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George persuades director pal Steven to give $1m to Darfur

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24 MAY 2007

With an address book filled with the names of Hollywood movers and shakers George Clooney has no problems calling in favours from buddies for pet projects. Doing the rounds at Cannes, the Ocean's Thirteen star has been persuading his rich and famous friends to open their wallets for the Darfur crisis. And top of the list was director Steven Spielberg, who gave $1 million to the total $9 million raised by the actor.

Steven's generous gesture came after George and his Ocean's co-stars, including Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and Don Cheadle, attended a £100,000-a-head fundraising bash on a £80-million luxury yacht moored off Cap d'Antibes.

Steven said he'd been moved to act on the Darfur refugee crisis as a result of his involvement with the Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education. In 1994 he founded the LA-based organisation to record the testimony of Holocaust victims in the hope of overcoming "intolerance, prejudice, bigotry and the suffering they cause".