‘INCLUSION RIDER’ GIVES DEFINING MOMENT TO OSCARS
The 90th Academy Awards turned March 4 night’s ceremony in Los Angeles into a celebration and exhorta- tion of representation and inclusion, after a year marked by seismic cultural change in Hollywood that rippled across the world. This is one night when movie love, popularity, longevity and insider Hollywood politics are all smushed togeth- er. This year was different as Frances McDormand, who won the best actress award for playing a grieving, furious mother in Three Billboards, created one of the night’s most memorable tableaux by ask- ing all the female nominees in the Dolby theatre to stand up. “Look around,” she said. “We all have sto- ries to tell and projects we need financing.” She finished her speech saying: “I have two words to say: inclusion rider,” a reference to a little known contract clause that lets actors demand diversity on both sides of the camera. Backstage, she stressed this is a new era. “We’re not going back. It changes now ... power in rules.” In his best director and best picture acceptance speeches, Guillermo del Toro stressed that he is a migrant from Mexico, and that lines drawn in the sand should be deleted.
Harvey Weinstein, an Oscar svengali who in previous years was thanked more times than God, was nowhere in sight, banished from the Academy last October after multiple allegations of his predations triggered the #MeToo avalanche.