Sir Michael Caine on Oscars race row: 'You can't vote for an actor just because he's black'

Sir Michael Caine said black actors should not be nominated just to add diversity, as he weighed in on the Oscars race row.

Hollywood heavyweights Spike Lee and Will Smith are boycotting the Academy Awards after no actors from ethnic minorities were nominated in the top four categories, but Sir Michael told Nick Robinson on Radio 4′s Today show it should not become a box-ticking exercise.

He said: “There’s loads of black actors. In the end you can’t vote for an actor because he’s black. You can’t say ‘I’m going to vote for him, he’s not very good, but he’s black, I’ll vote for him’.”

He continued: “You have to give a good performance and I’m sure people have. I saw Idris Elba (in Beasts Of No Nation)… I thought he was wonderful.”

The two-time Academy Award-winner also offered some advice to black actors to “be patient”.

“Of course it will come. It took me years to get an Oscar, years,” he added.

Sir Michael also pointed out the bright side of an Oscars snub.

“The best thing about it is you don’t have to go. Especially the Oscars, 24 hours on an aeroplane and I’ve got to sit there clapping Leonardo DiCaprio.

“I love Leonardo, he played my son in a movie, but I’m too old to travel that far and sit in an audience and clap someone else,” he said.

After returning from acting retirement because “I couldn’t find a television show I wanted to watch everyday”, Sir Michael is starring in new movie Youth and has also filmed bank robbery movie Going In Style with Morgan Freeman and Alan Arkin.

He admitted he has dismissed taking on another movie as he approaches his 83rd birthday, but said he would love to film the story of the Hatton Garden heist alongside Ray Winstone.

“I would do it, yeah, if the script was good. If I was starting that script it would begin extremely funny and then become extremely sinister because those guys are not funny guys, they’re serious criminals. It’s sort of comedy gets Jack Carter in the end,” he said.




..poor Michael, I don't really think he's understood what Spike Lee and others are saying, you can only 'give a good performance' or an Oscar nomination worthy performance if you're given an Oscar nomination worthy role in the first place...and 'those rooms' where all of the roles are cast with the movie executives, finance backers, writers, screen writers, producers etc..are very much 'white' is what Spike is saying...what Michael said about working with Ray Winstone as well, I think that's also a thing, that roles are written for specific actors/actresses just like songs are for music artists ..so if more diverse roles are not there for actors/actresses to show how diverse they themselves can be, then that's going to limit in screenwriters thinking of them when they're writing, or writers thinking of a black actor playing their character...they're not being allowed to fully helped to 'imagine' all possible castings that may be neutral and not specific to being a certain this or that...and not being allowed to imagine them all because of the lack of diverse roles for black actors/actresses, so it's a circle which has to be broken and has to start in those rooms without a monopoly of 'white'...so if a book is looked at to being adapted to a movie and 'neutral' lead characters/great characters/Oscar potential characters are there, there is an equal representation or more representation of voices in those rooms for all actors who could be just as perfect and could give the good performance that is needed because it isn't about meh performances, it's about meh roles compared to the opportunities of white actors ...it's a tough job making a performance good if it just hasn't got that scope of possibility...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/m...sity/79161308/
Reese Witherspoon criticizes Oscars diversity

It's now a no win situation because if black actors do get nominated in the furutre people will say it's because they have to be seen as inclusive to all races and meet a certain quota to keep the peace. So the actors themselves will always have that thought at the back of their minds. Was i selected because of my performance or colour etc.

:facepalm:

You could say that of the next James Bond. It looks like many people dont want the best actor they want an actor who fits into their ethnic image of Bond. Ability seems to be secondary.

Charlotte Rampling isn't happy either
http://www.msn.com/en-gb/entertainme...id=binganswers

It's gonna be very interesting to see who they choose next as the new James Bond. My money is on a chinese midget with tourretts.

Time we had a Jayne Bond :idc:

But she must be lesbian to tick that box.:cheer2:

Suits me.

I know the very man who would make an excellent Bond,he's Scottish too.:smug:

He's the wrong colour.

Well done for finding an interview where she says nothing other than - Perhaps they weren't good enough. The same excuse that was used 10/20/30 years ago :thumbs:

I dont think she's quite got the point.

It's a bit ****ty to focus on James Bond. It was written by a white man, writing for white men, about a white man seducing women, firing guns and driving fast cars. The films adapted from that. It is what it is. Hollywood doesn't focus on bringing brand new stories to the forefront, it's more obsessed with franchises for blockbusters, biopics for character transformations and little-guy-facing-adversity type films for the same kind of character transformations that critics love, seeing actors dress up/down and portray a heartbreaking story. I agree that it's unfair that there aren't so many roles for ethnic minorities, but it begs the question, what exactly do we want to see? It would be phoned in to have a black James Bond because of reasons outlined above; it would be better to have original stories, but about what? I think there are some incredible TV producers and actors and actresses who are doing much more to break down racial and gender barriers, and also TV seems to be getting a better budget in general and is becoming more exciting than film anyway... I much prefer investing in a well produced 10 hour long series of something like Game of Thrones or How To Get Away With Murder or Grey's Anatomy or some other huge TV show that will tell a proper story and allow for better character development than a 90 minute long film that lives and dies by its box office takings.

Who is this ho talmbout maybe there weren't enough good black actors, bitch please. Straight outta compton smashed it, Idris and Michael B Jordon. There's no reason why any of those at least couldn't be nominated, specially Michael B when the film was being praised and Stallone was recognized. Wtf is that medicocre film with Steve Carrell. Another wallstreet type with white guys corrupting each other?:sleep: Maybe if we didn't have asswipes like Matt Damon tamlbout blacks in terms of diversity are ok in the casting but not the writers room, things might've been different.

Beautifully said.

Thanks :) I dunno, I get why there are so many people getting angry about this but I don't think it's a racism issue as such, it's just a general problem with Hollywood becoming stagnant and obsessed with insane budgets in a kind of parody of the Space Race or something. Audiences don't go to the cinema as much as they used to, the whole industry is becoming unsustainable and as such I find it a bit pointless to be trying to break down barriers in an industry that's ready to collapse anyway. Special effects have been done to death and I haven't personally gone to see a superhero film since the last Christopher Nolan Batman came out because the whole genre is exhausted, but that's what Hollywood wants to spend money on - and if not that, it's extending the shelf life of its existing franchises from Pirates of the Caribbean to Shrek... none of these films are made to impress critics, so the very small remaining space for films which critics (i.e. Academy Awards et al) will give consideration to is a narrow playing field regardless of your race. Everyone bemoans Leonardo DiCaprio not having won an award yet but at least he gets casted in these sorts of films on a regular basis.

I hope more film actors bite the bullet and star gunning for TV roles because there are far more exciting shows on TV than there are films I want to see.

Who cares,lol

I also think that there are minorities who actually never get a chance to feature in Hollywood films unlike African-Americans which might be a bit of a stupid thing to point out but I do think is worth considering - take the film Aloha, it was universally panned for whitewashing its cast and rightly so, but I couldn't name you a single actor other than maybe Dwayne Johnson who's a famous Pacific Islander actor. Lucy Liu is one of a very few East Asian faces in Hollywood. Are there even any Indian subcontinent actors? Arab actors?

Dev Patel played the lead role in the 2008 best film winner Slumdog millionaire

Fair point, but then again, that was eight years ago and his career hasn't taken off since then. I'm talking established names - there are none that I can think of right now?

:laugh2:

See, when you have to go back 8 years to find an example.. it usually indicates a minority is under-represented. Also it was a movie set in India.. so it makes sense that they would have an Indian actor. Why do they have to do that only for a role that involves poverty?

Why not just have more southasian main characters? Or even just friends of main characters in all movies?

I was just giving an answer to the last part of Zs post.

But yeah let's deny it if it's not what you want to hear, I'm fine with that.

Look at White applauding whitesplaining. It's like all the condescending people listening to a black person that's experienced racism and then preceding to say but that's not racism this is what racism is and then "explains"

..yeah Z, obviously it's all ethnic minorities and not just African-Americans..that's really just specifically being highlighted in this because Spike is such a spokesperson in Hollywood for African- Americans so that's where his focus is...but the example that wanna has said with Dev Patel..that was a movie that could have only been cast with Asian actors, I mean there was no choice in that and that's the same with many ethnic minorities...Jackie Chan, oooo we need a kung foo person..?...that type of thing...so Slumdog won an Oscar and from that Oscar..should have brought a diversity roles for many of the actors but did it..?...I can't see that it did, it's kind of a 'where are they now' type thing and yet it was an Oscar winning movie...whereas with many 'typical 'white' movies that could compare, with unknown actors being cast...that would have meant an opening to their career, that big part/opportunity they had been waiting for in Hollywood, not a thank you very much and now the door is closed, maybe you'll get a bit part every now and then....that's how it seems to me anyway...maybe that also happens to actors/actresses who are not ethnic minority as well but compared to the roles cast there, I would say to a much, much lesser degree....

Actually Gerard Butler would make a great Bond.But will Smith's wife would defo kick off if he did.:joker:

Anyone see Ice Cube on the Graham Norton Show? He had an interesting point to make. He said you get lots of accolades in the movie business and didn't seem unduly worried that Straight Outta Compton was only nominated for Best Screenplay. He also said:

"How could you be mad because one other academy or guild or whatever didn't say we're No. 1 … It's crying about not having enough icing on your cake."



http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/new...er-used-858446

I think it's an excellent move, When I heard they were going to make changes I was dreading the thought of them adding a quota which would be worse than snubbing actors of colour altogether since it would just be tokenism. Taking steps to diversify the voters themselves is a good move which could bring a big change to Hollywood itself.

:clap1: :clap1:

Charlotte Rampling now claims her comments were misinterpreted.

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2016...misinterpreted

One pf the quickest back tracks ever.

Silly bitch.

This is the third time you've made this rather unfunny and irrelevant comment.

Why you've grouped black skin in with a list of disabilities is quite telling though.

Yesterday she had plenty to say for herself but apparently today those comments were misinterpreted. Not sure how her comments could have been misinterpreted, yesterday she seemed quite emphatic.

Yeah, I don't think it's about them not getting awards. It's more that the Oscars shortlists exposes the large disparity between how many white people head movies and how many non-white people get that opportunity.

Considering some of the stuff Spike Lee's said about white people, Rampling's comment fades into insignificance.

I do think it was a case of her misunderstanding the situation. Her original interview implied she hadn't read/heard much about the boycott prior to the interviewer bringing it up and got the wires crossed about what it was about.

I think we all have views on gentrification.

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/02/26/us...entrification/

Can someone please tell me just WHAT this thread is about, if it is NOT about the fact that black actors have NOT been nominated for an Oscar for two years running? Please enlighten me.

Yes Spike does not Like our Builders
who buy out local zones to build New High End flats.


Thats OK
he should make a Film on it.

Regeneration
is needed in many Zones


Life In The City

Yes Spike Lee started it off
now a Gang off Actors want to back him.
to Not go to the Oscars
Lack of Black Winners Moan

I say Blacklist* the feckers

* Thats a Business Term Only.

Spike Lee is a gifted film maker but he has a massive chip on those paranoid shoulders and his frequent bleating does no good to the black cause. Sorry - Just my opinion.