Tag Archives: awards

Movies, pop culture

I AM GAGGED—OSCARS 2017

Watching any award show can be frustrating—they’re long, they’re tedious, and there are too many commercials—so I’m not going to make this intro any longer/more frustrating than it is already.

Moonlight won the Oscar for Best Picture. End of Sentence. Let that be the end of the sentence.

Moonlight, the story of a black, queer man growing up in Miami, won the Oscar for Best Picture. Yes.

To change the headline, to say “HOLLYWOOD SCANDAL: STEVE HARVEY MOMENT AS MOONLIGHT ACTUALLY WON THE OSCAR” is to take away from this moment. This very important moment.

In a year and time when the rights and bodies of LGBTQ people are being arbitrated over, when people of color are being targeted, when minorities are being further marginalized, let us not sully this moment. Moonlight, an exceptional film, won. It won.

In their speech, Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty touched upon diversity, boldness and strength represented in artistic works. Those are very important lodestones for us to carry with us into this next year—a year that has been marked by several different upsets of various sorts. La La Land, despite whatever accolades it deserved, wasn’t a movie that represented all of that. That doesn’t mean that it wasn’t imporant. But it’s like how 25 won “Album of the Year.” It shouldn’t have.

“Of the Year” should indicate something that encompasses the entire year. And in the same way that Lemonade touched upon Blackness, womanhood, police brutality, and politics—Moonlight did that. And in this moment, in this time that is so fraught with chaos and darkness and meanness, it is such a relief that there is some recognition for the accomplishments and contributions of black and queer artists.

I think it’s a tough act to balance art with artists. It was tough to see Casey Affleck take the Oscar for Best Actor. Especially in this year, it is tough to watch men who have accusations of sexual assaults leveled against them receive widespread validation.

It was tough to see that as much progress the Oscars made this year—Mahershala Ali won Best Supporting Actor as the first Muslim Actor to win an Oscar, Viola Davis won her first Oscar for Best Supporting Actress and is the first Black woman to win an Oscar, Emmy and Tony for acting, obviously Moonlight, and more diversity in the nominations—we are still affirming white men with allegations of sexual assault.

Maybe Casey Affleck truly had an amazing performance, but what does it say about us that we validated that? That if your performance is good enough, we’ll forget those three instances of assault? That if you have enough money, not even a Pussygate scandal will cost you the Presidency?

On another note, Patricia Arquette pointed out that her sister, trans actress Alexis Arquette, who passed away in September of 2016, was not included in the “In Memoriam” at this year’s Oscars. And unfortunately, when talking about what the wider public can do for trans youth on the Vanity Fair Post-Oscar livestream, Arquette was cut off to make way for Jon Hamm & Co. talking about licorice (unclear). So I did a little research—you can donate to the ACLU, donate your money or time to the Trans Lifeline, get involved at your local level, and be vocal about support for trans rights.

Sometimes validation comes from the top, but most importantly—and most crucially—it comes from the roots, from the people, from us. On a $1.6 million budget, Moonlight grossed $25 million world-wide. Gavin Grimm, a young trans student from Virginia, is bringing his case to the Supreme Court. Change happens, great things happen, from the ground up. Small things become big things, and then those things become world-changing.

Moonlight won the Oscar for Best Picture.

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music, pop culture

THE GRAMMYS 2017

(i tried to make the header look like a golden plaque? idk don’t judge)

I’m not a music journalist, so I can’t give you all the deep tea on the Grammys, or what each award stands for. I actually didn’t watch the awards show because I don’t have a TV and honestly I can find the performances later. Isn’t that what’s most important?

Rolling Stone released an article, “Grammys 2017: Who Will Win, Who Should Win” by writer Keith Harris, that’s really helpful in understanding the individual nuances of each category.

There are essentially only a few categories that anyone is/should be interested in. “Album of the Year,” “Song of the Year,” “Record of the Year,” and “Best New Artist.” There are other ones: “Best Solo Performance,” “Best Pop Vocal Album,” and on and on until the only person left standing is CeeLo Green because apparently he’s a robot now.

The way Rolling Stone broke it down for the first three categories is this. “Album of the Year” relates most to album sales. “Song” is about the written-ness, and “Record” relates more to performance and singing. In each of these, it was a toss-up between Beyoncé and Adele for Lemonade and 25, respectively.

Adele ended up sweeping all three, with Beyonce winning “Best Urban Contemporary Album” (before the cameras were rolling, apparently they hand out a bunch of awards because the Grammys are long enough as it is).

If we’re going by the Rolling Stone outline, then it makes sense that 25 won Best Album. It sold 3.38 million in the first week of its release; 17.4 million copies in 2015; 20 million copies sold total. That’s, like, historic. So Album of the Year; that makes sense.

And if “Song” relates more to the written, then Adele wins that too. She writes all her own stuff (probably with some help) but whatever. She wrote “Hello.” Yes, done.

But “Record of the Year” should’ve at least gone to Beyoncé. I think that’s what’s so hard about Adele and Beyoncé. I LOVE BOTH OF THEM. Not even out of some deluded idea of “fairness” because—let’s face it—these awards basically mean nothing monetarily to these two queens. They’ll still be fucking incredible, no matter what some group of voters decides (there’s an allegory in there somewhere).

And this is the part that confuses me—does the voter group take into account public perception? Because of the two, 25 and Lemonade, the latter was more—in my small, tiny, chic opinion—the more influential. It brought police brutality into the national dialogue when Beyoncé wore a Blank Panthers-inspired outfit to the Super Bowl; when she released “Formation,” the music video of which invoked Hurricane Katrina, black womanness, police brutality, and Black Lives Matter. She did that.

It seems like that should be accounted for: the amount that Beyonce contributed to, affected and influenced our country’s dialogue about race. Lemonade was powerful in its own right—as a visual album and experience, and the songs that touched on the intersection between Blackness and Womanness—but it also impacted 2016 in a major way. A way that seems not to be recognized by the Grammy voters.

Adele, in her acceptance speech, said that Beyonce should’ve won “Album of the Year,” which maybe is true and is a nice sentiment, but kind of bullshit. I LOVE ADELE, so this is not shade, but there’s underlying condescension in the notion of “You should really won this (but I won this) but you should’ve!” I don’t think, honestly, Adele meant it that way, but actions speak louder than words.

Justin Bieber, Drake and Kanye West made the action to skip the Grammys, despite being nominated in several categories, because they felt the award show did not accurately recognize the contributions and accomplishments of black artists. According to TMZ, they thought it was kind of irrelevant. And after watching Adele sweep every category against Beyonce, I have to agree.

We’re in a tough place because it’s two QUEENS against each other, but Lemonade was iconic in 2016. Not just because it was good, but because it was important. And as heart-rending and evocative and emotional and lovely as 25 was, it wasn’t important and necessary in the same way that Lemonade was. There was pain in the voice of Adele, and in the eyes of Beyonce, when Adele dedicated her award to Beyonce. Because at the end of the day, they—and all artists—recognize the value and depth of each other’s art. Now if that could just be accurately represented, that would be killer.

I just need to reiterate that I love Adele, and writing this has physically hurt me, but I have to honor my truth.

ALSO CONGRATS TO CHANCE THE RAPPER FOR “BEST NEW ARTIST” YOU COMPLETELY DESERVE IT!

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