Everything is political – including the Oscars. This week, Wesley Morris, The New York Times’ Critic at Large, joins the show to discuss this year’s standout nominees and what their roles revealed about our culture and our politics, plus the election process leading up to the Oscars and its parallels to the presidential election we’re right in the middle of.
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On today’s episode
Our host
Errin Haines is The 19th’s editor-at-large and writer of The Amendment newsletter. An award-winning journalist with nearly two decades of experience, Errin was previously a national writer on race for the Associated Press. She’s also worked at the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post.
Follow Errin on Instagram @emarvelous and X @errinhaines.
Today’s guest
Wesley Morris is a critic at large and the co-host, with Jenna Wortham, of the culture podcast “Still Processing.” Since coming to The New York Times in 2015, Mr. Morris has written about the moral force of civilian cellphone videos, Hollywood’s addiction to racial reconciliation fantasies, and the endangerment of romantic comedies.
Follow Wesley Morris on X @Wesley_Morris.
Episode transcript
Wesley:
I’m following you.
Errin:
You’re following me. Okay, well…
Wesley:
I’m following you.
Errin:
Get in, loser. We’re going to the Oscars.
Errin:
Hey y’all. Welcome to the Amendment, a weekly conversation about gender, politics and power from The 19th News and Wonder Media Network. I’m your host, Errin Haines. On this show, we’re centering the voices of people who have been marginalized in our country and getting clear on the unfinished work of our democracy. This week we are talking about the Oscars. They were on Sunday, and I was definitely tuned in because I think that while the Oscars are about movies and entertainment, they’re absolutely political. For one, they are literally an election. The actors and actresses campaign for months before the show, and then the Academy votes for which movies they think are the best. But beyond that, the Oscars are also a reflection of our culture. They give us clues into what we value as a society and why. So to dig into all of this, I’m talking to my favorite culture critic, and my friend, Wesley Morris. Wesley is the New York Times critic-at-large, and the winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for criticism. That means he knows what he’s talking about, people. He’s also a seasoned pro at covering the Oscars and thinking about how they reflect our political lives. So I’m so excited to chat with him today. Welcome, Wesley.
Wesley:
Thank you for having me, Errin.
Errin:
First of all, let’s just get your overall takeaways from Sunday. Was there one moment in particular, like an acceptance speech or a gaffe or an upset, that really stuck with you?
Wesley:
Huh. I mean, there were a lot of things happening.
Errin:
All the things.
Wesley:
First of all, I wanna say that I thought the show was good in a very traditional way, right? This is what an Academy Awards broadcast should look like, had people not done things like mix up the winner’s envelopes.
Errin:
Sure.
Wesley:
If nobody ever got slapped. You know what I mean?
Errin:
No violence. Great.
Wesley:
Yes. I mean, the worst, the worst you want to happen is John Travolta not being able to say the words “Idina Menzel,” right? That’s about as bad as it should ever get.
Errin:
So, I have heard you describe the months before the Oscars as a campaign, and I agree with you, but I want you to explain what that means. Like what do these actors and actresses actually have to do the months before award season?
Wesley:
Everything they’re asked to do. Essentially from the period during which your movie comes out to the night of the ceremony, you are kind of putting on a show. You are going to people’s houses. You are going to everything you’re invited to. You gotta find a stylist and a somebody to do your hair and makeup if you don’t already have one. And you cannot miss a single event. You skip one event, it’s over. “Oh, she didn’t come? Oh, well then I guess she must not want this.”
Wesley:
“Guess [we] can’t vote for her, ’cause she doesn’t seem grateful.” And now I have all these questions about whether it’s good for your mental health. Um, listening to Da’Vine Joy Randolph, who won the supporting actress Oscar on Sunday night, talk about how odd this experience has been. Danielle Brooks has talked about how odd this experience has been.
Errin:
That’s the thing. I mean, it’s the performing of the job overshadowing the actual doing of the job, right?
Errin:
Because you’re not getting nominated if you don’t have a certain caliber of performance. But you’re not gonna win if you are not doing all the performative stuff that it takes to curry favor with, you know, these voters. But again, I do think there’s something to what you’re saying about the process, like, is this really how we have to do this process? And on this pod we talk about what it means to amend our democracy. So I’m just curious, like, if you had a magic wand, you’re king of the Oscars, how do you amend this election process?
Wesley:
I mean, I think you shrink the window. The process begins in, I don’t know, when would I say it begins in earnest? Let’s just say it begins, like, with the Golden Globe nominations, right?
Wesley:
But award season starts, I would say, in September with Telluride — The Telluride Film Festival and the Toronto Film Festival. So September is when it really begins. And then you’re in December, January, Golden Globe nominations. Golden Globes happen. The Oscar nominations are at the beginning of January, and the show is not until March. How many months is that? That’s six months! That’s a crazy amount of time for people to be on their best behavior. Do you know what I mean? Like, not messing, you can’t mess up at all.
Errin:
But P.S., I mean, in our presidential politics, you’re talking 18 months on your best behavior, right? No room for error. Uh, so shorter campaign window in our Oscar campaign, but maybe also in our real campaigns? I’m here for that.
Wesley:
I wonder what you, I mean, what do you think? I mean, I can definitely tell you that there’s just like a whole industrial apparatus built around the season, right? I’m partially to blame in some ways because as a New York Times person, I am now responsible for this thing that Lynn Hirschberg and A.O. Scott did for years called, “Great Performers.” I am now the “Great Performers” person, but I’m not thinking about the Academy Awards when I’m doing this. But I mean, it is still another thing for people who become nominees to, like, the publicists really expect them to do it. And they wanna know if I’m gonna pick their people. And I would just say, I mean, partially in my defense, but also on behalf of what is being done here from the purest least cynical and opportunistic standpoint, is that we are celebrating and recognizing great achievements in motion pictures, right? It is a nice memorialization of that year with these people who get chosen.
Errin:
Yes, absolutely. Agreed. I mean, this is supposed to be the point of award shows. I mean, you know, taking the politics out of it, like it is celebrating people, you know, who really did their job at a very high level and who really did move so many of us with their performances.
Wesley:
Mm-hmm.
Errin:
As opposed to, you know, presidential elections. Which, I mean, yes, they’re about choosing this candidate, but in a lot of ways it is kind of a celebration of our democracy, right? And our democratic process and, you know, the voters’ kind of power to elevate this person that’s going to represent all of us. Right?
Wesley:
Well, that’s an interesting thing too, right? Like, I mean, who are these winners representing? Like if you were me in 1991 when Whoopi Goldberg won, she, I think, was the first — she would’ve been my first Black winner. And so I did … I remember sitting in my living room being like, <sob>, “It’s Whoopi.”
Errin:
Yeah. It’s amazing.
Wesley:
Like, even as a kid, I was like, “She’s my third. She’s the person I wanted to win third most, based on the work. But in my heart, she was number one.” Right?
Errin:
Yeah, because it was like, it wasn’t just that she won. It was like we won.
Wesley:
We won! We won! Yeah. And I was just, I remember being so happy. So she is…there is like this question of delegation, right? It’s not nothing when it comes to these shows, because some of these people really are representing other people.
Errin:
Yes.
Wesley:
Larger groups of people, which is why, you know, the Lily Gladstone loss — or her not winning, I guess. I mean, did she lose? No, she just didn’t win.
Errin:
I think it does feel like she lost and not just that she didn’t win. And it was a loss for all of you, right? I mean, and it shouldn’t be that, obviously because…
Wesley:
But the history’s too deep. This show is 96 years old. Or, you know, the award is 96 years old. And, you know, there’s a lot — and we’re talking about American movies —there’s a lot of history.
Wesley:
There’s a lot of stuff that the, you know, if not the Academy itself has to atone for, then what the Academy represents as being an award show, devoted to Hollywood — well, devoted to movie-making. You know, there’s a lot to atone for. But, I also think that there’s a way in which, like, a reparative work is being done by giving her that best actress statue.
Errin:
Sure. And the Academy having an opportunity to do something historic and something that, you know, a lot of people would think of as being overdue, right? I mean, it either is all about the performance or it isn’t. You know?
Wesley:
Ding ding ding ding ding. Yep.
Errin:
If it is gonna be about other things, like, why couldn’t that have been one of them? I mean, but let me ask: I mean, obviously I’m, you know, watching all of this through a gender lens, racial lens, and there were kind of these multiple movies in the best picture category…
Wesley:
Mm-Hmm.
Errin:
…that feature these complicated stories about the lives of White women, right? I’m thinking about “Barbie,” I’m thinking about “Poor Things.”
Wesley:
“Maestro.”
Errin:
Yes, “Maestro” as well. What are the arguments that these films are kind of making about feminism or about liberation? “Anatomy of a Fall,” you know, I think to a degree.
Wesley:
Woof. You know, it’s funny ’cause sometimes I’ll watch these movies — and I don’t always do this. But, I mean, I don’t always do it during the so-called regular season — but when you get into the postseason, like I do spend a lot of time thinking about, “I wonder how this would’ve gone if ‘Anatomy of a Fall’ was about a Black woman.”
Errin:
Jail.
Wesley:
We wouldn’t be like, “I wonder if she did it.” It wouldn’t matter, ’cause she’d be in prison.
Errin:
She’s in jail. She’s in jail.
Wesley:
It is a prison movie.
Errin:
Yes.
Wesley:
But I, you know, it’s funny. I think that each of these movies … I think I’m compelled by the story I am being told about, um, this individual woman. But I also think that these women, you know, these are White women who are coming into a realization of their White womanness, right?
Errin:
Mm-Hmm.
Wesley:
I mean, “Poor Things” is basically the journey of an inanimate object who is revivified into White womanhood.
Errin:
Yes.
Wesley:
And all of the, sort of, capitalist demands placed on that White womanhood. And the only moments of pleasure — the only moments of true, unmitigated, non-financial pleasure that she experiences in that movie, who provides it? A Black woman.
Errin:
Correct.
Wesley:
And if you think about “Barbie,” who is doing, who is waking Barbie up and then making her feel better about the struggle — her White woman struggle?
Errin:
America Ferrara.
Wesley:
It’s two Latinas.
Errin:
Mm-Hmm.
Errin:
Let’s transition into supporting actors, right? The women who were in movies that weren’t starring women. DaVine Joy Randolph won best supporting actress for her role in “The Holdovers.” She plays — for people who haven’t seen it — she’s a boarding school cafeteria manager in that movie. A hell of a performance by her individually. But also, there is kind of this symbolism that I do think we need to unpack. I mean, her role, her subsequent nomination, how does that speak to this history of Black supporting actress nominees that come before her?
Wesley:
I mean, most of them have had a job like the one she has.
Errin:
Yeah.
Wesley:
You know, one of the unfortunate things — from where I sit, anyway — is that you, in having to explain and enthuse and think through what it means for people like DaVine Joy Randolph to become, you know, to join this exclusive acting club…there is this ancillary question of, “How did they get there? What was the role that got them into that club?” I’ve spent my entire sentient life from when I was a kid, really, truly thinking about what the problem really is with the depiction of Black women doing this work. Because it is the work that I was raised by.
Errin:
Sure.
Wesley:
You know? That work got me to college. And the problem with it, of course, is that the movies think of it as a limitation. And they can never imagine a different occupation for Black women, right?
Errin:
Absolutely.
Wesley:
And the pinnacle according to Hollywood, for a Black woman — a Black woman actor, right? —
Errin:
Yes.
Wesley:
—is still working for White people.
Errin:
It’s to play the hell out of a role like that. But like, that is the type of role that gets their attention in terms of how they see us.
Wesley:
That’s a great way to put it. That’s a great way to put it. That’s a great way to put it.
Errin:
Also to your point, I mean … it’s not that we don’t have people in our lives like this, that we don’t love people in our lives like this. That these people…
Wesley:
That it’s not important work!
Errin:
Correct. But there’s a way in which this kind of flattens our humanity, right? Because the experience of people like that is not necessarily the experience that is being celebrated by folks who want to nominate folks who play this role. I guess I’m just wondering what it means that this portrayal is Hollywood’s best interpretation of a Black woman, right? Like it feels like there’s some sort of larger message here.
Wesley:
This longest-lasting, legacy oriented…I mean, it just is proof that things don’t change, right?
Errin:
Yeah.
Wesley:
Things don’t want to change. It’s funny because, you know, I like to keep track of the best director winners and the ways in which that has evolved in the last 20 years. And you can see the changes in The Academy through that category to me.
Wesley:
Where you have all of these … Now, if you’re a White man, White American man, the odds of you even being nominated are low — unless your name is Scorsese or Spielberg. Or in some cases, Fincher. But that is to say that amid all this change, some things have stayed fixed. I mean, I am gonna be cynical now, but I’m just gonna say like, I think for a certain kind of voter, it is a comfort to still be able to give Academy awards to people for service work.
Wesley:
And it doesn’t matter how good that person is in the movie. And in, you know, in DaVine Joy Randolph’s case, I think what is so beautiful about that performance is it’s so free of that history.
Wesley:
You know, it is not burdened. I mean, what you felt watching Viola Davis in “The Help,” for instance, was like a real tension about what it means to play this part.
Wesley:
A part she would later even renounce having played. And what’s so good about what DaVine Joy Randolph does in “The Holdovers” is she just doesn’t care. She has liberated herself from the burden of that history
Errin:
Of the role, yes.
Wesley:
Right.
Errin:
And if this is what Hollywood is going to continue to reward. What is the message that that sends to Black women actors, about the roles that they’re supposed to want, choose…
Wesley:
Well it’s just so interesting to me to think about the role that Emma Stone won for. Which is like the invention of a woman, essentially. And the idea that her best buddy in the movie is this Black lady—
Errin:
Yeah.
Wesley:
—who gives her the only sexual pleasure that did not come at a cost for anybody. I just…there’s like… there’s a whole history that we are, like — no matter how progressive we think we are, no matter how, you know, radical and revolutionary these movies are — there’s always some kernel of the opposite of that within them.
Errin:
Right. That we have not yet…that we have yet to reckon with. I mean, you’re bringing up history and I’m thinking about —we kind of talked about it a little bit earlier — the few actors who were poised to make history, but didn’t. Lily Gladstone obviously didn’t win in the best actress category.
Errin:
And then you had Colman Domingo, a first-time nominee, who didn’t win in the best actor category.
Errin:
What do you make of these nominations? And also the fact that they didn’t win.
Wesley:
I mean, somebody’s gotta lose. We’ll start there. But I would say, this is an unusually large rookie class of nominees.
Wesley:
And most of the class — most of the first-time class — are non-White people. It represents part of this huge shift, in terms of the way we’ve been thinking about the Academy Awards since 2017, and April Reign’s “Oscars so White” hashtag. And so here you have, in 2023/24, a very different picture. But, that, to me, is always a smokescreen for the real…for these other problems.
Wesley:
And there was a moment last night — Cord Jefferson wins the adapted screenplay Oscar for “American Fiction” based on a Percival Everett novel. And, in his speech, he’s like, “I’m not here to be bitter and unhappy about all the studios that passed on my movie. But I will say that for as much as we love these $200 million movies, you know how many people out there who are looking for an opportunity like the one I got — that nobody wanted to give me, that I had to fight for? There are so many of us who would kill to just make a $10 million movie. For $200 million, you can make 20 tens!”
Errin:
Right, yeah.
Wesley:
So, why not consider that? And I think that — and aside from the speeches about the war in Ukraine and the Hamas-Israel war. And then the great industrial speech from Sunday’s show was Cord Jefferson basically arguing that the real problem here is that you’re making too few movies that cost too much money. And that that $200 million budget is a risk. It’s not a guarantee. Y’all got lucky with BarbenHeimer. There was nothing preordained about those movies making what they made. And so, I think, to answer your question, Errin, you get 20 tens, you’ll get much more, I think — in this age that we’re in now — you make 20 $10 million movies … many more of them will have many different people doing many different things. And that’s huge.
Errin:
Yeah. I mean, banking on the blockbuster at the expense of representation. Who is being sacrificed for the blockbuster that may or may not make it? Which, honestly, that makes me think about what even comes next for a Colman Domingo or a Lily Gladstone?
Wesley:
Mm-Hmm.
Errin:
These folks that are kind of playing people on the margins. Like what does an Oscar nomination do for their career?
Wesley:
I mean, it changes everything. I mean, you know, I did not know who Lily Gladstone was before “Killers of the Flower Moon.” I had seen her in things and didn’t know I was watching Lily Gladstone. I’ll never not know that I’m watching Lily Gladstone now, for the rest of my life.
Errin:
Facts.
Wesley:
That person is going to work. The question is, like, what does the work look like? How much agency does she have to choose to say no to things? How satisfying to her is the work going to be — whether it’s things that’ll get her back to the Academy Awards or things that just she had a good time doing. Does she get to do a romantic comedy? Is that a thing she wants to do?
Wesley:
Does she get to, like, play a doctor who goes to the moon? I don’t know. Like, does she get the opportunities to do all the things that an actor should get to do?
Wesley:
Like use your imagination to solve human problems in art, to become new people in art. I would like to know…that’s the real question: Like what does this career look like in five years? You know, Colman Domingo is a slightly different story, um, because, A) He’s older. He’s been around for a long time. I mean, is this a capstone or is it a stepping stone?
Wesley:
This Oscar nomination for playing Bayard Rustin. I think he will continue to work. He’s been working this whole time. But like, does he star? What does he star in?
Errin:
Star in. Yes.
Wesley:
Like, what is he carrying? Is he getting to do the work he wants to do? And having it mean something. I mean, that’s really gonna be the test. I think Regina King’s winning the Oscar — for as famous and as meaningful to you and me as Regina King was — I definitely think that Oscar changed her life.
Errin:
It did. I think so, too.
Wesley:
And that was a woman whose life was fine!
Errin:
Before she won the Oscar she was doing pretty good, right?
Errin:
Okay. So you are now an Academy of one. I’m bestowing that power on you. Are there any movies or performances that did not get graced with the Oscar spotlight that you wanna highlight?
Wesley:
Oh sure. Teyana Taylor in a movie called, “A Thousand And One.” She plays a woman who’s just gotten out of prison and is trying to restart her life. And restarting her life leads her to make a very interesting decision. The movie is well made. Her performance is so quiet and subtle and so much about what her face isn’t doing. I don’t think enough people saw it to even put it near an Academy Award nomination.
I mean, all the people in “Air.” I liked “Air” a lot. I think “Air” is a really good American movie that is very honest about Black and White people and what the friendship really is about. Which is, you know, it’s not about being homies. It’s about getting paid.
Errin:
Yeah.
Wesley:
And it is a very shrewd movie about capitalism and race. Like the most honest…one of the most honest ones I have ever seen.
Wesley:
I just think it’s so light that it’s just easy to miss what’s really going on under its surface. But I think all the acting in that movie, from Viola Davis to Matt Damon to Chris Messina, is really good.
Errin:
I have to go back and watch that one. I mean, I remember seeing it, but then my attention — my post-pandemic attention span — is completely shot. So I’m gonna join you in the academy for one second to just say, I mean, I thoroughly enjoyed “Origin,” and…
Wesley:
Oh, yes!
Errin:
…really thought that thought that would’ve gotten some sort of acknowledgment.
Wesley:
Aunjenue Ellis [Taylor] in that movie..
Errin:
What Ava was able to do with that book and that story…
Errin:
I don’t know if anybody else could have done that. But also like, yes, Aunjenue Ellis [Taylor] and what she was able to pull off, too.
Wesley:
That’s an impossible role. Because you and I both write for a living. It is boring.
Errin:
Hello.
Wesley:
Nobody wants to see the movie of how I make that sausage.
Errin:
Absolutely not. Well, I mean, this could not have been a better idea. Thanks for hanging out with me. This is incredible. This is my pleasure. We now understand the politics of the Oscars.
Wesley:
There’s a really good book, by the way, called “Oscar Wars.” If you want to just like, to get a good infrastructural foundation for what we’re talking about, Michael Schulman, “Oscar Wars” came out last year. It’s really good.
Errin:
Look at you giving us a syllabus at the end. Okay. Wesley, 2024 people, thank you so much for hanging out with me. Thank you so much for helping me think through the amendment of our Oscar politics.
Wesley:
Amen. Hey, look what you did.
Errin:
Okay. So my 19th Hive already knows this, but in case you’re new to The 19th or new to The Amendment, welcome. We have an asterisk in our logo. The asterisk is there to signify the fact that while the 19th amendment granted some, but not all women, the right to vote on paper. That was really not the whole story. So the asterisk really reminds us that our work is far from finished in this democracy. That’s the journey that we’re on here. Thank you for being on this journey with me. And so to end each show, I’m gonna give you my asterisk on the news. Today we’re talking about Equal Pay Day, which we marked on Tuesday. So White women are making 74 cents to the White man’s dollar compared to 89 cents for Asian women, 69 cents for Black women, 57 cents for Latino women, 59 cents for native women. We don’t know what the data is for LGBTQ+ people because the census, hello!, doesn’t collect this data.
Errin:
Now, every year we cite these statistics and we wring our hands and nothing changes. So what is it gonna take for this to change? Men. Yeah, I’m tired of asking women what they think about being paid and valued less for their labor. Talking to my men out here: Are you really comfortable with these numbers? And if you aren’t, what are you prepared to do about it? Do you understand that this affects you, too, in terms of your household, your earning ability, wealth creation, generational legacy? Is it cool with you that your mom is maybe making less money than this man that’s doing the same job as her, your sister, your wife, your girlfriend? Right? Don’t you wanna be able to take better vacations? Don’t you wanna be able to save more for your retirement? Don’t you wanna be able to contribute more to the massive child care bill that you have, or that college bill that’s looming out there? These are all things that are impacted by the wage gap — and there’s so many more — and it persists because men are allowing it to persist. So until men decide that this is their priority, and not just ours, we’re gonna remain decades away from achieving parity. Now, I, for one, don’t wanna wait that long, and I need the men in my life to get restless, too.
Errin:
So that’s my asterisk for this week, and that’s this week’s episode of The Amendment, which is also a newsletter, by the way, that I write. You can subscribe to it for free by going to the 19thnews.org, where you can also find all of our great journalism around gender, politics and policy. For The 19th and Wonder Media Network, I’m Errin Haines. Talk to you again next week.
The Amendment is a co-production of The 19th News and Wonder Media Network. It is executive produced by Jenny Kaplan, Terri Rupar and Faith Smith. Our head of development is Emily Rudder. Julia B. Chan is the 19th’s Editor-in-Chief. The Amendment is edited by Jenny Kaplan, Grace Lynch, and Emily Rudder, and was produced by Adesuwa Agbonile, Grace Lynch, Brittany Martinez and Taylor Williamson with production assistance from Luci Jones. Our theme music was composed by Jlin. I love my theme music.
