“There were nominations left off the table”, he added before listing off possible nominations for this year including Straight Outta Compton, Creed, Will Smith, and Idris Elba.
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“I think that it’s our responsibility now to make the change”, she said.
“It is a white-male dominated industry so that change has to happen at the root or it’s not going to change as we see with the nominees unfortunately”, said Morgan. “I think that’s absolutely true”, Clooney said.
In a lengthy Instagram post, Lee said he “cannot support” the “lily-white” Oscars.
“I am both heartbroken and frustrated about the lack of inclusion”, she wrote. “This whole Academy thing is a misdirection play”, he said.
She sassily stated: “You ain’t Barack and Michelle Obama and y’all need to get over yourselves”, and concluded that Will and Jada were in fact part of the problem with their production company Overbrook Entertainment.
“I mean, we can’t say hocus-pocus, presto chango”, he said.
Separately, black actress Jada Pinkett Smith said she too would not be attending the February 28 star-studded ceremony. It has me thinking about unconscious prejudice and what merits prestige in our culture.
In response to the boycott spearheaded by Smith as well as director Spike Lee and civil rights activist, Al Sharpton, Isaacs has released a statement.
Last year’s all-white acting nominees also drew calls for a boycott, though not from such prominent individuals as Lee and Pinkett Smith.
“At the Oscars, people of colour are always welcomed to give out awards, even entertain, but we are rarely recognised for our artistic accomplishments”, she tweeted following the nominations announcement. The actress called on the black community to remember they are powerful people who should consider making programs that are “just as good as the so-called mainstream”.
He suggested the only way things would change is if the studios adopt a system akin to that used by the National Football League, which requires that minorities be interviewed when coach or executive positions open up.
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Most urbanites looked askance when Boone Isaacs was chosen as the first black president of the Academy, knowing that she would wield very little power to implement changes.
