Photo caption: ANGELA BASSETT APPEARS with her husband, Courtney B. Vance. Bassett in a screenshot showing her disappointment in not winning the Oscar for Actress in a Supporting Role.
Ok, the word on the street is that some white folks are up in arms after the Oscar presentations of March 12 because they didn’t appreciate Black actress Angela Bassett’s nonchalant posture after she didn’t win the “coveted” gold statue.
The phenomenal Bassett was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her commanding role as Queen Ramonda in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, as were Hong Chau for The Whale, Kerry Condon for The Banshees of Inisheren, Stephanie Hsu for Everything, Everywhere All At Once, and nepo actress Jamie Lee Curtis (her parents are Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh) for the same film—and for which she won.
Bassett didn’t jump for joy when Curtis’ name was announced, and everyone could see the disappointment on her face. The uproar: some white folks say that she should have rallied around a fellow actress and not be disrespectful.
Bassett, whose husband fellow actor Courtney B. Vance is always exuberant in his support of her, was reportedly all hopeful before the awards ceremony. The New York Post reports that Bassett was the first person to be nominated for an Oscar for a Marvel movie. And earlier in the night, Bassett, who was first nominated for an Oscar in 1994 for What’s Love Got to Do With It, reportedly told Entertainment Tonight that she was “feeling pretty good.”
But a win for Bassett was not to be. She has a great body of work from her first feature film Boyz N The Hood in 1992, as well as Malcolm X that same year, through Passion Fish in 1992, Waiting to Exhale in 1995, How Stella Got Her Groove Back in 1998, The Rosa Parks Story in 2002, to Black Panther in 2018 to her latest film—and a myriad of stellar film and television performances in between.
Admirers would say that she should have won an Oscar for her splendid work as Tina Turner, but all that “goldness” was snagged by actress Holly Hunter for Best Actress in the film The Piano.
There have been think pieces written about the perception of Bassett as being a sore loser. Piers Morgan, the British broadcaster, who has in the past relentlessly trolled Meghan Markle because she reportedly chose Harry the British royal over him, gave Bassett the “Trump Award for Sore Loser,” writing in the New York Post: “Angela Bassett looked like she was glugging a vinegar bottle when she heard she’d lost the Best Supporting Actress to Jamie Lee Curtis. Bassett’s abject failure to even pretend to be gracious wasn’t the best ad for her acting skills.”
Another Twitter handle named @mrmikewinch tweeted: “I don’t know, might be just me, but Angela Bassett not standing, not clapping, and scowling while Jamie Lee Curtis accepted the Oscar seemed foul. I get you’re disappointed but show some grace & class.”
Yet, other Twitter posts against Bassett were just as annoying, but Jonathan Majors and Michael B. Jordan, currently starring in Creed III, gave a sweet tribute to Bassett as they were announcing an Oscar shortly after Bassett was overlooked. As Jordan and Majors got to the mic, Jordan looked towards Bassett and said, ‘Hey Auntie,’ as Majors looked at her and said, ‘We love you.’ Jordan played Erik Killmonger in both 2018s Black Panther and 2022s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the nephew of Bassett’s Queen Ramonda.
Other Twitter posts were just as complimentary toward Bassett: “I 1st saw @ImAngelaBassett in Boyz in the Hood & a voice inside of me screamed, “Finally!” An educated, intelligent, uncompromising, direct, graceful, respectful, dignified, & Unapologetically Black Queen is onscreen BECAUSE we exist. We see #AngelaBassett everywhere she is…” tweeted @Earthatone.
mzpeachz1 tweeted: “I don’t care who say what…#JamieLeeCurtis DID NOT deserve an #Oscars over THE #AngelaBassett, & Angela didn’t owe anyone a fake ass smile…#Oscars #Nepotism #OscarsSoWhite.”
@about_womanhood tweeted: “#AngelaBassett has had AT LEAST 5-6 roles where she deserved at least a nomination before this one. It’s a crime she isn’t an Oscar winner yet. Few actresses have her feminine power and grace. She has been showing how it is done since playing #TinaTurner back in the day. #Oscars.”
It is believed that the Academy made up for ignoring many of Denzel Washington’s great performances in movies such as Malcolm X, Hurricane, Fences, Flight, American Gangster, among others, when they gave him the Oscar for playing a dirty thug cop in Training Day (although he had won an Oscar for that one tear that he shed as a soldier in 1989s Glory).
The same goes for Halle Berry, who won an Oscar for playing a grieving mom with sleazy scenes, along with Billy Bob Thornton in the 2001 Monster’s Ball.
“Have I not given everything!” as Bassett proclaims to one of her woman soldiers in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, after the soldier loses sight of Queen Ramonda’s daughter. Maybe, eventually Bassett will get the coveted gold statue soon as a “makeup” award, as the Academy did, in my opinion, with Washington and Berry.
