Chris Rock's monologue, Leo DiCaprio's win and Alejandro Iñárritu being played off are just some of the highlights from the 2016 Oscas.
The 2016 Oscar awards show re-cap
The 88th annual Academy Awards has given us plenty to talk about:
Chris Rock makes a room full of white people squirmy and doesn't let up.
Leonardo DiCaprio becomes the king of the world by finally winning the Oscar.
And investigative journalism gets the golden Spotlight.
We are all in the Oscars afterglow and the LA Times Rebecca Keegan joined the show to break it all down.
Other highlights from the show:
Mark Rylance beating out Sly Stallone, Mark Ruffalo, Christian Bale and Tom Hardy for Best Supporting Actor.
It was one of the biggest upsets of the night and the internet was abuzz about Sly Stallone's snub:
Mark Ryance is a HUGE upset. No @TheSlyStallone. No @MarkRuffalo
— The Frame (@theframe) February 29, 2016
Alejandro González Iñárritu refuses to be played off
The show really tried to control the length of acceptance speeches by having the orchestra play them off. Now, they really tried when Iñárritu, who won for best director for Revenant but he wasn't stopping.
He started off his speech by thanking stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy. Just as he was thanking cinematographer Emmanuel "Chivo" Lubezki the music began to play and get louder, but Iñárritu pushed on, concluding:
“I am very lucky to be here tonight, but unfortunately, many others haven’t had the same luck. There is a line in the film that [Glass says] to his mixed-race son, ‘They don’t listen to you, they just see the color of your skin. So what a great opportunity to our generation to really liberate ourselves from all prejudice and, you know, this tribal thinking, and make sure for once and forever that the color of the skin become as irrelevant as the length of our hair.”
How do we the Academy avoid another #OscarSoWhite
The countdown is now on for when next year's list of nominees is announced. What happens if there is a repeat of #OscarsSoWhite? The controversy is fresh but the movie making process is slow. Is there enough time for the next batch of nominees to be more diverse? It's not looking good, LA Times found the Academy is still 91% white after four years of a diversity drive.
To hear the full interview, press the blue play button above.
Chris Rock’s edgy Oscars set rubs some Hollywood insiders the wrong way
Comedian Chris Rock made race a central theme when he hosted the Academy Awards Sunday night.
Rock came out of the gate swinging and wasted no time dismissing the calls that he protest the gig because of the lack of non-white nominees. He made a series of jokes about race, including one about lynching:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrOJgDcIzFY
How did Chris Rock handle the controversy? Take Two put that question to three Hollywood insiders. Here are some highlights from the interview.
https://twitter.com/AlyndaWheat?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
A while back, you wrote an open letter to Chris Rock about how he should host the Oscars. It seems like he read your piece and heeded your advice.
“He did exactly what I said. I suggested [he] go after Will and Jada Smith, Spike Lee, he did that. He made some very edgy jokes — I don’t know if lynching is something we needed to hear about last night, but he went there. He was edgy. I even threw something in my piece about throwing Stacey Dash under the bus, and I think he did that too.”
Anne-Marie Johnson, actress
Anne-Marie, one of the reasons I was so grateful to have you here with us this morning is that you starred in one of my favorite films of all time, “Hollywood Shuffle.” It poked a lot of fun but made some very serious points about the lack of diversity in Hollywood … How do you think humor can work in terms of having this discussion about diversity or the lack thereof in Hollywood?
“Humor can work if done well, and I have to disagree. I think he completely missed the point. I guess we were watching a different Academy Award show. I didn’t think he was edgy. I think the only African-American comic who could have pulled it off in a way that would have been completely mind blowing was Richard Pryor, and unfortunately, he’s no longer with us. I have nothing against Chris … But he pitted African-American against African-American, and that’s not the problem. The problem is that [our] films are not given the go-ahead because the industry relies on the global dollar and not the American dollar.“
Jenny Yang, actress, comedian, writer
Jenny, I saw you nodding during a lot of what Anne-Marie was saying. Your take on Chris Rock’s take on race last night.
“I just felt I was sitting through a really uncomfortable corporate diversity HR meeting where Chris Rock was representing the company and all of the jokes were just landing flat. He is a comedian. I’m a standup comedian and he had a huge task to handle, and that’s tough … 'Not your mule' was trending on Twitter, black folks saying, ‘Chris Rock can’t be responsible for carrying the water of all underrepresented people,’ and I get that. But as an Asian-American watching Chris Rock as a comedian, you can do way better than trotting out little Asian babies and making them some weird mascot stereotype — that’s like thirty years ago as well, that joke.”
The discussion didn’t end there. To hear the full debate, press the blue play button and tweet your thoughts to https://twitter.com/taketwo .
The Styled Side goes to the Oscars
#OscarsSoWhite overshadowed much of yesterday's Academy Awards.
But there was also a campaign on the red carpet to ask women questions other than, "Who are you wearing?" called #AskHerMore.
"It's about urging red carpet reporters to ask meatier questions than just those about fashion," says Michelle Dalton Tyree from Fashion Trends Daily.
"I understand what the celebs are saying. They're saying, 'There's a lot more to this movie,'" says Tyree, but she points out that most of those reporters are from media outlets dedicated to fashion. "Their publications would be incredibly angry if they didn't ask this because that's what they're on the red carpet to do."
Beyond that campaign, Tyree says there are a couple of noteworthy trends on the red carpet.
Watch for white
"We saw a lot of white this year, and particularly white gowns that were heavily embroidered," she says.
Lady Gaga stunned people in her white Brandon Maxwell strapless “twofer,” as Tyree dubs it; it's a hybrid gown and jumpsuit.
"I think we're going to start seeing these repeated with a lot of retailers," she predicts, "but done in a little bit more wearable way."
She expects locally-based ABS by Allen Schwartz will be a great store to start with, as well as Halston.
2016: year of the sternum?
Tyree was taken by Charlize Theron, whose dressed showcased a very deep V-neck line.
She expects that it will start a trend among designers, but in a much more modest way.
"Manufacturers and designers are going to bring it up a bit so it's not quite as sternum-showing as we've seen," says Tyree.
Pouty lips without the permanence
Tyree reports that there are a couple new body treatment trends that stars are now using when it comes to awards season.
"I tried something they call 'Cinderella Lips,'" explains Tyree. "It's very temporary saline lip enhancer that only lasts 2 days. Stars use it for award shows or films and it give your lips a slight, nice plump."
A more expensive treatment she ran across, especially for those high-slit looks, is the “Cankles Be Gone” treatment.
"It’s a $500 treatment that uses a fat emulsifier to contour that stubborn problem of thick ankles unofficially known as 'cankles,'" she says. "Now that you have all these skin-baring looks, you've got to come up with ways to make sure everything looks perfect."
Kamala Harris gets Democratic endorsement heading into June primary
California Attorney General Kamala Harris has solidified her position as front-runner for an open US Senate seat by securing a key endorsement from the state Democratic Party.
Harris got the endorsement at the Party convention Saturday with nearly 80 percent of the vote.
Her main challenger, Orange County Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez, also made her pitch for support over the weekend. Both Democrats are vying for the Senate seat that Barbara Boxer has held for more than two decades.
For more, we're joined by
Senior Editor for KQED's California Politics and Government Desk.
Salaam Reads is the new initiative targeting young Muslim readers
Hollywood is not the only realm where white faces dominate.
The publishing industry has often failed to reflect this country's diversity.
Zareen Jaffery is an executive editor at Simon and Schuster Children's Publishing.
She's also the head of Salaam Reads, an imprint designed specifically to produce books focusing on Muslim characters and stories.
Jaffery joined the show to discuss what goes into the project and why it's necessary.
To hear the full interview, press the blue play button above.
KKK protest points to long history in SoCal
Five Ku Klux Klan members arrested by Anaheim police have now been released, according to officials. The KKK members clashed with counter protesters Saturday in Anaheim. The confrontation quickly grew violent and three people were stabbed, one critically.
The Anaheim Police Department says 12 people were arrested. Seven others, who were seen beating the Klan members and attacking them with wooden posts, remain in custody.
"At that point I wasn't have a deep, philosophical, introspective thought," said Brian Levin, a professor at Cal-State University, San Bernardino who filmed the incident on his cell phone and rushed to a Klan member who had fallen to the ground and was getting hit by counter protesters.
"I put myself over him...telling people to get away, do not hit him," said Levin, who added that although he strongly disagrees with the group's views and stances, did not want to see him hurt.
The incident points to a long and troubled history of the KKK presence in the area, said Joanna Mendelson, California Investigative researcher & Director of Special Projects at the Anti-Defamation League.
"Even if there's a handful of members, even if their voice is small, it certainly sends ripple effects in the community ," she said. "People are outraged, people are angry, people are upset to know that these groups and this ideology can flourish in today's time."
A coalition of community groups and religious leaders, including the Mexican Consulate and the Orange County chapter of the NAACP, say they are planning a candlelight vigil tonight at 6pm in Anaheim.
LA's decades-long effort to get Pershing Square right
For decades, city developers in Los Angeles have debated what to do about downtown's Pershing Square.
It's a 150-year-old public space for which there's been a lot of vision but not a whole lot of results.
The latest effort at reimagining the park comes from the non-profit group "Pershing Square Renew," which launched a design competition and narrowed down the list of finalists to four late last year.
Los Angeles Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne joined Take Two to discuss the challenges of re-designing Pershing Square.
To hear the full interview, click the link above.
Number of sea lions stranded along Pacific Coast has gone down, but is it a good thing?
In 2015, more than 3,000 sea lions were found stranded throughout the Pacific Coast.
So far this year the number is lower, but that might not be the good news it appears to be.
Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association say recent surveys of the sea lion population have found fewer and fewer pups.
Wildlife biologist with NOAA Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle, Sharon Melin joined the show to discuss.
To hear the full interview, press the blue play button above.
A California scientist is tracking a parasite that turns bees into 'zombies'
Maybe call them the "Flying Dead" of the insect world: A parasite is making honey bees act like zombies.
The so-called "zombie bees" caught the attention of entomologist John Hafernik at San Francisco State University a couple years ago. He has since been leading a citizen scientist effort, dubbed ZomBee Watch, to track the strange phenomenon across the country.
John Hafernik joined host A Martinez to tell more about how the parasite, and how its impacting the already-suffering population of honey bees in the United States.
To listen to the full interview, click on the blue audio player above.