Calling all TV and film lovers,
The 70th Emmys was pretty hard to watch for supporters of onscreen representation. Despite calling itself the "most diverse Emmys in history,” of the 26 awards handed out just 3 went to people of color and 1 to someone with a visible disability.
LGBTQ fared a bit better, with Ryan Murphy picking up 3 awards for American Crime Story and RuPaul’s Drag Race nabbing a win. Still, the shutout of Atlanta, the loss of Sandra Oh to Claire Foy, on top of the glaring dearth of Latinx nominees—Rita Moreno, anyone??—all added up to the sense that the Television Academy is supremely out of touch.
Still, I take solace in the fact that Monday night saw the Emmy’s worst ratings ever. The tide is turning, with or without the Television Academy.
Watch intelligently,
Li Lai, founder of Mediaversity Reviews
|
|
To All the Boys I've Loved Before
Mediaversity Grade: B+ 4.42/5
If you haven’t seen To All the Boys yet, what are you waiting for? This rom-com’s a Netflix darling for a reason! Read the review→
|
|
Castle Rock
Mediaversity Grade: C 3.31/5
For fans of spooky, head-scratching mystery, Hulu’s Castle Rock fares surprisingly well considering its decades-old source material. Read the review→
|
|
|
Knee-jerk reactions to the latest on TV or in theaters:
TV
|
|
|
Castle Rock “Henry Deaver” (Season 1, Episode 9 on Hulu)
Forever “Together Forever” (Season 1, Episode 1 on Amazon)
Shadowhunters “Love is a Devil” (Season 2, Episode 8 on Hulu)
Film
|
|
|
A Simple Favor
Follow us on Instagram for the latest at your fingertips. 💅
|
|
KEEP DOING WHAT YOU'RE DOING
|
|
Earlier this month, MENA Arts Advocacy Coalition released a brief that found just 1% of TV series regulars are of Middle Eastern or North African (MENA) descent. Fully 78% of those roles give this report its name, “Terrorists and Tyrants.” Worse yet, the remaining roles erase their culture altogether, as MENA actors play white characters—a phenomenon movingly recounted by actor/writer Amir Talai for Vulture. Read more coverage from Shadow and Act→
|
|
|
A team of UK researchers published their findings on the relationship between narrative arcs and box office success. The analysis showed that “man in a hole” movies—that is, films with an emotional trajectory of a fall followed by a rise—were the most financially successful across genres. Read more coverage from The Guardian→
|
|
|
Film criticism has fallen under the magnifying glass lately, thanks to a steady drumbeat of research that shows how skewed the ranks are. In July, The Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film released their latest “Thumbs Down” report, an ongoing study that began in 2007 that now pegs the ratio of 2 male reviewers for every 1 female reviewer. They also found that over 80% of all film reviewers are white. Read more coverage from USA Today→
This was followed by an update from the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, in partnership with Time’s Up as they co-released “Critic’s Choice 2.” In this report, the authors look at reviews for the Top 300 highest-grossing films of the last few years to examine how film critics break down by gender and race. The results are depressing, if unsurprising: white men outnumber women of color, 31 to 1. Read more coverage from Colorlines→
On the plus side, all this data is having a real and positive impact. At the end of last month, Rotten Tomatoes overhauled its submission process and has since added hundreds of new critics in efforts to balance out its roster.
|
|
|
|
