Frances McDormand Delivers the Most Giddy and Inspiring Acceptance Speech of Oscars 90
Frances McDormand was gonna damn near hyperventilate she was so thrilled to win the Best Actress Oscar this year for her role in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. But she demanded that if she fell over, the crowd should pick her up, because she had things to say. Holy hell, did she! Check out her speech above.
After thanking everyone she wanted to thank with regard to her award for her film, she takes a moment to ask all the female nominees in every category to stand up, and they do so to raucous applause. McDormand then gets down to the nitty-gritty of biddness:
“Look around, ladies and gentlemen, because we all have stories to tell and projects we need financed. Don’t talk to us about it at the parties tonight. Invite us into your office in a couple of days—or you can come to ours, whichever suits you best—and we’ll tell you all about them. I have two words to leave with you tonight, ladies and gentlemen: inclusion rider.”
And with those words, McDormand was setting the agenda for Hollywood in the post-Me Too era. If the question is, what do we do to move the needle toward parity and greater inclusion? The answer is, in part: finance women.
And make sure there’s an inclusion rider in your contract. An inclusion rider is basically something A-list actors and other powerful folks in Hollywood can put in their contracts stipulating that their work on a project is contingent on a certain level of diversity and inclusion being reflected both above and below-the-line (creators, performers, crew, etc).
You wanted concrete things to do in order to affect change in the entertainment industry? Here are two things. Go do them, Hollywood.
(image: screencap)
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