So, as the saying goes, it’s come to this.
What’s “this”? “This” is a metastasizing cultural mandate that it is part of systemic racism for a white citizen in the United States to seek any position, place of honor, influence, prestige or prominence, reward, benefit or achievement that a “BIPOC” might have attained without the competition. Naturally Hollywood in one of the agar nutrients growing this toxic and unethical contagion.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced that it will be “conducting a review” of this season’s Oscar nomination campaigns by studios and artists. Everyone knows, however, that the real impetus for the investigation is the grassroots campaign that nabbed a best actress Oscar nomination for Andrea Riseborough’s performance in the independent film “To Leslie.” Riseborough is, to the public at least, an obscure 41-year-old British actress whose film was heard of by few, seen by fewer, cost little to make and grossed nothing by Hollywood standards. Critics, however, were lavish in their praise for her performance, and, missing the advantage of big studio promotional marketing aimed at Oscar voters, she and the film’s supporters created buzz the old-fashioned way, through networking and word of mouth.
The film’s director, Michael Morris and his wife, the actress Mary McCormack, appealed to notable friends in the actors’ section of the Academy of Motion Picture Sciences, urging them to see the film, post about Riseborough’s performance on social media, and to host in-person or Zoomed interviews with the actress. Among the glitterati who promoted Riseborough on social media or through events hyping the film were Susan Sarandon, Helen Hunt, Zooey Deschanel, Mira Sorvino, Constance Zimmer, Rosie O’Donnell, Alan Cumming , Edward Norton, Charlize Theron, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Minnie Driver, Gwyneth Paltrow, Amy Adams, Frances Fisher and Kate Winslet, who said of Riseborough’s To Leslie performance at the event she hosted, “I think this is the greatest female performance onscreen I have ever seen in my life!”
It worked. But—oh-oh!—none of Riseborough’s advocates were black, and you know what THAT means.
When she won the nomination—remember, nobody is questioning the quality of her performance—it became a racial issue, because virtually everything in post-Obama America is a racial issue. The New York Times reported that questions were being asked about “whether Ms. Riseborough, who is white, had secured a nomination that may otherwise have gone to a Black actress like Viola Davis (“The Woman King”) or Danielle Deadwyler (“Till”)”. Chinonye Chukwu, the director of “Till,” wrote on Instagram after the nominations, “We live in a world and work in industries that are so aggressively committed to upholding whiteness and perpetuating an unabashed misogyny towards Black women.” Though she didn’t mention Riseborough’s nomination, it has been widely assumed that it was the catalyst for her outburst.
LA Times film critic Robert Daniels wrote: “Although it’s easy to point a finger at Riseborough for taking a slot from Black women, broken systems persist when we focus our ire on individuals … what does it say that the Black women who did everything the institution asks of them – luxury dinners, private Academy screenings, meet-and-greets, splashy television spots and magazine profiles – are ignored when someone who did everything outside of the system is rewarded?”
Well, it’s “easy” if one the one pointing a racist asshole, I guess. Of course, the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag, which first appeared in 2016 after no non-white actors were nominated in any of the performance categories, is back. Dammit, what the Oscars need is racial quotas! (The Academy has de facto quotas already.) Variety quoted an anonymous Academy member as saying, “No matter what happens, [Riseborough’s] reputation is being tarnished, whether her campaign did something or not.”
Tarnished, presumably, as a purveyor of systemic racism. As Scott Feinberg argues with brio in “Oscars Op-Ed: Why Surprise Nominee Andrea Riseborough Is Unlikely to Face Sanctions for Unusual Campaign,” the claim that there was anything unprofessional or inappropriate about the success of the Riseborough movement is absurd. He recounts the amusing history of how studios had used money and influence to acquire nominations on grounds other than merit in the past, stating that”unabashed solicitation of Oscar votes is a tradition almost as old as the Academy itself, and an unavoidable outgrowth of dangling a prize that could change the fortunes of a film or filmmaker.” He also points out,
But what happens when good work is done by filmmakers or talent who are not backed by the infrastructure and deep pockets of a big studio? Most of the time, not much….
Over the years, however, some filmmakers and talent associated with these kinds of movies have refused to go down without a fight. Some argue that a self-funded grassroots campaign is embarrassing and looks, in the parlance of our time, “thirsty.” But a handful of folks have calculated that one is worth mounting anyway — out of pride in their work and/or a feeling that recognition could lead to life/career-changing opportunities — and have taken matters into their own hands….And, oftentimes, those investments paid off. See: Robert Vaughn’s best supporting actor nomination for The Young Philadelphians (1959), Nick Adams’ best supporting actor nom for Twilight of Honor (1963), Cliff Robertson’s best actor nom and win for Charly (1968), and Candy Clark’s best supporting actress nom for American Graffiti (1973)…And to me, it’s particularly understandable why Riseborough’s friends and supporters adopted this approach. All of her higher-profile competitors who ended up not nominated on Tuesday —[including] [black actress] Viola Davis for The Woman King— had way more money spent on their behalf by the studios distributing their films. Riseborough’s friends and supporters had to act scrappier because they, unlike their competitors, didn’t have the resources not to…
Much quoted is actress Christina Ricci’s post to Instagram: “Seems hilarious that the ‘surprise nomination’ (meaning tons of money wasn’t spent to position this actress) of a legitimately brilliant performance is being met with an investigation. So it’s only the films and actors that can afford the campaigns that deserve recognition?….”
Well, it’s only a problem if some of the actors who miss out on nominations are black, apparently.
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Pointer: Dr. Emilio Lizardo.
Ethics Alarms 
Alan Cumming!!! Oopsie! Alan, shouldn’t you withdraw your letter in support of this white Brit Colonialist natural woman? What were you thinking, buddy?
Assholes.
I bet all the glitterati will fold like cheap suits and grovel apologies.
Is it possible the woke will never be satisfied with anything less than equal outcomes in everything?
How would that look if equal outcome became the new standard?
See, eg., the Soviet Union.
I was at an all day seminar once about 15 years ago with about 200 others. I’m white, but in my profession these seminars are usually pretty well integrated. For whatever reason, though, at this particular seminar we were all pretty much the same race.
At lunch there was a woman keynote speaker. She was older, maybe mid-70’s, and had a bit of a subdued 70’s vibe. She was thin with long wavy locks of salt and pepper (mostly salt) hair and turquoise and silver jewelry. I thought she would be a really interesting speaker. I wasn’t wrong, though what she had to say was not anything I expected.
She started talking about how we are the master race, how we needed to take our rightful spot above all the other races and put the other races in their place. I was stunned. I could have closed my eyes and imagined myself at a Ku Klux Klan rally.
What shocked me most was the reaction of the others present. Instead of the horror I felt, they were cheering her on, clapping and shouting their approval. I couldn’t believe it. These were my colleagues. A few of them I considered friends. They were all university educated and trusted members of society.
I wasn’t sure what to do, or how to react. I wanted to stand up and say that what she was saying was wrong, or at a minimum I wanted to walk out. But I stayed silent in my chair. It was so unexpected I was unable to react. But the main reason I didn’t rise up in protest: I was the only white person there. Everyone else, including the speaker, was black.
Afterwards, I asked a couple of people I knew who had been at the meeting what to make of it. They basically answered that it wasn’t what it was. One of the younger guys said it was only what the older generation thought, that the younger generation went along with it but didn’t really believe it. But for me, my trust was shattered. I look at things like Black Lives Matter, Critical Race Theory, and Wokeness through a whole different lens than I would have before.
So in answer to your questions, “Is it possible the woke will never be satisfied with anything less than equal outcomes in everything?”, based on my experience at that meeting, I doubt even that will satisfy them.
I watched Andrea Riseborough as Stalin’s daughter in “The Death of Stalin”. Pretty crazy movie.
That being said, we watched “The Woman King” a couple of weeks ago and, while I had not been enthusiastic about watching it, it turned out to be pretty good. We both loved the performances.
What I find particularly troubling is the casual assumption that it was Riseborough, not, say, Ana de Armas or Michelle Yeoh, who was the fifth-in-line nominee, and that one or the other of Davis or Deadwyler was necessarily next in line.
Suppositions and presumptions masquerading as fact: the story of life in the 2020s.
Missed that, and it’s an excellent point.
Well, yeah. Frankly, though, I am surprised that Ana de Armas hasn’t caused a ruckus: She’s Cuban/Spanish, but not the good Castro kind.
This whole kerfuffle is amusing. The Academy has launched an investigation into Riseborough’s marketing strategy. Hmmm . . . . . Is there a preferred strategy? Open bribery is fine as long as the nominees check off DIE criteria and the more the better? Seems a bit silly considering that they are giving awards for “best performance” and not “best liaison or nominating campaign”. Think about that: there is an acceptable nominating campaign. This actor, Riseborough, decided to enlist the services of some heavy weights to lobby for her performance. The horror. The mind boggles at the superficiality and arbitrariness of this whole thing. In the end, who cares?.
jvb
That is, indeed, the bottom line with the Oscars now. Too bad. It was fun while it lasted.
Among the glitterati who promoted Riseborough on social media or through events hyping the film were Susan Sarandon, Helen Hunt, Zooey Deschanel, Mira Sorvino, Constance Zimmer, Rosie O’Donnell, Alan Cumming , Edward Norton, Charlize Theron, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Minnie Driver, Gwyneth Paltrow, Amy Adams, Frances Fisher and Kate Winslet, who said of Riseborough’s To Leslie performance at the event she hosted, “I think this is the greatest female performance onscreen I have ever seen in my life!”
Those irredeemable racists! How dare they promote a white actress, regardless of how good they think their performance is, when there are so many deserving “BIPOC” actresses who haven’t had the opportunity to slop at the Oscar trough.
What a tragic tale of woe! (If my writing’s sarcastic intent didn’t shine through for whatever reason, let me emphasize it a bit.)
What we see here made manifest is exactly what Critical Race Theory and it’s derivatives preach — there is no equality, and therefore equity must be enforced and white people particularly must be made to suffer not just coming in second or third regardless of the quality of their performance, but anyone suggesting it should be otherwise must me shamed and shunned. That’s what this is, written in bold, bright neon emotions.
I am perfectly happy to see these leftists hoist on their own petard. I feel for the profession, as I would any profession that was so hopelessly compromised by politics and virtue-preening. But it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving candidate, at least in terms of the profession. Pretty soon there won’t be any need to care about art anymore, because quality and merit are only distantly secondary considerations.
With respect to Riseborough, well, I guess those are just the wages of all that white sin. Sucks, doesn’t it?
Like for PEDs in baseball; an asterisk next to an Oscar winner’s name to designate *privileged not BIPOC* would at least be a woke step in the right direction.
Maybe they should just divide the Oscars up by genre (or something), so that they can include categories which may have fewer white viewers but which hold cultural touchstones and icons for other ethnicities. After all, if you had people competing for “best singer” and 60% of the country liked pop, 20% liked hip hop, and 20% liked country, that doesn’t seem very fair to all the hip hop and country artists. They deserve their own categories.
Another factor in this situation, I suspect, is that people may be less likely to cast nonwhite actors in lead roles if they’re worried about “the movie’s broad appeal” or “the relatability of the character”. That’s definitely a problem. The people who claim that it’s impossible for white people to relate to anyone else certainly aren’t helping.
The people who complain that nonwhite casting is “political” also aren’t helping. If you can’t use art to introduce people to different perspectives, then what’s art for? Mindless entertainment? Granted, some people may find it distracting to be introduced to the perspective that other ethnicities are normal, relatable humans, and that’s exactly why people care about the representation of nonwhite ethnicities in media. Humans shouldn’t find it distracting to watch the lives of humans who aren’t exactly like them, and it’s a valid long-term strategy to try and broaden people’s perspectives through art.
I don’t necessarily think most artists are good at broadening people’s perspectives, but I endorse the principle and support their opportunity to try. They just shouldn’t complain if they make something cringeworthy and people don’t like it.
“Another factor in this situation, I suspect, is that people may be less likely to cast nonwhite actors in lead roles if they’re worried about “the movie’s broad appeal” or “the relatability of the character”. That’s definitely a problem. The people who claim that it’s impossible for white people to relate to anyone else certainly aren’t helping.”
It’s not a problem, it’s reality. Minorities say repeatedly that they want to see “people like them” on screen, but so does everyone else to a greater or lesser extent. Entertainment is a business: if you can cast actors of equal ability who will have particular appeal to 15% of the market or 75%, which do you cast to maximize the likelihood of box office success?
Black Oscars and white Oscars! Separate but equal! There. Problem solved.
In vain, we look to Hollywood for consistency in ethics or morals!