The outcry over the nomination of 20 white actors and no black ones for the Academy Awards gained momentum on Monday — Martin Luther King Jr Day — as director Spike Lee and actress Jada Pinkett Smith announced they would not be attending the Feb. 28 ceremony.
However, at a star-studded gathering of mostly black performers to honor King at Riverside Church in Harlem, mentions of the Academy Awards were kept in check, even by those whose films and performances were not nominated.
Neither the event’s host, Ryan Coogler, the director of Creed, nor the film’s stars, Michael Jordan, who read a Fred Hampton speech before a rapt crowd, and Tessa Thompson, who read one by Angela Davis, alluded to the complaints surrounding the nominations.
Chris Rock, who is scheduled to host the awards, also kept on message after taking to the stage following Jordan, reciting My Dungeon Shook by James Baldwin.
Rock made only one joke.
“I don’t really appreciate having to follow the heartthrob, but I will try my best,” he said of Jordan.
Earlier in the day, Lee had announced on Instagram and Pinkett Smith through a video their intentions not to attend the awards because, for the second year in a row, none of the actors nominated are black. They did not call on Rock to do the same.
Referring to himself and his wife, Lee wrote: “We cannot support it and mean no disrespect to my friends,” naming Rock; one of the producers, Reginald Hudlin; and Cheryl Boone Isaacs, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences president. All three are black.
In a video released on Monday, Pinkett Smith said of Rock: “I can’t think of a better man to do the job at hand this year than you, my friend, and good luck.”
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