Oh, Hollywood. Always the drama.
Oscar Boycott 2016: Several black actors, actresses, directors, and producers have said they will not attend this year’s Academy Awards ceremony on February 28 because the vast majority of nominees, in every category, are white.
Will and Jada aren’t going. Spike Lee isn’t going. Nick Cannon isn’t going. (Wait. Was he ever going?)
Danny DeVito chimed in to reassure us that, of course, the Academy is racist because the entire country is racist.
And since we hadn’t heard from everybody yet, Charlotte Rampling, a 2016 best actress nominee for her role in 45 Years, told us that the Oscar boycott is reverse racism: “These days we live in countries now where everyone is more or less accepted.” Thank you, old, white, British woman, for clearing shit up.
My problem with the Oscars? Not the lack of black nominees this year or any other year. Nope — it’s the times, in the past, when they’ve handed out what I call the token Oscars — the trophies that say, Hey, black people, we see you out there. Really.
See Denzel Washington. If you’ve watched Glory, you know why he won the 1990 Best Supporting Actor award. And, if you’ve watched Training Day, you have no idea why he won the 2002 Best Actor Oscar. One hell of a swagger in that leather coat, but come on.
See Halle Berry. Amazing actress. Still, was that crying and awkward thrashing around with Billy Bob Thornton in Monster’s Ball really Oscar-worthy?
Got to love the power of subjectivity. Academy voters base their votes on what they like, whom they like, whether the club sandwich they had for lunch is sitting well in their bellies, etc. And I’m subjectively saying that Berry wasn’t as good as Sissy Spacek in In the Bedroom. I’m subjectively saying that giving Washington an Oscar for Training Day was absurd. And, it’s just my opinion when I say that, truly, Washington (for Glory), Hattie McDaniel (for her role as Mammy in Gone with the Wind), and Mo’Nique (for her role in Precious) are some of the few black actors/actresses who earned their prizes.
Still haven’t seen 12 Years a Slave, so I don’t know about Lupita Nyong’o.
Sorry, Cuba Gooding, Jr. You too, Jamie Foxx.
Let’s just do away with the Oscars completely. Or, go the route of Little League teams and give everyone a trophy. I’ve been practicing my speech:
First, I’d like to thank the Academy for giving me the opportunity to see that I’m OK with black people winning Oscars for playing slaves or moms on the welfare, but not OK with black people winning Oscars for portraying criminals or mothers to dead sons or athletes or famous black musicians — which makes about as much sense as your random nominees and winners. Most importantly, thank you for letting me know that you like us, you really like us, and we like us when we play parts we were born to play or parts everyone expects us to play — the roles we have to play. Shout-out to the writers who make that happen. And thanks to IM Global for bringing 50 Shades of Black to theaters everywhere.
This article appears in Jan 28 – Feb 3, 2016.