Lack of diversity
Fans use hashtag to decry lack of diversity in awards’ nominations for second year
Acclaimed roles by Will Smith, Michael B. Jordan and Benicio Del Toro overlooked as white performers sweep slots in acting categories,
As the dust begins to settle from the 2016 Oscar nominations announcement, many fans’ enthusiasm quickly turned to disappointment after not a single black actor was nominated.
Actors and actresses of colour did not make it to the 20 award slots available in the best actor, best actress, best supporting actor and best supporting actress categories.
For the second year in a row, fans used the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag to voice their frustrations Thursday morning.
“And the #Oscar goes to . . . somebody white. #OscarNoms,” Twitter user Jamar Hooks wrote.
“The #Oscars this year looking a lot like a Trump rally. All White,” Michael Skolnik commented.
Darnell Hunt is a sociology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and the director of the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies, which releases a “Hollywood Diversity Report” annually.
He said he was hardly surprised that actors of colour were left out of the Oscar nominations. The snubs, he said, reflect a lack of diversity within the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, which votes for the awards.
“Unfortunately, the nominations kind of reflect the state of the industry as it relates to diversity. We’re talking about an Academy that’s 93 per cent white, 76 per cent male, and average age 63,” Hunt told the Star in a telephone interview Thursday.
This year’s Oscars host is Chris Rock, who has regularly brought is- sues of racism into his comedy. Rock did not comment on the #OscarsSoWhite criticism Thursday, sending out only a tweet to say that the nominations mean “we now know who’s going to be throwing up at the Vanity Fair party.”
Many people said they hoped Rock would use his opening monologue to hold the Academy accountable. “Chris Rock is going to totally nail them for that,” Anele Mdoda commented.
Fans on social media wanted Idris Elba to be nominated for his role as an African warlord in Beasts of No Nation, for which he received BAFTA, SAG-AFTRA and Golden Globe nods.
Many were also upset at snubs of Will Smith for his part in Concussion and Michael B. Jordan, who starred in Creed, and that Puerto Rico-born Benicio Del Toro was also left out for his part in Sicario.
While NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton was nominated for best original screenplay — after being left out of the Golden Globes nominations — many on social media were quick to point out that the nominated screenwriters are white.
Hunt said awards like the Oscars set the standards for what the industry views as great films, and that in turn shapes “future decisions that are made about what projects will be green-lit, with what budgets, (and) with what stars.”
“We’re reproducing the same old exclusionary industry by only recognizing certain types of projects and that’s a huge problem,” he said.
Astudy last year from the Universi- ty of Southern California found that film characters are still overwhelmingly white.
Of the top 100 films in 2014, 73.1 per cent of characters were white. Black characters accounted for only 12.5 per cent of the ones on screen, compared to only 5.3 per cent for Asian and 4.9 per cent Hispanic characters.
Hunt said the industry needs to be restructured to better reflect the diversity of U.S. society. That means diversifying membership in the Academy and among studio executives, as well as what roles are being offered to minority actors.
“The high-quality roles need to be diversified so that the machine is not producing an output that pretty much guarantees the snubbing of people of colour every year, which is what we’re seeing right now,” he said.