And the Oscars went to Diversity, Chris Rock, and the brilliant ads spoofing the Oscar speeches in the breaks.
As the conversation around #OscarsSoWhite continued raged into the night of the event, the show itself began with Chris Rock asking the question, “Is Hollywood Racist?”
The answer? “Damn right, it is.”
And so the producers pulled all stops to make the presentation as diverse as possible. From our very own Priyanka Chopra, who had the surprising subtitle of a Bollywood actress during her presentation, to all the other brown and black presenters including the president of the Academy awards— who populated the stage as proud examples of Hollywood’s diversity on stage, unlike in the nominations themselves, where they had no representation.
Never in recent times has diversity and the lack of it, as well as social issues such as sexism and sexual abuse—with a jab at Donald Trump, a speech on consent by Vice President, Joe Biden, to the winners of the best song dedicating their song to the LGBT community—had such a starring role on America’s stage of entertainment,.
In many ways, the #OscarsSoWhite did what it did not do—put a spotlight on the issues that plague the country and perhaps the entire world—discrimination, lack of diversity, and opportunity for people of color, women, and those with different sexual preferences.
And, in the background with charges of sedition flying back and forth in the Indian news, the Oscars So White evening also featured what makes America a land of such opportunity—a land where no man can be arrested for freedom of speech.
And finally, in the words of Alejandro González Iñárritu, winner of the director for best movie, “What a great opportunity for our generation to really liberate ourselves from all prejudice, and this tribal thinking, and make sure that once and forever that the color of our skin becomes as irrelevant as the length of our hair,” he said in his best director acceptance speech”
