TORONTO — For all the political discussions surrounding his career, his life and his new film “Suburbicon,” George Clooney does not want to run for office.

“The reality is, I have to assume there are many more people out there much better qualified to do that than me,” the superstar actor-writer-director-producer said in an interview at the recent Toronto International Film Festival, where “Suburbicon” screened.

“I think the reason people talk about it is because our bench doesn’t seem very good on the Democratic side right now, it doesn’t seem exciting,” added the two-time Oscar winner, addressing a small group of journalists including one from The Canadian Press.

“By this time eight years ago, (Barack) Obama — we’d already heard him give a speech at the convention and there was excitement, and so we had somebody that everybody was looking towards in the battle between him and Hillary (Clinton), and there was something going on.

“I think right now there is a lot of looking and nobody sees anybody, so that’s when the Rock or whoever sort of comes into play. So for me, I will support whomever I can by doing fundraisers or whatever way I can and helping what I probably am better at than making policies.”

U.S. President Donald Trump’s tenure has come up often in discussions surrounding “Suburbicon,” which hits theatres Friday. The dark satire stars Matt Damon, Julianne Moore and Oscar Isaac in a tale of a deadly home invasion that unfolds alongside a white town’s vicious attack on an innocent black family in an American town in the 1950s.

Scenes of townsfolk staging increasingly angry protests outside the black family’s home feel eerily reminiscent of racial tensions brewing in the U.S., like the August white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., to which Trump responded that “both sides” were to blame.

Clooney, who directed and co-wrote the film, said the Coen brothers penned a first draft of the script a long time ago and offered him a part in it, but they ultimately abandoned the project.

Inspired by a racial divide in Levittown, Penn., in 1957, Clooney and his longtime producing partner Grant Heslov wanted to make a film about the scapegoating of minorities. They wanted the movie to have a slapstick feel so it wouldn’t feel like a polemic.

But when Trump was elected during the middle of shooting, the tone had to change as “the goofy seemed too goofy,” said Clooney.

“We did this film not really thinking that there was going to be a violent reaction in Charlottesville and that the president was going to compare the KKK to Black Lives Matter,” said Clooney, who won a supporting-actor Oscar for “Syriana” and another Oscar for co-producing “Argo.”

“I just have to constantly say this: Black Lives Matter protested for racial equality. The KKK, the alt-right protest for racial supremacy, they can never be compared.

“It makes me furious — furious — to see that coming from the president of the United States.”

Clooney was passionate and candid in the nearly hour-long interview at TIFF, peppering his sentences with profanity as he discussed a wide variety of topics, including the twins he and wife Amal, a human rights lawyer, had in June.

He said he’s “ashamed” at the U.S. for electing Trump and welcomes any attacks the right-wing website Breitbart News throws his way, declaring: “Come at me, I don’t care.”

“I would be ashamed if those weasley little putzes, whose voices are getting a lot higher every week as this presidency starts to look worse and worse — it’s getting a little tighter in their throat right about now — I’d be ashamed (if they didn’t attack),” he added.

At age 56, Clooney said he’s still open to acting, but he’s not going to take on roles just to be on camera anymore.

“I’m waiting for another ‘Michael Clayton’ or another ‘The Descendants.’ I’m waiting for one that makes sense for me to do,” said Clooney, noting that after he shot 2010’s “The American,” he realized he needs to take on age-appropriate roles.

“I was like: ‘OK, this is the last time I’m going to kiss the girl and this is the last time I’m going to be that guy.'”

Victoria Ahearn, The Canadian Press