Stuntmen demand an Oscar
Last week brought great news to fans and cinematographers alike: The BAFTA Awards have introduced a new category for Casting Professionals. Unfortunately, colleagues of the British from the American Film Academy are in no hurry to expand the list of Oscar categories. As a result, not only casting experts, but also representatives of other important professions remain without a gold statuette.Information that the British have introduced a nomination for casting directors made American stuntmen more active. Earlier this year, the stuntmen boycotted the 2019 Oscar, and now it has become known that they are preparing an even larger protest for the next ceremony, which will be held on February 9, 2020. Throughout the 90-year history of the Oscar, there have been only a few cases when academics presented awards to stuntmen, and even then it was about honorary statuettes for their contribution to the development of the industry and the development of technical devices for shooting. Naturally, people who risk their lives, perform crazy stunts and act as understudies for movie stars would like to receive awards not once every 20-30 years, but every year. Stuntmen and stunt directors do not put forward any exorbitant requirements. Moreover, many of them are willing to agree that the prize be found at the Academy's scientific and technical awards ceremony, which is held a couple of weeks before the main event and is not broadcast on television.  Legendary Hollywood stunt performer Jack Gill first raised the issue of introducing a new category in 1991. The academics said that first he needed to create a special Oscar committee from among the representatives of his profession. The organization promised that the process would take only 3-4 years. After 28 years, the stuntmen are still without a reward. Over the years, it became more difficult for Jack to make his way to an audience with the organizers of the Oscars. It got to the point that he had to ask friends from other committees to ask questions about the fate of the stuntmen. Gill's patience snapped when someone from the top management of the organization told his friend that stuntmen should not hope for a successful outcome of many years of struggle. "The Academy once made it clear that the Oscar committee could make a formal request for a new category when it has more than 100 members," Gill said. -At the moment, the organization includes 95 stuntmen. Next year we can step over the required line. It always seemed to me that an exception could be made for us, because there are much fewer stuntmen than actors, screenwriters, directors and representatives of other film professions. The academy does not disclose the size of the remaining committees, but I suspect that some of them have fewer than 100 members. And for some reason this did not prevent them from getting their own categories. ”  A series of scandals surrounding the last Oscar ceremonies led to the fact that the Academy began to rapidly renew its ranks. In July this year, the organization welcomed 842 new members from a variety of professions. If the number of recruits goes back to the hundreds next year, the chances are high that the stunt committee will finally reach 100. In this case, the leadership of the Academy will either start frantically coming up with new rules and excuses to deprive tricks of the well-deserved category, or will finally enter into dialogue with Gill. Source: Vulture The Topic of Article: Stuntmen demand an Oscar. |
