The Gothams decided that they should go gender neutral in their acting nominations this year, and the outcome has triggered many folks on social media. It’s very amusing to witness.
Only men won acting awards, leaving the women empty handed. The three acting winners were all men. You had some great performances from Nicole Kidman, Mikey Madison and Marianne Jean-Baptiste completely overlooked.
A few years ago, Sam Mendes made the case for gender-neutral Oscars. He admitted, to BBC's Laura Kuenssberg, "total sympathy" for the idea of nixing the Actor and Actress categories. “That’s the way it’s moving. I think it’s perfectly reasonable.
This year, Variety had has an interview with Academy President Bill Kramer saying that he is “exploring” the idea of having a gender-neutral Oscar categories.
Remember when the BRIT awards introduced an Artist Of The Year category as a gender-neutral replacement for Best Male and Best Female Artist categories, and all five nominees that year turned out to be male? Backlash ensued.
Actress Emma Corrin, who identifies as “nonbinary”, has led the charge in installing gender-neutral categories, with written op-eds in major media outlets. Corrin played a female character in “The Crown” (Princess Diana) and was submitted under the Best Actress category at the Emmys — this infamously rubbed her the wrong way.
I’ve warned people about this. Going gender-neutral in a male-dominated industry leads to the possibility of women being sidelined. It's as simple as that.
In November, Patricia Arquette did make some very good points about the negatives of going gender neutral, saying it would detract female actresses from getting recognized, and that’s exactly what happened at the Gothams yesterday.