By Stephanie Shore

With brutal honesty and straightforward delivery, Tim Robbins didn’t hold much back at Blackman Auditorium on Monday night.

“This was a sham from the start and they knew it,” Robbins said of the war in Iraq. “And that’s why they shouted us down – because they didn’t want public opinion to grow against them because they knew they didn’t have the facts to back it up.”

Although making some bold political statements at the forum, Robbins’ main agenda on Monday was not politics or acting – He was there to talk about theatre.

“Ideas and politics are irrelevant compared to emotional truth,” he said backstage before the forum.

Robbins, an imposing figure at 6 feet 5 inches, appeared at Northeastern to discuss “Theater as Civic Dialogue.” The star of movies like “The Shawshank Redemption” and “Mystic River” explained to an audience of students and fans that what’s really important in theatre is the heart and soul of the characters and the story.

“You have to find what’s moving about the people of the story you’re going to tell,” he said. “You can create a story that can raise questions, and the ultimate goal is not to change minds, but to open dialogue