Oscars voters criticize the Academy’s “completely ridiculous” new diversity rules for Best Picture
Oscar voters have labeled the Academy “utterly ridiculous” after new Best Picture diversity rules mean some of its most acclaimed past winners, such as The Godfather and Schindler’s List, are ineligible for nomination.
Under the new regulations, films will have to meet minimum requirements with regard to representation and inclusion.
This means that from 2024, the Academy of Motion Picture will disqualify films from the Best Picture contest that are deemed not to have enough actors in the cast and crew who belong to an ethnic minority, are from the LGBTQ community, or are disabled.
It means that a string of Best Picture winners over the decades, such as 2001’s Gladiator winner and 1977’s All the President’s Men winner, would lose the prestigious award if they were nominated today.
The new selection process has been criticized by voting members of the Academy, with one director calling the decision “completely ridiculous.”
Under the new Best Picture diversity rules, films such as the 2001 winner Gladiator starring Russell Crowe would not have been eligible to win
All President’s Men would lose the prestigious award if nominated today, as two of the four elements of the criteria would not be met
Under the new regulations, films will have to meet minimum requirements for representation and inclusion, which would mean that longtime Best Picture winners such as The Godfather would not be nominated.
The unnamed filmmaker told the New York Post: I’m for diversity, but to let you cast certain types of people if you want to be nominated? That makes the whole process contrived. The person who is right for the part should get the part.”
The director called the decision “crazy” and said no production should limit her choices in who to cast.
Another director questioned whether Schindler’s List would not be nominated “since there were no non-white people in the lead roles” and asked if Jewish people would be considered among the “underrepresented racial or ethnic group.”
While a Hollywood insider claimed that most people within the industry are not in favor of the new rules but are unwilling to speak out for fear of canceling the culture.
“Everyone thinks the Academy has gone too far. It’s ridiculous to tell us to regulate our work,” he told the news site.
An unnamed filmmaker questioned whether Schindler’s List would win Best Picture if these rules were in effect in 1993, questioning whether Jewish people were considered an underrepresented group
Academy Award-winning actor Richard Dreyfuss denounced the Oscars’ new diversity and inclusion requirements, saying, ‘They make me throw up’
Dreyfuss in his role as Elliot Garfield in The Goodbye Girl
He added that while filmmakers “talk about it among themselves,” it’s not “worth talking about it in public.”
However, Jaws star Richard Dreyfuss, 75, has been very vocal about the issue, previously claiming the waking agenda made him want to “throw up.”
In a scathing review of the rules last month, he told PBS’ Firing Line, “They’re making me throw up.
“No one should tell me as an artist that I have to give in to the newest, most current idea of what morality is. What are we risking? Are we really at risk of hurting people’s feelings?
“You can’t legislate that. You have to let life be life and I’m sorry, I don’t think there is a minority or majority in the country that should be served like this.’
Dreyfuss, who won the Best Actor award in 1978 for his starring role in The Goodbye Girl, added, “This is an art form. It’s also a form of commerce, and it makes money, but it’s an art.
“And nobody should tell me as an artist that I have to give in to the newest, most current idea of what morality is.”
New films will have to meet two of the four new standards. These feature a character from an “under-represented racial or ethnic group,” have a plot that focuses on an under-represented group, or have at least 30 percent of the cast from two or more under-represented groups.
Underrepresented groups include women, ethnic minorities, people from the LGBTQ community and the disabled.
That’s what a filmmaker told earlier The Hollywood Reporter: ‘I don’t know, maybe someone in my crew was neurodivergent.
“It’s not for me to ask. Have they done their job? Awesome. And how are we going to know who is gay if it’s illegal to ask people?’
While another unnamed producer added, “The intent is commendable, but many of the questions I felt uncomfortable asking.
“I didn’t intend to write all the actors and ask what their sexual orientation is. And if it’s not something that’s offered in their biography, are you really going to say, “Hey, are you disabled?”
The new rules will go into effect in time for next year’s 96th Academy Awards.
Best Picture winners at the Oscars would still have won the award in recent years had they met the diversity quota.
This year’s winner, Everything Everywhere All at Once, featured a mostly Asian cast, while the 2022 winner, CODA, documents the lives of a deaf family in Gloucester, Massachusetts.
The 2021 winner, Nomadland, focuses on a widow traveling across the US in a van, played by Frances McDormand’s, while the 2020 winner, Parasite, focuses on South Korean families.
Under the new regulations, even recently nominated films, such as Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, would not have made the cut
2019 winner Green Book would still have won as it focused on racism in Jim Crow South in 1962
And the 2019 winner, Green Book, was about exploring racism in Jim Crow South in 1962.
Other films nominated in recent years may not have turned out well.
The new rendition of All Quiet on the Western Front would not have been nominated because of the white male cast.
It’s likely that Elvis would have met the criteria, since “there are probably enough women and minorities out there to make it to 30 percent and qualify,” Jim Piazza, co-author of the Academy Awards: The Complete Unofficial History, told me. to the Post.
Joker, The Irishman, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Vice, Hackshaw Ride, Bridge of Spies, American Sniper and Nebraska are all films from the past decade that would no longer qualify for a nomination, Newsweek reports.
Looking further back, Martin Scorsese’s 2007 The Departed and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King would not have met the new diversity requirements.
An unnamed film critic added that if a “truly excellent film” doesn’t meet those requirements, the filmmakers will simply have to accept it, while a Hollywood executive said the rules cannot be implemented “without harming the film.”
MailOnline has contacted the Academy for a response.