Oscars invite diversity
Academy adds a record number of women, people of colour to membership
LOS ANGELES — The organization that bestows the Oscars is continuing to act on its promise to become more diverse by inviting a record 928 new members representing 59 countries to join, including actors Tiffany Haddish, Kumail Nanjiani, Gina Rodriguez and The Rider filmmaker Chloe Zhao.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences says 49 per cent of its invitees are female and 38 per cent of are people of colour. Should all the invitees accept, the new class would boost its overall membership to be 31 per cent female and 16 per cent persons of colour.
“Hey yo. I’m in The Academy,” Pakistani-American Nanjiani, who co-wrote and starred in The Big Sick, tweeted Monday. His wife and co-writer Emily V. Gordon was also invited to join.
Others celebrated elsewhere, like Haddish, who got the news from Melissa McCarthy on the set of their upcoming film The Kitchen.
“That’s super cool,” Haddish said in a video capturing the moment.
“So I get to vote?” Haddish added, before exclaiming with laughter: “I’m going to get movies for free?”
The film academy in 2016 pledged to double the number of female and minority ranks of its members by 2020. Then, just 25 per cent of its members were female and eight per cent were nonwhite.
Invitees always range from relative newcomers to industry veterans.
Some of the youngest prospective members include 22-year-old Call Me By Your Name actor Timothee Chalamet and Beasts of the Southern Wild’s Quvenzhane Wallis who, at 14, is the youngest invitee this year. Both were Oscar-nominated for their performances.
On the other end of the age spectrum is 84-year-old Gosford Park actress Eileen Atkins.
Other highly recognizable invitees include Dave Chappelle, Jada Pinkett Smith, Amy Schumer, Christine Baranski, Sarah Silverman and Kyra Sedgwick. A batch of The Simpsons stars were also among the acting invitees, for their various film roles, including Julie Kavner, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer and Yeardley Smith.
Both blockbuster and indie films are fair game for academy membership every year, too. This year is no exception, with invitations extended to persons in front of and behind the camera of films like Star Wars (including actress Daisy Ridley) and Black Panther (actor Daniel Kaluuya, designer Ilt Jones and writer Joe Robert Cole) to people like the revered, but very niche Hungarian director Bela Tarr.
Notable music invitees include Kendrick Lamar (Black Panther), Melissa Etheridge (An Inconvenient Truth) and Sufjan Stevens (Call Me By Your Name).
Ten of the invitees were invited to join multiple branches, including Nanjiani (for writing and acting), Zhao (for directing and writing) and The Florida Project director Sean Baker (for directing and writing). They will have to select only one branch.
New members will get a chance to celebrate together at private receptions this fall.