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This month has seen awards season draw to a close. The past weeks have seen the Golden Globes, SAGs, BAFTAs and now the Oscars take place, with the 92nd Academy Awards ceremony taking place over the weekend.
From political statements (Natalie Portman’s cape of female director snubs) and surprise wins (Parasite took Best Picture) to some very sweet red carpet moments, it’s safe to say that it closed awards season 2020 with an almighty bang.
But it wasn’t Brad Pitt’s joke about Prince Harry or reactions to Eminem’s random appearance that caused outrage. Instead, it was the award ceremony’s annual In Memoriam segment.
Every year, the Oscars dedicates time to film and TV industry figures who have died within the year gone - profiling everyone from actors and costume designers to directors and writers in photo and video montages, to a live music performance.
This year’s In Memoriam was accompanied by a rendition of ‘Yesterday’ by Billie Eilish and her brother Finneas.
The most news however stemmed from two noticeable absences in the tributes - actors Luke Perry and Cameron Boyse.
The internet unsurprisingly blew up, with fans posting their anger in their hundreds.
‘Wait a minute? Let me see if I'm understanding this...the Oscars had a memoriam and somehow Luke Perry was excluded despite that he's in one of the nominated films?!,’ posted one user. David Spade tweeted: ‘I cant believe Cameron Boyce and Luke Perry werent included in Oscars in memoriam They should have made room for them.’
Following a huge wave of backlash on twitter, the Academy released a statement, via E! News, explaining the omission.
‘The Academy receives hundreds of requests to include loved ones and industry colleagues in the Oscars In Memoriam segment’, the statement read. ‘An executive committee representing every branch considers the list and makes selections for the telecast based on limited available time.’
The statement continues: ‘While Luke and Cameron didn’t feature, they do appear in a tribute that features all memoriam submissions on the Oscars website. All the submissions are included on Oscar.com and will remain on the site throughout the year. Luke Perry and Cameron Boyce are remembered in the Oscar.com gallery.’
The Academy may have commented, but Twitter still isn’t happy with one user responding: ‘Dear #Oscars2020, I am deeply ashamed of you. I don't care how much time you have, #LukePerry and #CameronBoyce should have been on the memoriam. No if's, and's or but's. There is no legit reason not to have them on there and you should be ashamed of yourselves.’
