This year’s Academy Awards have come and gone and representation remains a hot topic. Actress Ariana DeBose and “CODA” Oscar winner Troy Kotsur celebrated the inclusion, despite no deaf or disabled nominees this year, while actors Michael B. Jordan, Jonathan Majors and costume designer Ruth Carter honored fellow Oscar nominee Angela. Bassett in a year when the lack of black women nominees was on everyone’s mind. And in terms of overall female representation, this year’s Oscars were lower than last year’s.
However, history was certainly made on Sunday night in numerous specters.
Actress Michelle Yeoh became the first Asian woman to win Best Actress, while costume designer Ruth E. Carter marked only the second time a black woman has won Best Costume Design, or twice in any category. Daniel Kwan, one half of the “Everything Everywhere All at Once” writing and directing duo, became the fourth Asian artist to win the Best Director award. Kwan’s three Oscars (Best Picture, Director and Original Screenplay) comprise three of the 11 wins by black nominees.
This year’s Asian representation, particularly in the acting categories, was the highest in Academy Awards history, with the most nominations since 2004. In addition to Yeoh, Kwan and Ke Huy Quan from “Everything Everywhere “, Judy Chin’s hair and makeup award for “The Whale” brought the total East Asian winners to four. All four South Asian nominees, the songwriting duo behind the producers of “Naatu Naatu” and “The Elephant Whisperers,” won their categories.
But of the 101 individual categories at this year’s Oscars, only 19 nominees were people of color. That’s only 18% of the nominations. However, they only account for less than 6% of earnings.
Black nominees only make up 7% of the individual nominees, though they ended up securing just one win, for the aforementioned Ruth Carter. Angela Bassett for “Wakanda Forever” and Brian Tyree Henry for “Causeway” were the only black actors nominated, leaving black performers accounting for less than 2% of the nominees. Compared to last year, which had 13 nominations for black talent, this year there were only seven, marking an 85% decrease from the previous year.
And then there was the complete lack of women in Best Director, despite the fact that Sarah Polley won Best Adapted Screenplay for “Talking Women,” which was nominated for Best Picture. This makes it the first year that women have won the Best Adapted Screenplay category two years in a row, following Sian Heder for “CODA.”
Additionally, all of the costume nominees this year were women, and every film nominated for production design included at least one nominee. But history could have been made tonight if Mandy Walker had won Best Cinematography for “Elvis”; she would have been the first woman to win. That award went to James Friend for “All Quiet on the Western Front.” This marked the third time, and third loss, for a woman in Best Cinematography. Women still make up just 3% of Best Cinematography nominations in Oscar history.
Last year was the worst result for female nominees in four years, with them winning 23% of the categories in which they were nominated. This year they actually fared worse, with just nine wins out of 57 nominations. The women only had 15% of the wins this year.
That said, hearing Ke Huy Quan and Michelle Yeoh call out the industry for the lack of opportunities they’ve received only emphasized the continued need for diverse nominees. What can be done to fix that? The jury is still out, but we have a whole year to hope that next year’s Oscars show signs of improvement.
