It was one of the most famous acceptance speeches at a Hollywood awards show. When she took the stage as the first African-American woman to win the Best Actress Oscar in 2002 for Monsters Ball, Halle Berry told a star-struck audience of her win, “This is for every nameless, faceless woman of color that now has a chance because this door tonight has been opened.”
Fast forward 15 years later, Berry is singing a different tune. In a recent interview with Teen Vogue, Berry told Editor-in-Chief Elaine Welteroth that her 2002 Academy Award win meant “nothing” to her now as she is the only woman of color to have ever won Best Actress since then.
Berry told Welteroth it was “probably one of her lowest professional moments,” after she realized for the second year in a row it was only white actors and actresses who were nominated for the Academy Awards.
I sat there and I really thought, ‘Wow, that moment really meant nothing…That meant nothing. I thought it meant something, but I think that meant nothing.’ And I was profoundly hurt by that and saddened by that…It’s troubling, to say the least…
After this realization, Berry became committed to making more opportunities for people of color:
I want to start directing. I want to start producing more...I want to start being a part of making more opportunities for people of color. I have conversations more deeply with the Academy members, and I’m trying to figure out how to help and add more diversity into the Academy. … These kinds of groups have to start changing and we have to start becoming more conscious and more inclusive…We need more people of color writing, directing, producing, not just starring. We have to start telling stories that include us.
But it's not true -- the picture isn't as bleak as Berry paints it. Since 2002, four black women have been nominated for Best Actress and five have won Best Supporting Actress; Jennifer Hudson, Mo'Nique, Octavia Spencer, Lupita Nyong'o and just this year, Viola Davis. On the flip side, in the past 15 years, black actors Morgan Freeman and Mahershala Ali (this year) have won Best Supporting Actor.
But, as People magazine’s Mike Miller writes, since 2015’s controversy on lack of diversity, more actors and actresses of color have been nominated:
Following the controversy surrounding the 2015 Oscars, last year’s race included more nominees of color in major acting categories. Denzel Washington was nominated for Best Actor for Fences, Ruth Negga was nominated for Best Actress for Loving, Mahershala Ali won Best Supporting Actor for Moonlight and Viola Davis, Naomie Harris and Octavia Spencer were all nominated for Best Supporting Actress for Fences, Moonlight and Hidden Figures, respectively. Davis ended up winning the award.
The Academy is lunging to push more minority voters into its Oscar balloting. Perhaps Hollywood awards would mean more if it was truly on the best acting performance, not based on color.
