets. Do you want the organisation to be taken seriously or do you just want the immediate attention a famous face brings?"

Weaving said a decision by his two children to give up meat led him to forsake eating red meat five years ago.

"It is not a prescriptive thing," he said. "Both my children are vegetarians … The more I started thinking about it, the more I thought my son's natural, childish reaction was spot on."