The Academy Awards is over with
predictable outcomes: an Oscar to one Black
artist and Black folks inside and outside the
industry complaining. #OscarsSoWhite has been
the case since 1929 when the Academy for
Motion Arts and Sciences was founded. The
abounding racism in the industry did not just
come to light in 2015 with a hashtag. African
Americans are faced with the reality either of
being overlooked for their talents or
seriously start looking at their options.
The Academy has been touting
more diversity since the hashtag embarrassed
almost a decade ago. Right, more diversity in
nominations. It continues to fall short of the
Oscar getting into Black hands. There’s also
the big issue of who’s getting the big bucks.
Black women are still at the bottom of the pay
scale.
The talents of Black women have
been on display at every level of the movie
industry, yet they have never received the
recognition or the pay they deserve. Hattie
McDaniel received Best Supporting Actress for
her role as Mammy in “Gone with the Wind.” The
film’s producer had to pull some strings at
the segregated venue in order for McDaniel to
attend. Even then, she couldn’t sit at the
front table with her co-stars; she was
relegated to a small table against a back
wall.
The
situation for Black women isn’t that
bad
but progress has been painfully slow. Hallie
Berry, who accepted the award for Best Actress
in 2002, is still the only Black woman ever to
receive an Oscar for that category. Don’t even
look at categories like directing or
screenplay. And we can’t even catch a break in
the categories where Black women flourish in
real life like song, costumes, make-up and
hairstyling.
If this is an industry that
Black artists think is important to their
careers and if they believe that the Academy
is critical to affirming their talents, then
it’s time to up the ante. It’s time to stop
the whining, the crying, the begging, the
complaining. It’s time to know your history.
It’s time to get organized.
There are enough Black mega
stars to pool monies that will re-envision a
different kind of industry. When actor Tim
Reid built New Millennium Studios in Virginia,
he was on the right track - have your own
production studio so you don’t have to depend
on the white ones. He built it in 1997 but
they didn’t come. Rumor has it that more
whites used the facility than Black artists
and filmmakers. Reid sold the studio and the
sixty acres it sat on in 2015. Reid and actor
wife, Daphne Maxwell Reid, are still finding
independent ways to cultivate new talent in
the film industry.
There needs to be a laser focus
on collective goals. Will Smith needs to slap
down racist practices in Hollywood instead of
his fellow Black actor. Tiffany
“I’m-gonna-meet-my-future-man-out-there”
Haddish should’ve taken a pass on her
fact-finding trip to Israel (especially since
no actions to help the situation came out of
it). Taraji P. Henson could channel her tears
about the pay gap into decisive action. It
would be more powerful if the Black female
actresses spoke in solidarity about the pay
issue instead of as individuals. Individualism
plays into the old divide-and-conquer tricks
successfully used by those in power.
Marcus Garvey once said, “get
organized and you will compel the world to
respect you.” In this case, Black people in
the entertainment business need to get
organized and compel Hollywood to respect them
by any means necessary.
