EMERALD AISLE
Female stars make a stand for women as tainted media industry celebrates its biggest night of the year
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were at last night’s Bafta awards, an event dominated by the film industry’s campaign against sexual harassment. Most nominees and guests wore black to support the Time’s Up movement at the event at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Determination to eradicate the abuse of women the world over.
Bafta host Joanna Lumley highlights the main theme of the night.
IT WAS an event dominated by one theme – the growing movement against sexual harassment and gender inequality in the film industry.
Stars arrived at London’s Royal Albert Hall dressed in black for last night’s Bafta awards, a themed inspired by the campaigns #MeToo and Time’s Up.
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were at the glittering awards ceremony, in which Gary Oldman won the leading actor Bafta for his portrayal of Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour.
Accepting his award, Mr Oldman thanked his three sons and his “beautiful wife” for their support.
He also thanked Sir Winston Churchill who, he said, “held the line for honour, for integrity and freedom, for his nation”.
He said: “I thank you Sir Winston, I thank you and the Churchill family and, of course once again, Bafta, I’m so grateful for this incredible honour.”
Picking up the best film prize for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, director Martin McDonagh said that he was “overwhelmed”.
“This is a film that is a hopeful one in lots of ways, but it is also an angry one,” he said.
“And as we have seen, sometimes anger is the only way to get people to listen and change, so we’re thrilled that Bafta has recognised this.”
Allison Janney said she was hit with a “wave of emotion and joy and pride” when she won her best supporting actress Bafta for I, Tonya.
She said: “Having Kate and William there in the front row, I wanted to say something to them, but you don’t call them Kate and William so I just decided to look at them.”
Prince William, who is president of Bafta, presented the Fellowship award, the highest accolade given by Bafta to someone who has made an exceptional contribution to film, television, or video games.
This year the prize went to Sir Ridley Scott, the British filmmaker behind Alien, Black Hawk Down, Gladiator and the
original Blade Runner. Sir Ridley’s latest film, All
the Money in the World, had to be recast after its lead actor Kevin Spacey was accused of sexual assault, with Christopher Plummer taking his place. Yorkshire-based God’s Own
Country was nominated for the Bafta for British Film and actor Josh O’Connor was nominated for the EE Rising Star award.
As the show kicked off Bafta host Joanna Lumley praised the Time’s Up movement as a continuation of the work of the Suffragettes a century ago.
She hailed the “determination to eradicate the abuse of women the world over” as she took to the stage.
Stars took activists as guests to highlight the fight campaign against sexual harassment.
Gemma Arterton walked the red carpet with Eileen Pullen and Gwen Davis, two of the 187 “Dagenham Girls” who walked out of the Ford Motor Company’s Dagenham plant in June 1968 after learning their work was classified as unskilled – leaving their pay 15 per cent below that of their male counterparts.
“The main thing we want to say tonight is we’re here, we’re here for you and we will listen,” she said.
Andrea Riseborough walked the carpet with Phyll Opoku-Gyimah, a co-founder, trustee and executive director of UK Black Pride.
Ms Opoku-Gyimah said: “It’s absolutely important to be here. When these cameras stop rolling and Andrea goes back to work and other women like Andrea go back to work in the industry, we’ve got to make sure that they are supported, that their stories once told are believed, and there is no silencing of women.”
During the event demonstrators wearing “Time’s Up Theresa” T-shirts stormed the red carpet to protest against the Government’s Domestic Violence and Abuse Bill.
The Sisters Uncut group linked arms and lined up along the carpet, then lay on the floor and chanted. The group claims the Bill will criminalise survivors while distracting from funding cuts to domestic violence services nationwide.