Next to Simonyan was the night‘s biggest global cultural celebrity, acclaimed director Emir Kusturica, who has twice won the Palme d‘Or at the Cannes Film Festival. Born a Muslim in Bosnia, he converted to Orthodox Christianity and is a Putin booster. Putin awarded him the Russian Order of Friendship in 2016. Of Putin, Kusturica once said, „If I was English, I would be very much against him. I was an American, I would even fight with him. But if I was Russian, I would vote for him.“