Nicolas Cage in Uganda and Kenya
When Cage was appointed as a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, the organization's Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa demonstrated a knowledge of the eccentric star's oeuvre, saying, "The Lord of War has become a messenger for peace, the Bad Lieutenant has turned into a good cop, and the inmate from Con Air has become a champion of prison reform."
The actor visited Uganda for eight days in November 2009 to highlight human-trafficking problems that help spread HIV, and learned about how child soldiers there are recruited. He also stopped in Kenya, where he visited a prison full of dancing Somali pirates.
Nearly a year later, at a United Nations conference against organized crime in Vienna, Austria, Cage said, "Through working with UNODC, I've come to understand who the world's real heroes are. I've seen the brave souls working on the frontlines, operating under the most difficult circumstances and with very limited resources."
Cage now knows a little more about limited resources. Around the same time he was in Uganda and Kenya, the world discovered he had bankrupted himself during a spending spree that included 15 homes and a fleet of Rolls Royces.
Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images Entertainment
SUBJECTS:
