The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will take “dramatic steps to alter” its membership following criticism of all 20 acting nominations going to white performers for the second consecutive year, academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs said Monday night. In a statement released by the academy, Boone Isaacs said she was “both heartbroken and frustrated about the lack of inclusion.
“The academy is taking dramatic steps to alter the makeup of our membership. In the coming days and weeks we will conduct a review of our membership recruitment in order to bring about much-needed diversity in our 2016 class and beyond,” Boone Isaacs said.
The move to change the composition of the academy’s membership is not unprecedented, Boone Isaacs said. “In the ‘60s and ‘70s it was about recruiting younger members to stay vital and relevant,” Boone Isaacs said. The statement came hours after writer/director Spike Lee, who received an honorary Oscar in November, and actress Jada Pinkett Smith, whose husband was left off this year’s Oscar nominations list, announced they would boycott next month’s Oscars due to the lack of diversity among the nominated performers.
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