{"id":1969,"date":"2017-09-10T18:57:41","date_gmt":"2017-09-10T18:57:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/commarts.pleather.us\/2017\/09\/10\/george-clooney-the-key-to-diversity-lies-with-studio-executives-not-the-oscars\/"},"modified":"2017-09-10T18:57:41","modified_gmt":"2017-09-10T18:57:41","slug":"george-clooney-the-key-to-diversity-lies-with-studio-executives-not-the-oscars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/2017\/09\/10\/george-clooney-the-key-to-diversity-lies-with-studio-executives-not-the-oscars\/","title":{"rendered":"George Clooney: The Key to Diversity Lies with Studio Executives, Not the Oscars"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/t\/george-clooney\/\" id=\"auto-tag_george-clooney\">George Clooney<\/a> has a message for anyone criticizing the Oscars for a lack of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/t\/diversity\/\" id=\"auto-tag_diversity\">diversity<\/a>: You\u2019re looking in the wrong place. \u201cIt\u2019s less about the Academy and more about the industry,\u201d said the 56-year-old actor-director during an interview at the Toronto International Film Festival. \u201cI think we need to get more interesting young minority filmmakers getting their films out. It was great to see \u2018Moonlight\u2019 do what it did. I\u2019m happy to see that. We need more of those.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"pmc-related-link see-more\">\n\t\t\t<strong class=\"pmc-related-type\">See More:<\/strong><a target=\"_self\" href=\"http:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/2017\/09\/academy-motion-picture-john-bailey-foreign-language-1201873110\/\" title=\"New Academy President John Bailey is Willing to Ask if Movies Need Theaters For Oscar Qualification, and Other Radical Ideas\">New Academy President John Bailey is Willing to Ask if Movies Need Theaters For Oscar Qualification, and Other Radical Ideas<\/a><br \/>\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p class=\"p1\">As another awards season takes flight, there are fewer buzzy fall titles with people of color and women directors, which has already raised fears of another #OscarsSoWhite sequel. Clooney, however, thinks that the film industry needs to change its ways if Oscar voters want diverse\u00a0options. He offered a recent example of a project he was offered a few weeks ago. \u201cIt\u2019s like an action film, but similar to \u2018The Dirty Dozen,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cI was reading it, and I was thinking, I\u2019m not the right guy to do this part, but why aren\u2019t you getting Idris Elba to play this? He\u2019s a leading man. There\u2019s no reason why this character can\u2019t be black.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">Elba, whose last star vehicle was the poorly received sci-fi-western \u201cThe Dark Tower,\u201d has a history of being under-appreciated in the film industry. In 2016, his lack of a supporting actor nomination for \u201cBeasts of No Nation\u201d was often cited as an example of one major performance overlooked by the Academy when it all the acting nominees were white. Most recently, rumors that Elba had been in talks to play James Bond were put to bed by Sony, which re-upped Daniel Craig\u2019s contract.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">\u201cClearly, the star system isn\u2019t what it used to be, where you put a name out there and everybody comes to see the movie,\u201d Clooney said. \u201cSo why isn\u2019t Idris asked to play this guy? Why isn\u2019t Idris in line for the next Bond? Where is the studio\u2019s imagination?\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">Despite his progressive philanthropic causes, most of Clooney&#8217;s work hasn\u2019t led the charge for diversity. \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/t\/suburbicon\/\" id=\"auto-tag_suburbicon\">Suburbicon<\/a>\u201d is his first big project to deal with racism. The movie, which Clooney and writing partner Grant Heslov spruced up from an old Coen brothers project, stars Matt Damon as a blue-collar man in an exaggerated \u201950s suburban setting enmeshed in a crime gone wrong \u2014 but the movie&#8217;s central motif is the neighborhood impact of a black family who moves onto the same block.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1201859772\" style=\"width: 754px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1201859772 size-large\" src=\"http:\/\/www.indiewire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/7f83d5641c23bc6d8dc23ce7726d9d7a.jpg?w=744\" alt=\"Julianne Moore and Matt Damon, &quot;Suburbicon&quot;\" width=\"744\" height=\"505\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Julianne Moore and Matt Damon, &#8220;Suburbicon&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"image-credit\">Paramount Pictures<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">The family is heckled around the clock by Confederate flag-bearing white people, images that have particular resonance in the wake of the Charlottesville riots. Clooney started working on the movie during the 2016 election, but said he wasn\u2019t surprised that more recent events echoes its themes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">\u201cOf course, Charlottesville happens, because every few years Charlottesville happens again,\u201d he said. \u201cWe keep forgetting that we haven\u2019t excised that original sin completely. When I was growing up in Kentucky, the civil-rights movement had its big wave and segregation was exorcised from this country. We really felt like we were on this trajectory toward it all being finished. It wasn\u2019t something you thought would be around. It\u2019s a surprise that it\u2019s still a part of our world.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">As a filmmaker, Clooney said it took years for him to tackle race because he had yet to find the right project. \u201cA lot of people ask me why I haven\u2019t done any movies about Darfur or South Sudan,\u201d he said, recalling his advocacy in the region. \u201cWell, I haven\u2019t found the script that\u2019s right to do it. My personal life and where I go \u2014\u00a0philanthropic things \u2014 have always been toward whatever is inclusive, not exclusive. That\u2019s always been an important part of my life. It\u2019s just hard to find those films.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">But Clooney added that he would rather see more minority filmmakers work their way into the industry, echoing the rise of Mexican filmmakers in Hollywood over a decade ago \u2014 the so-called \u201cThree Amigos\u201d of Alfonso Cuaron, Alejandro Gonzalez I\u00f1arritu, and Guillermo del Toro, whose \u201cThe Shape of Water\u201d just won the Golden Lion at the Venice International Film Festival.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">\u201cAll these great Mexican filmmakers showed up, it was like, fuck, this is great filmmaking,\u201d Clooney said. \u201cThat\u2019s what I\u2019d like to see\u2026 some really interesting young filmmakers out there. You want to feel something fresh and new constantly. You want people pushing the limits. There\u2019s a way to make things much cheaper now so there are a lot of different voices out there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">He also acknowledged the need for stronger female-centric projects. \u201cI feel as if our industry has lost sight of what we could do well,\u201d he said. \u201cIn the \u201830s, seven of the top 10 movie stars were women. Now, it\u2019s really hard for women. There are a few \u2014 the Jennifer Lawrences of the world \u2014 but mostly, they\u2019re having a tough time and we\u2019re going, \u2018Well, why? What\u2019s happened?\u2019 And women aren\u2019t the minority, by the way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">He placed the blame at studio executives\u2019 feet. \u201cThe thing is, when a business is run by a certain group of people who can\u2019t see putting a 45-year-old woman as a romantic lead, well, that\u2019s a problem,\u201d he said. \u201cYou need to be able to say, she\u2019s still sexy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">Needless to say, he\u2019s not hopeful about the prospects of a diverse Oscar season in the wake of the \u201cMoonlight\u201d win. \u201cI have a sense that now that\u2019s happened, they\u2019ll be like, well, we did it, and move on.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><em>\u201cSuburbicon\u201d opens October 27.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Source: IndieWire film<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>George Clooney has a message for anyone criticizing the Oscars for a lack of diversity: You\u2019re looking in the wrong place&#8230;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":245,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_vp_format_video_url":"","_vp_image_focal_point":[],"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[45],"class_list":["post-1969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-careering"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paqOTj-vL","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/245"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1969\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/m2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}