Following in the footsteps of Charlotte “racist to whites” Rampling and Michael “be patient” Caine is Kristen Stewart, who told Variety that those who have been speaking out about diversity in Hollywood after zero people of color were nominated for any acting categories in this year’s Oscars should stop “sitting around and complaining about that, do something. Go write something, go do something.”
“And that’s easy to say,” she continued, nearly becoming self-aware before veering wildly off course. “Like, f–k, it’s hard to get movies made. It’s a huge luxury. Who gets to just make movies? But that subject is just so prevalently everywhere right now, and it’s boring.”
To her credit, Stewart’s argument (if you can call it that) isn’t in favor of the status quo—something that couldn’t said for Rampling and Caine. She is arguing that people should organize or create things to inspire change, not just talk about it. The problem is, fuck, it’s hard to get movies made, especially for women and people of color—a lack of opportunity is part of the problem.
And also, speaking out about #OscarsSoWhite, even if it’s “boring” to Stewart, has inspired change. On January 21, the Academy announced plans to “double the number of women and diverse members of the Academy by 2020,” which almost certainly wouldn’t have happened if people hadn’t spent most of the previous week sitting around complaining.
Update: Variety, which originally reported that Stewart’s comments were about diversity, has changed its story and now reports that they were about gender equality. Variety conducted the interview in question.