#OscarsSoWhite is trending for the second year in a row, after the academy failed to include an artist of colour in a whitewashed list of actors and actresses nominated for awards. In response to the nominations, Chris Rock, the host of the upcoming awards show, tweeted: “The #Oscars. The White BET Awards.” Jada Pinkett-Smith, Will Smith, and oscar-winning director Spike Lee announced that they will boycott the Oscars in protest of the lack of recognition of black artists across the board, including best director. Many other entertainers such as George Clooney, Reese Witherspoon, and Oscar-nominated Mark Ruffalo have also voiced their support. Additionally, 50 Cent and Fast and Furious star Tyrese Gibson, have called for Chris Rock to step down from his role as host. Rock said he will not step-down, but a producer for the Oscars announced he is rewriting his material following the controversy. In an interview with ABC, Will Smith said“It’s going the wrong direction.” He added.“It’s so not about me. It’s about children who are going to sit down and watch this show, and they’re not going to see themselves represented.”
Matters only worsen when people do not recognize the issue. Charlotte Rampling, a 69 year-old British actress nominated for best actress, told the French radio station Europe 1 that the public backlash against the all-white nominations is “racist to whites.”
“One can never really know, but perhaps the black actors did not deserve to make the final list,” added Rampling. When asked if the Academy should introduce quotas, a proposal which no current advocate of increased diversity has raised, she responded: “Why classify people? These days everyone is more or less accepted.”
America has a race problem. Hollywood has a race problem. Both have always had a race problem. The academy is but a small reflection of that. Hollywood has never shown a correct representation of the audience it is entertaining, and neither does the Academy. White actors have consistently been casted for roles for people of colour, say Chuck Connors as Geronimo in the 1962 film, or more recently, Ridley Scott’s film Exodus: Gods and Kings whose lead actors were all white (yet, tanned significantly to fit the roles). It only get worse: not only is there racial bias to actors in the casting of roles, but there is bias in the casting of ballots as well. Of the Academy’s 6,000 members 93% are white, and 76% are male with an average age of 63.
Some other actors that were nominated for the oscars this year contrast the views of Ms. Rampling, and support the furore surrounding the controversy. Nominated for his work in Spotlight, actor Mark Ruffalo told the BBC that the U.S. is “rife with a white privilege racism” that is stretched from the entertainment business to the criminal justice system.