“God is good…all the time,” Regina King said as she closed her “Best Supporting Actress” acceptance speech at the 91st Academy Awards Sunday night.
“…And all the time, God is good,” I said back. My response was so instinctive, that I laughed at myself for doing it. I can’t remember if I did, but I feel like I even looked over my shoulder in an effort to “turn to my neighbor” and waited for a collective “amen” from the church. A call and response so synonymous with the black church, that I imagine I wasn’t the only one who did the same thing after cheering King on for the first black person to win.
But this wasn’t Sunday evening service. This universal moment in blackness was happening before the world at the Academy Awards. Even if it was the only Oscar statue handed to an African-American, last night’s ceremony would have been one of the blackest Academy Awards in history because of King’s parting words.
The night ended up being historically black. The church folks will say that King giving honor to God (who is the head of her life), teed black people up for the #Oscarssoblack moment. From “Black Panther” to “BlacKkKlansman” the blackity, black, black Academy Awards were so black that white people won big because of all the blackness – which I’ll get to in a minute.
But first, let’s get into the history that was made.
Ruth E. Carter was the lone designer charged with creating for here and now among the Oscar nominees via “Black Panther.” She was up against a 19th century western and two different periods within the British Monarchy.
But Carter’s vivid colors and a contemporary twist in paying homage on the prints, lines and fabric of the diaspora – and contributed to a more comprehensive narrative to the continent, one that speaks beyond the commonly accepted misconceptions of poverty, famine and lack.
“Marvel may have created the first black superhero, but through costume design, we turned him into an African king,” Carter said in her speech. “It’s been my life’s honor to create costumes. Thank you to the Academy, thank you for honoring African royalty and the empowered way women can look and lead on screen.”
St. Louis native Kevin Mayes served as Carter’s head tailor.
Through Carter, Marvel Studios received its first ever Academy Award. She became the first black woman to ever win an Academy Award for costume design.
“This has been a long time coming,” Carter said. “Spike Lee, thank you for my start. I hope this makes you proud.”
Lee was proud for her – and later for himself when he won his first ever competitive Academy Award for “Best Adapted Screenplay,” for “BlacKkKlansman” – an award he shared with Kansas City native Kevin Wilmott.
Draped in purple and gold – an ostentatious tribute to his Omega Psi Phi Fraternity – Lee was fittingly presented the award with his longtime friend and fellow Morehouse man Samuel L. Jackson. Jackson broke through in Hollywood with his acclaimed performance in Lee’s “Jungle Fever.” Jackson lifted Lee off of the ground for a full body hug before Lee began his speech, provided personal context to the history of black people in this nation. An excerpt from his speech reads as follows:
Four hundred years. Our ancestors were stolen from Mother Africa and bought to Jamestown, Virginia, enslaved. Our ancestors worked the land from can’t see in the morning to can’t see at night. My grandmother, Zimmie Shelton Retha, who lived to be 100 years young, who was a Spelman College graduate even though her mother was a slave. My grandmother who saved 50 years of Social Security checks to put her first grandchild — she called me Spikie-poo — she put me through Morehouse College and NYU grad film. NYU!
Before the world tonight, I give praise to our ancestors who have built this country into what it is today along with the genocide of its native people. We all connect with our ancestors. We will have love and wisdom regained, we will regain our humanity. It will be a powerful moment. The 2020 presidential election is around the corner. Let’s all mobilize. Let’s all be on the right side of history. Make the moral choice between love versus hate. Let’s do the right thing! You know I had to get that in there.”
Before Ruth Carter and Spike Lee’s moment, more history was made. Hannah Beachler became the first black woman to win an Oscar for production design. With his “Best Supporting Actor” win, Mahershala Ali became only the second black man in history to win two competitive Oscars. Denzel Washington is the other.
Ali was the bright spot in a film that whitewashes the actual Green Book by making the film about the redemption of Tony Vallelonga as opposed to the atrocities and racial terror imposed on blacks driving through the south in the Jim Crow era who were forced to use a handbook as their guide for safe travels. The title bamboozled some people, but “Green Book” director Peter Farrelly made it clear who the film was actually about and for.
“This whole thing starts with Viggo,” Farrelly said as he and his team – including Ali and Octavia Spencer – stood on stage to accept the evening’s biggest award. It was the second time Dr. Don Shirley and the people for whom the Green Book was produced were left off the thank you list. Ali was the only one who took the time to do so.
Ludwig Goransson was also able to capitalize from the super black Oscars by winning “Best Original Music Score” for “Black Panther – but he gave credit where credit was due. Goransson also won a “Record of the Year” Grammy for Childish Gambino’s “This Is America.” So, thanks to “the culture” he his halfway to an EGOT.
