Mark Ruffalo has a house in Sullivan County. Record reporter Steve Israel reached out to Ruffalo earlier this week to ask about his connection to the region and his activism. The actor wrote this response while on his way to Los Angeles, where he is up for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role in "Spotlight."
We try to get to our place in Callicoon as much as we can on weekends and holidays and of course spend the summer there. It’s a place I will always hold dear to my heart, filled with lifetime friends and lots of positive sentiment. It’s the best most interlocked community I have ever lived in save for my early years in Los Angeles when I was scraping it out to become an actor. Something about struggle brings people together in a way that nothing else does. It creates a relationship to folks that you may have missed out on without having to work together.
I am still active with many of the groups I worked with over the years and am close to all of the folks that populate them, some of my closest friends in the world live there. I have been all over the world and there are few places left that are as pristine, rural and full of opportunity like the Catskills. There are few places where the people are so real and approachable, and when you make a friend it’s a friend for life. I grew up in a small industrial town, it was an American Motors town and it was working class. I enjoy that world, it feels like home to me. It is straightforward and unadorned and real. That’s where I feel most comfortable, those are the kinds of stories I am interested in, they are the kind of people that I feel kindred to.
Just outside my town there were vast dairy farms, where I would spend my days as a boy fishing in creeks and ponds or climbing around in trees. Everything about the Catskills remind me of my childhood. I don’t know what to say other than it’s my home. I think everyone can relate to that.
My continued work against climate change and pushing for clean energy as well as taking the fracking fight internationally is rooted in my deep love of New York state. What I learned and saw there was how people who really care about a place can make a positive difference in the world and even fight and beat the biggest most well-moneyed industry in the world with grit and guts and determination. Working with all the beautiful caring souls of our community and seeing their love of place, brought that to life in me.
The folks there have taught me so much and I am grateful to everyone in my community, even the folks we had to fight against. Because they too fought for what they believed in and they too love that place. Our work is not done in New York and I personally have been working hard to start to change the energy system there to one that will keep billions of dollars in the state by creating our own electricity and powering our lives with it instead of sending our money out of state for fuel or send our kids overseas to fight wars for fuel, or have to destroy our natural resources to extract fuel. I can go on and on.