Oscar voters were 94 percent white and 77 percent male in 2012. Four years later, the academy has made scant progress: Oscar voters are 91 percent white and 76 percent male. ~LA Times
It’s that time of year again: Academy Award season. Don’t forget to schedule your DVR because today, Feb. 28 is the 88th Academy Awards, otherwise known as the Oscars. Last year was full of fun and entertainment led by host, Neil Patrick Harris, as well as juicy drama arising from the acceptance speeches of Oscar winners.
This year’s Academy Awards will navigate through the #OscarsSoWhite protests occurring nationwide.
The actor and comedian, Chris Rock, will host. This will be Rock’s second time hosting the Oscars–he previously hosted in 2005, and according to his OSCAR promo commercials on ABC, he states that the top 3 reasons to tune into the Oscars is 3) presenter cleavage, 2)find out who died this year and 1) he might curse.”
The Oscars are America’s favorite award show and typically draws the largest non-sports TV audience each year–43.7 million viewers in 2014. We love the red carpet, with all the elegant, beautiful, and sometimes ridiculous dresses, and even more so we love the drama. Last year, there was a lot of buzz and excitement during acceptance speeches. The top three speeches that wowed that audience was 1) Graham Moore’s Speech when accepting an OSCAR for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Imitation Game. In his speech, Moore admitted that he attempted suicide when he was 16 and encouraged the audience to “stay weird.”
The second jaw dropping speech was given by John Legend in his award for Best Original Song in the movie Glory. John stated that America “is the most incarcerated country in America” and that “Selma is now.” The third, and by far my favorite speech was given by Patricia Arquette who said, “To every woman who gave birth, to every taxpayer and citizen of this nation, we have fought for everybody else’s equal rights. It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all and equal rights for women in the United States of America.” Arquette defended feminism in her acceptance speech for Best Supporting Actress in Boyhood.
This year there has been some talk among celebrities like Jada Pinkett Smith, who plan to boycott the Oscars for the lack of African American nominees. You can only imagine what might be said up on stage regarding this issue.
The LA Times reported in 2012 that: “Oscar voters were 94 percent white and 77 percent male. Four years later, the academy has made scant progress: Oscar voters are 91 percent white and 76 percent male, according to a new Times study.
Blacks are about 3 percent of the academy, up from 2 percent; Asians and Latinos are each just over 2 percent, with both groups up slightly. The academy has invited more women and minority group members over the last four years, but with its 6,261 voting members appointed for life, the organization’s ranks were on track to remain overwhelmingly white and male for decades.”
Why boycott the Oscars? The reality is that the signs of progress on diversity are almost non-existent.
But just in terms of film, this year we have a lot to look forward to. The nominees for the 88th Annual Academy Awards range from movies such as The Revenant, Mad Max:Fury Road, Joy, and more. The Revenant has received 12 nominations, which may lead to Leonardo DiCaprio getting his first Oscar. Leonardo played a frontiersmen who must fight to survive in the wilderness. He is nominated for Best Actor in his role in The Revenant.
Mad Max:Fury Road has also received an abundance of nominations. It has received 10 nominations, some that include Best Picture, Cinematography, and Costume/Design. My Oscar predictions are that The Revenant will take home most of the Oscars for Best Picture, and that Dicaprio will win his first Oscar for his leading role. As always, many think Jennifer Lawrence, a crowd favorite, will take home another Oscar for her leading Role in the movie Joy.
Be sure to tune into ABC Sunday evening to watch all the drama and excitement unfold. The red carpet will start at 7:00 pm Eastern time and the ceremony will begin at around 8:30 Eastern. Don’t miss out.
As always, the Oscars proved to be an unforgettable night. It has been two days since the Oscars aired and the entire nation still can’t stop gabbing about the events that unfolded Sunday night. There was a lot of love, laughter, and of course the drama!
The drama began immediately when host, Chris Rock’s opening monologue was devoted to the #OscarsSoWhite controversy. Chris Rock did not fail to restrain his thoughts on the matter when he said, “Is Hollywood racist? You’re damn right Hollywood is racist!” He then kept his rant going by suggesting that Hollywood has always been racist but there was never a need for protests due to the fact that there were more important things to worry about such as lynch mobs. This was a bit awkward, and a little unsettling to hear those words spoken as a “comedic” performance, while the primarily white audience responded with laughter
Racial tension proved to be a theme during a separate controversy that has Asian-Americans upset. Chris Rock is catching a lot of hellfire for speaking on racism, when he himself stereotyped Asian-Americans by bringing three children of asian descent onto stage, referring to them as “his accountants.”
It’s safe to say that the Oscars provided a lot of jaw-dropping moments while raising a lot of questions and awareness of the current state of our society in regards to race. However, we can’t forget the moments that couldn’t help but make us smile. My favorite part of the Oscars is when Leonardo Dicaprio finally won an Oscar for his part on the leading role of The Revenant. His speech was was very eloquent and well informed on his cause to the save the planet. Dicaprio ended his speech by saying, “Let us not take this planet for granted, I do not take tonight for granted.” On a lesser serious note, Dicaprio was later found getting his name engraved into talking to the engraver saying, “Do you do this every year? I wouldn’t know,” as a joke of this being his first Oscar win.
Other highlights include that Brie Larson received the award for Best Actress in her performance for Room and Mad Max: Fury Road took home 6 awards for sound mixing, sound editing, film editing, makeup, production design, and costume design.
It was another great year for the 88th Academy Awards. We’ll have to patiently wait for another year to pass by to see the drama unfold next year.