“Spotlight” actor Mark Ruffalo is “weighing” an Oscar boycott in light of the current controversy surrounding the lack of diversity in this year’s nominations.
“I’m weighing it, yes,” he told BBC Breakfast on Thursday morning. “That’s where I’m at right now. I woke up in the morning thinking, ‘What is the right way to do this?’ Because if you look at Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s legacy, what he was saying is the good people who don’t act are much worse than the wrongdoers who are purposely not acting and don’t know the right way.”
When asked what he thinks about the lack of representation of people of color in this year’s nominees, Ruffalo said he totally agreed with the controversy.
“It isn’t just the Academy Awards,” Ruffalo said. “The entire American system is rife with white privilege racism. It goes into our justice system.”
Hollywood has come under fire for the second year in a row for failing to nominate a single actor of color in any acting categories.
On Monday, director Spike Lee announced that he would not attend what he called the “lily-white Oscars,” while leading entertainment figures such as Will and Jada Pinkett Smith and “Straight Outta Compton” producer (and Oscar voter) Will Packer criticized the persistent status quo.
Academy president Cheryl Boone Isaacs, also an African American, issued a statement on Martin Luther King Day promising changes within the group.
“I am both heartbroken and frustrated about the lack of inclusion. This is a difficult but important conversation, and it’s time for big changes,” Boone Isaacs said.