Oscar voter: No one would complain about Selma 'snub' if a white man had directed it
Every year, The Hollywood Reporter snags an interview with an anonymous Oscar voter, getting a rare behind-the-scenes look at the decision-making process behind Hollywood's biggest awards ceremony. 2015's "brutally honest ballot" begins as the voter rails against complaints that Selma director Ava DuVernay was "snubbed," arguing that DuVernay didn't deserve a nomination in the Best Director category:
"What no one wants to say out loud is that Selma is a well-crafted movie, but there's no art to it. If the movie had been directed by a 60-year-old white male, I don't think that people would have been carrying on about it to the level that they were. And as far as the accusations about the Academy being racist? Yes, most members are white males, but they are not the cast of Deliverance — they had to get into the Academy to begin with, so they're not cretinous, snaggletoothed hillbillies. When a movie about black people is good, members vote for it. But if the movie isn't that good, am I supposed to vote for it just because it has black people in it? I've got to tell you, having the cast show up in T-shirts saying "I can't breathe" [at their New York premiere] — I thought that stuff was offensive. Did they want to be known for making the best movie of the year or for stirring up shit?"
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