The night Hollywood brought their black friends – publico

                 

                         
                     

                 

 
                         

Most unpredictability about the Oscars this year – what nobody foresaw – was how the organizers of the ceremony dealt with the much-criticized lack of racial diversity Hollywood

.
                     

                         The absence of any actor or actress blacks among the 20 nominees in the categories of interpretation and the alleged lack of recognition for the Academy with Selma , historical drama directed by african American Ava Duvernay on a landmark in the struggle of American civil rights, distracted attention from the competition itself for what many viewed as a reflection of false liberalism of Hollywood, always ready to defend progressive causes but perpetuating the status quo when it comes to your own backyard . Or, as others have said less benevolently:. Nominations this year have highlighted the systematic racism of the American film industry

That the last year’s edition has devoted 12 Years Slave Steve McQueen, the first film made by a black to win the main prize in 86 years Oscars, only served to accentuate the contrast. The difference a year makes: in 2014 there was talk of “history-making” on the integration Awards, this year there was talk of hypocrisy

Recent events. in Ferguson and Staten Island, where black unarmed youths were killed by white police also definitely buried the illusions of Obama was on a post-racial America and did return a debate on racial divisions more combative and less compliant.

This discomfort climate made the ceremony this year had a surprisingly political nature, rather than in a long time: the highlight of his almost four hours was – and this is consensual – the presentation of Glory , hymn about the emancipation of black people in America who mentions Ferguson and won the Oscar for best song (the one assigned to Selma ), followed by the speech of his co-performer, John Legend who pointed out that the film itself is unable to do:. that there is a relationship, a story not closed, between the events portrayed in Selma, and this

“Selma is now. The Voting Rights Act by which [Martin Luther King and other black activists] fought 50 years ago is being called into question in this country today, “said the musician, before stating that there are currently more blacks in American prisons than slaves . in 1850

But what made the truly rewarding ceremony for those who have long sought a good reason to pay attention to the Oscars – and not found in the movies, jokes, the musical numbers, the speeches – went to see Hollywood’s efforts to try to correct or distract the public’s lack of diversity of this issue, making the issue even more apparent

As a white person who proclaims “But I have black friends.! “When are accused of racism, the organizers of the ceremony wanted to redouble black visibility in the room, bringing them to the front rows, often focusing the camera on them, providing a parade of black presenters on stage (13 in total, including many Sometimes pairs of black actors with white actors). As often happens with well-meaning whites when they are faced with their racial attitudes, desculpabilização had its unusual and condescending moments (not yet spent a minute from opening when the presenter Neil Patrick Harris joked that the Academy Awards “honor the best and most white, “but it was a self-derision gesture intended to make way for dangerously risky racial jokes throughout the ceremony).

Of all the contradictions that contain the Oscars, this is perhaps the one for which we will remember this issue here a long time: an exaggerated celebration of a multiracial Hollywood not see the work of any black colleague worthy of nomination.