They have her emails! Oh no, the crimes, all the crimes. No, but seriously, this is getting ridiculous.
Andrea Riseborough got Oscar-nominated for this tiny little movie that made $23,000 at the box-office and now the big Hollywood studio machinery is going full blast to shame her and make her feel embarrassed that the tremendous work she delivered in “To Leslie” was illegitimately nominated.
It seems like every day a new hit-piece shows up in the mainstream media, the lapdogs of these big studios who felt cheated by this nomination. The latest one is courtesy of Vanity Fair who show these flimsy emails as proof that the Riseborough campaign did something wrong.
VF is singling out Riseborough’s “well-connected” manager, Jason Weinberg, and Mary McCormack, a veteran TV actor and the “To Leslie” director’s wife. McCormack’s crimes against humanity were that she reached out to actors and other contacts since December, inviting them to official screenings or to watch the film on the Academy’s website. The horror!
“We think you will love it,” McCormack wrote in an email sent in early January. “Other than how proud I am of my husband Michael, we feel so strongly about beautiful films being seen whether or not they have millions and millions to spend on publicity. Films like TO LESLIE are important for the future of film making, so we want to support it and get the word out especially because we know that it doesn’t have the financial means for marketing. In a sea of multi-multi-million dollar award campaigns it is almost impossible for a small independent film like TO LESLIE to break through.
The event was said to be “low-key” and small, centered on a Q&A with Morris and some of the film’s talent. McCormack isn’t even an Academy member, so what’s the big deal here?
There is no smoking gun here. The backers of this small little movie did not go against the grain of fairness. The “To Leslie” campaign decided to do what everyone else does during awards season.
As I mentioned yesterday, all this is doing is turning Riseborough into a stronger contender. She’s getting more press, more attention, and an incentive for people to go see her film. Voting for Riseborough is a vote against the machinery of awards season. Voting for Riseborough is the same as voters giving the middle finger to all the haters in 2019 by marking on their ballot “Green Book”.