Now that the 2016 Oscar nominations have been announced, the academy are facing some backlash due to the lack of diversity. Already some stars have commented that they’ll be boycotting the ceremony this year, while others have spoken on what needs to change within the selection process to ensure fairness and diversity with the selected nominations. Here are 5 stars who’ve commented on this issue.
Chris Rock
Chris Rock is the host for this year’s Oscars and took to twitter after the nominations were announced to joke about the lack of diversity this year. He tweeted: “The #Oscars. The White BET Awards.”
Gina Rodriguez
Actress Gina Rodriguez explained that the diversity problem begins on the Academy board which is mostly made up of white males: “You also have to look at the diversity on the Academy’s board. It’s not as diverse as reflected in today’s society. [We’ve] got to fix that.”
Jada Pinkett Smith
Jada Pinkett Smith made headlines when she claimed she will boycott the awards this year due to lack of diversity. She explained: “Begging for acknowledgement, or even asking, diminishes dignity and diminishes power. And we are a dignified people and we are powerful. Let’s let the academy do them, with all grace and love. And let’s do us differently.”
Niecy Nash
Niecy responded that she doesn’t know if a boycott is the answer to bring about change: “I don’t know if avoiding it altogether is going to help, but I just think we have to continue to move forward. We have this awareness and this spotlight — we’ve got to look at other work. There’s other work out there that I think was missed. We’ve just got to do better.”
Spike Lee
Director Spike Lee shared an Instagram post revealing his disappointment with the academy and commenting that he will also boycott the awards this year: “How Is It Possible For The 2nd Consecutive Year All 20 Contenders Under The Actor Category Are White? And Let’s Not Even Get Into The Other Branches. 40 White Actors In 2 Years And No Flava At All. We Can’t Act?!”
