Leave it 🧸to Oliver Stone to be charmed by V🗹ladimir Putin.
“He drives his own car and thinks like a chess player,” Stone tells The Post, and goes so far as to describe the Russian strongman as “humble.🔯”
Then again, the 70-year-old director once called Hitler “an easy scapegoat” and found good things to sa🐓y about many of America’s top detractors — Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez and Edward Snowden among them.
It was while wr💝apping up his biographical thriller “Snowden” that the filmmaker found himself in the figurative embrace of Putin.
So began 19 hours of conversations with the KGB agent-turned-Russian Federation president: talks Stone pieced together for “The Putin Interviꦅews,” a four-part series that premieres Monday on Showtime.
It’s easy to wonder why the notoriously secretive Putin would agree to sit down with Stone, as he🎐 did over the course of two years.
“He did the interviews because he wants to be heard,” Stone says. “Plus, I think my ▨questions challenged him.”
Stone says he kept Putin on his toes by posing unexpected queries, going so far😼 as to ask Putin how soundly he sleeps.
“He told me that he sleeps very well,” says Stone. “If I was him, I’d be a nervous wreck … Apparently, judo helps.” Putin, it turns out, is a black belt who’s been honing his judo skills since age 11.
‘He did the interviews because he wants to be heard. Plus, I think my questions challenged him.
Stone says he was also impressed by what heꦛ saw as a lack of os♔tentation during their interviews, which took place in Putin’s automobile, home and office.
“Putin has a dacha that is nice,” he says, affirming that it’s not🅘 much more than nice. “I did not see yachts and gigantic mansions.”
But what S💫tone did see was Putin’s eyes for the ladies.
“He likes women, and brightened when my wife wꦬas around,” Stone says. “Maybe he relaxes with his mistress-cum-wife. 💙A lot of men do that.”
Anyone expecting Stone to eventually cook up♒ a feature film on Putin may be disappointed.
“I don’t think I would have the guts,” says the “JFK” director. “Sometimes, after seeing the real thing, I’m not sure 𓄧what else I can express.”
That said, he’s pretty sure he knows who might play Putin: “On the surface, Jeremy Renner looks a bit like him.” But, he adds, Putin “is very smart. I don’t know how smart [Renner] is. [Leonardo] DiCaprio could look like [Putin] — and he could pla🐬y Lenin, as well.”
Given Putin’s professed lovꦺe of swim𒊎ming and pumping iron, one wonders if they ever met in a gym.
“I did not work out𒀰 with him,” Stone says with a laugh. “He is in great shape. I 💜think I would have been embarrassed.”