One of the most depressing snubs in this year of OscarsSoWhiteRedux was Idris Elba. Idris Elba was nominated for a lot of other awards for Beasts of No Nation, but he didn’t get a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination. Idris hasn’t said one word in particular about the Oscar snub, but he did appear before a Parliament committee yesterday to discuss the diversity problems within Britain’s entertainment industry. He said in part:
“We need to counter what everybody has, see the lay of the land and see who has which careers in TV. Who makes TV, and who is allowed on TV and when they get the opportunity which roles do they play, on and off screen. You have to ask the question – are black people normally playing petty criminals? Are women always the love interest or talking about men? Are gay people always stereotyped? Are disabled people ever seen at all? This is what every young British actor asks me – black, white, male, female – should I go to America to become a successful actor? And I’m always in a quandary because it’s not always true that the grass is greener. The reason I went to America is because the U.S.A. has the most famous diversity policy of all and it’s called the American dream….[But there’s] the gap between the dream and reality. Now the gap is what Martin Luther King set out to fill in his dream. To champion diversity is to champion the American dream.”
I’m including the video of Idris’s speech below. Idris has lived, on and off, in America for more than a decade. He’ll always be a Londoner, but many of us here in America accept him as one of our own too. And he not wrong about British diversity problems, nor is he wrong about the the gap between the dream and the reality in America.
God, he looks great in this video, right? And even though he’s reading from notes, you can tell he wrote it himself and he’s comfortable with the words, and he’s trying to make the discussion interesting and engaging. As for what he’s saying… he’s said it before, as has David Oyelowo (who was snubbed for an Oscar nomination last year for his brilliant work in Selma): as much as we complain about the lack of diversity in American films and TV, it’s SO MUCH WORSE in Britain.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
The amazing/horrible thing about the lack of roles and opportunities for Africans in Britain is that as a result they come to America with the hope of actually gaining more opportunities, but, the sad consequence is that they then take opportunities from American born black actors and actresses.
I say this as an African, but it’s amazing to see the influx of African talent because even when it comes to portraying an American black civil rights leader somehow a black actor still is not good enough.
You can not outrun discrimination or ignorance. I’m not blaming Idris or any of the other African actors/actresses at all. Just that it’s interesting that problems not solved in other places (Britain) come to add to problems already occurring with lack of respectable roles.
It must be infuriating. I think it’s a dual thing: people NOT in the US believe the American Dream works better than it actually does; you have the biggest global centre of the industry, which is bound to make it international. And, as ever, it’s the POC who lose out the most.
For what it’s worth, Clarke Peters of The Wire, who has lived this side of the Pond for years, said they other day that eventually black British actors heading to the US were going to“wake up and go: ‘You know, this is the same nonsense over here as it is there’”.
I think it might be true that there are more opportunities for black Englishmen in America, but that doesn’t mean there are more opportunities for black Americans in America than there are for black Englishmen in Britain. This is speculation, I don’t have anything to back it up with, but if anyone knows of a black actor who has addressed this issue?
I’m British and I think it is pretty much the same in TV. Casting has got better but the gatekeepers (commissioners etc) are still mostly white, as are the writers and directors. And the higher brow the product, the whiter it is. So we have diverse soaps, procedurals and soapy dramas, but the high quality stuff is still very white. I see that with US TV also – low-to-middlebrow stuff is really diverse but the more middle-to-highbrow it gets (eg The Affair, Fargo), the whiter it gets.
In film, I think it’s worse here. Where we do well in film is technical expertise and it’s all very white.
Theatre: don’t know enough about US theatre to compare, but ours is dominated by whiteness. Paterson Joseph had to write his own play to get a story told!
I agree with you. Racism and lack of diversity spans across the entertainment world. But even if the system was more fair, British actors, black and white, would still be coming to US for job opportunities. Even though most films and shows are made for American consumption, the entertainment industry is international now. The business Capital of it is still Hollywood where most (big) deals are made and talent agencies are headquartered, etc. So talent from all over the English speaking world especially counties like Australia or S. Africa almost have no choice but to come to US for more and better opportunities as well as better pay, (although Australia’s is coming up).
I only bring this up cause Americans view the entertainment industry nationally and that it’s our jobs that are being taken from us especially if it’s a foreign actor playing an American. But really there’s a lot of foreign investment and cross over in the business, and the big studios don’t want to be exclusionary. They want to make money exporting American culture entertainment, and they can’t do that unless they allow other countries to participate.
It’s been evening out more now, but Americans still get the lion’s share of entertainment jobs. And although I think it’s a good thing, it makes more competition for POC all around.
I actually think the situation is very similar, but I am an outsider who watches a lot of BBC and American shows in equal parts. I actually often wondered whether the UK had more opportunities. One of my fave shows was Hustle, where the magnificent Adrian Lester was the lead, but then Leverage featured four main characters, two of which were women, and one of the men was black. In Doctor Who they had several fantastic black characters including Martha (who never got the respect she actually deserved as a companion, she was so underrated) up to the recent companion boyfriend. Is it perfect? No, and it needs to be advanced as a cause on both sides of the pond. But I would be curious how many UK actors come over to HW and are dissapoined.
I’m sick of white people making this issue into some sort of affirmative action or tokenism plea from men and women of color. They’re always moaning that it should be about the best performance even though there’s such a huge dirth of roles for people of color and a lack of recognition besides. You’re telling me Stallone had the best performance in Creed? You’re telling me Jennifer Lawrence deserved an award for the same repeat mediocre performance but suddenly there just isn’t any room for more poc nominstions? What you’re saying isn’t that these nominations were the best options your saying that people of color just aren’t good enough and don’t deserve to be brought to the table. You’re saying that we should be thankful for women getting roles even though neatly all these women are white women and women of color are being erased. I’m sick of it.
+1000000
Who excactly you would have nominated instead of Lawrence? There was not many people in discussion apart from Lily Tomlin whose film I have not seen (unless Vikander and Mara had actually campained for lead which they did not). Lawrence was great in her film in my opinion too.
Idris did not really impress me in Beasts of No Nation. But he was good and if I were voting I would have probably voted on principle unless the other supporting actors were really much better (I have not seen the nominees). Sometimes there is no big diffence of how good the performance was and it is not terrible to make a statement by voting.
Aside from Lily Tomlin, which really should have been nominated, there’s Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren. But they’re all old and wouldn’t draw in the youth demographic viewers like Lawrence would.
The Oscars are more about money and industry politics than about who did the best performance or is most deserving. It’s not that JLaw is not a good actress, but the system is warped with few lead roles, and the better roles are always going her because she is marketable and sells tickets. It’s a repetitive cycle, and it gives an exaggerated representation of her talent.
You will drive yourself crazy thinking about Oscars in terms of “best” or “deserved”.
Stallone is nominated because he gave a good performance and has had a 40+ year career during which he’s had ups and downs and made a lot of friends. That’s a narrative the Oscar voting majority (old white guys) LOVE. Lawrence was nominated because she gave a good performance, charms voters when she meets them, and is the biggest female star in the world. It’s a good Oscar story. No one cares that much about “best” so it’s not a referendum on whether POC gave good performances or deserved to be the there.
It’s about diversifying the voting body and roles being filmed so you have more POC who match the Oscar narrative; long careers, big stars, lots of friends who will vote for them regardless. Cynical but true.
I don’t think any POC I’ve met have issues with white people winning awards. I saw Creed and loved it. Stallone deserves an Oscar for his performance. I’m not going to argue that he should not win. The problem is that ONLY white people get nominated and win. In the entire history of the Oscars, we’ve had one black woman (well, biracial woman) win best actress. Are we really supposed to believe that in the history of the awards, only one black woman ever managed to pull off an outstanding performance worthy of Best Actress? Yeah, that’s part of the problem. POC have a hard time even getting nominated. I would have loved to have seen Elba get a nomination. If he lost to Stallone, I would not protest, because Stallone genuinely deserves the award. But let’s get some nominations, then we can talk about winning! There are so many POC who are doing great work, and it’s discouraging to see them not get recognition.
Another issue is that when POC do win awards, they tend to win them for playing roles that play to stereotypes. The last 3 black women to win for Best Supporting Actress played, in order: Welfare Mother, Maid, and Slave. That’s…not great. POC can play as varied, nuanced characters too, and they deserve that chance. That’s what this is all about – increasing diversity across the board – in choice of roles, in chances for nominations, and in awards. It’s across the board.
He is a gorgeous man. Hope his speech can inspire the people with power to do better, be colourblind and be fair.
I really would have loved for him to win, let alone being nominated at the Oscars. sigh..
I watched the whole thing live and bless him, he got nervous a few times. Never, ever seen Big Dris nervous before. Good on him, because he made a nuanced speech.
I watched the whole thing too and thought it was a brilliant speech. Well-researched and written coming from an utterly genuine and heartfelt place. How humble to get nervous at the end and be able to joke about it. He is the sexiest man on earth to me and for the first five minutes, I was dying of the sexiness but after that, I started to really listen and hear his message and, damnit, if I don’t have so much respect for him as an ambassador for this issue. And you know what’s sexier than anything? Respecting someone for being willing to be an ally and advocate for others.
He’s amazing. You know what I would love to see? I would love it if everyone went to the Oscars as scheduled (POC) I mean..and Chris Rock walked out onto to the stage and said “Welcome to the Academy Award Show, enjoy”! And then he walks off stage into the audience and every single person of color gets up and they all make a graceful exit. I think that would be amazing. I would stand and cheer. Really simple and powerful. like “Hey ancient, white men, here’s your show, bye b!tches”. If everyone did it, then it would be hard to blacklist all of them, wouldn’t it?
I love that he included disabled persons in the list of groups that aren’t portrayed often enough.
Is his date semi-squatting? If yes, how bizarre!
I loved Idris in Pacific Rim as the fatherly, authoritative military hero mash-up character. Now, THAT’S a diverse film.