Will’s wife Jada announced she would not attend or watch the show on 28 February (16) in protest, and Will, who was out of the country when she made her video declaration, will also boycott the ceremony because he believes the nominations reflect a greater problem in the U.S.
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Of the class of 2016, Mark Ruffalo, supporting actor nominee for Catholic Church abuse probe film “Spotlight“, said on Thursday that while he supported calls for diversity, “I will be going to the Oscars in support of the victims of clergy sexual abuse and good journalism”. “I am an Academy member and it doesn’t reflect me, and it doesn’t reflect this nation”. “The entire American system is rife with a kind of white privileged racism that goes into our justice system”.
“There is a position we hold in this community, and if we are not part of the solution then we are part of the problem”.
“I was out of the country at the time”, he told Robin Roberts in his first interview on the subject.
The filmmaker Spike Lee has also said he will skip this year’s awards show.
Some, most vocally Janet Hubert (who played Aunt Vivian on Fresh Prince of Bel-Air for three seasons before being replaced by Daphne Reid), have accused Pinkett Smith of calling for a boycott primarily because her husband was snubbed for his role in Concussion. The double Oscar-winner denounced the Academy, saying he feels like things are moving in the wrong direction.
Following the announcement of the Academy Awards nominations earlier this month, numerous actors have spoken out about the lack of diversity among the list – with not one non-white name featured. There is a regressive slide towards separatism towards racial and religious disharmony.
And he said that the Academy’s current conflict reflected a deeper malaise in American society.
Cheryl Boone Isaacs, who is black, has described the failure of the 6,000 members of the Academy to nominate ethnic minority actors as “heartbreaking”, and promised to reform the system.
Ruffalo told Sky News: “This is a conversation that we’re having on every level in America today”.
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He said: “There’s probably a part of that in there, but for Jada, had I been nominated, and no other people of colour were, she would’ve made the video anyway”.
