Real-Life ‘Get Out’ Character Bradley Whitford Lectures Stephen King on Diversity
Stephen King got a lot of unasked-for lectures recently when he tweeted about diversity not being an important criteria for him when considering his Oscar nominations.
As a writer, I am allowed to nominate in just 3 categories: Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Original Screenplay. For me, the diversity issue–as it applies to individual actors and directors, anyway–did not come up. That said…
— Stephen King (@StephenKing) January 14, 2020
…I would never consider diversity in matters of art. Only quality. It seems to me that to do otherwise would be wrong.
— Stephen King (@StephenKing) January 14, 2020
The most important thing we can do as artists and creative people is make sure everyone has the same fair shot, regardless of sex, color, or orientation. Right now such people are badly under-represented, and not only in the arts.
— Stephen King (@StephenKing) January 14, 2020
It’s a sensible stance that I broadly agree with. A good movie is a good movie and a bad movie is a bad movie; a bad movie starring a woman isn’t any better than bad movie starring a man.
Bradley Whitford took issue with King’s comments, telling TMZ King is “expressing his ignorance” before struggling to think of anyone who he felt had been snubbed aside from Greta Gerwig, who the TMZ interviewer had just mentioned, settling on Adam Sandler who, to be fair, is Jewish.
It reminded me of a story about how when Whitford was filming Get Out, he didn’t realize the line “By the way, I would have voted for Obama for a third term if I could,” was a creepy thing to say and suggests he may have even said it to Jordan Peele himself.
Jordan Peele sort of had the perfect casting in a movie where white people are body snatching blacks people because it’s fashionable in their upper-class white liberal circles to do so, didn’t he?
