Viola Davis says she won't be attending the Oscars this year, addresses Hollywood diversity issues
Viola Davis says she won't be attending this year's Oscar Awards. She also sounds off on inequality in Hollywood...
Viola Davis will not be attending the Oscars this year.
While Davis said that the reason she will not be attending is that she will “be on vacation,” she did go on to address the larger diversity issues facing the awards.
The Oscars nominations for acting categories were exclusively white again this year, prompting the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite to trend around social media, but Davis says the awards aren’t the only problem.
“The problem is not with the Oscars,” she explained. “The problem is with the Hollywood movie-making system.”
She went on to outline some questions that “the people who are in power who have the yay or nay vote” should be asking.
“How many black films are being produced every year? How are they being distributed? The films that are being made, are the big-time producers thinking outside of the box in terms of how to cast the role?” she asked. “Can you cast a black woman in that role? Can you cast a black man in that role?”
“The problem isn’t even our pay,” she later added. “You could probably line up all the A-List black actresses out there [and] they probably don’t make what one A-List white woman makes in one film. That’s the problem. You can change the Academy, but if there are no black films being produced, what is there to vote for?”
