Sean Penn has received a special honor in Ukraine, shortly after he missed the 2026 Oscars. The actor was presented with a unique Oscar statuette in recognition of his ongoing support for the country amid its ongoing conflict with Russia.
Sean Penn receives unique Oscar from Ukraine
Sean Penn skipped the 2026 Oscars on Sunday, where he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in One Battle After Another. Kieran Culkin received the award on Penn’s behalf. A day after the ceremony, the actor was photographed in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv.
While Penn did not accept his third Oscar at the ceremony, he received another honorary statuette a couple of days later. On Tuesday, March 17, he was gifted a one-of-a-kind Oscar trophy by the CEO of Ukrainian Railways, Oleksandr Pertsovskyi. The unique statuette is made from the metal taken from a Ukrainian train that was damaged by Russia during their ongoing war.
The special moment was captured on video, showing Penn receiving the honorary statuette from Pertsovskyi. In the clip, shared by the BBC, the Ukrainian Railways CEO tells the actor, “You’re missing Oscars… So we made this one,” adding that “this is from the railcar that was damaged by the Russians.”
Penn has long been a strong advocate for Ukraine and its President Volodymyr Zelenskyy since the Russian invasion of the country in February 2022. The actor had shown his support by gifting one of his previous two Oscars to Zelenskyy. At the time, Penn told Variety, “I thought, well, f—, you know? I’ll give them to Ukraine. They can be melted down to bullets they can shoot at the Russians.”
Most recently, Zelenskyy shared a photo of himself and Penn on Monday. “Sean, thanks to you, we know what a true friend of Ukraine is,” he penned in the caption. “You have stood with Ukraine since the first day of the full-scale war. This is still true today. And we know that you will continue to stand with our country and our people,” Zelenskyy added.
