A Serious Oscars Entry

Good evening everyone and welcome to The Magical Mystery Blog.

Again, I apologize for forgetting Friday’s entry. Over the weekend, we’ve had some important events occur, including the Oscars. With Jennifer Lawrence still tripping on her dress and Leonardo DiCaprio still not winning an Oscar (poor guy, can’t they give him a break?), the Oscars was led by the delightful and wonderful Ellen DeGeneres.  As she hosted this grand gala of celebrities, she helped in creating a night of insanity and memorable moments.

From the entire audience eating pizza, to breaking Twitter, to photobombs, and even the ultimate selfie, the night was full of laughter and merriment. However, a few serious occurrences were noted from the 2014 Oscars. These serious moments not only dealt with celebrities of the evening, but also important topics within our society.

1) Ellen and the “Transphobic” Joke

moviefone.com

Ah Ellen, the good witch of the Oscars.

In her opening monologue of the Oscars, Ellen uttered the following joke to Liza Minnelli: “Hello to the best Liza Minnelli impersonator I’ve ever seen. Good job, sir.”

From this joke, the audience was captured in silence, and the media had already noted Ellen as a transphobic person. As everyone knows this woman, she is a very accepting person. If you’re atheist, that’s fantastic. If you’re heterosexual, that’s great. If you’re God  Himself, that’s amazing. It’s the type of person she is. As for transphobic, she is not even close.

Her joke was focused more on the fact that at nearly every drag show, Liza Minelli is often portrayed by men. Liza Minnelli has also been a favorite of female impersonators. So by no means was Ellen’s joke transphobic, but rather poking fun at a celebrity as she does with many others.

2) Jared Leto

cbsnewsradio.com

Jared Leto, a cissexeual actor, took home an Oscar for his portrayal of a HIV positive transgendered woman in the movie, “Dallas Buyers Club.” While this was a great achievement for the actor, many others, especially those from the transgendered community, did not believe so.  Thousands of Twitter users tweeted that Leto did not deserve this award because he was a white, cissexual male who played a transgender role. However, this isn’t the first time Leto has been heckled for this particular role. At a Q&A session for the Santa Barbra Film Festival, a woman complained that only straight actors can play transgender roles. Others have issues with the fact that he did not thank the transgender community in his Oscars acceptance speech.

It’s good he won the award because he challenged himself to play an extremely specific role.  As for him playing the role, he is what he is, and tried to play the part to the best of his ability. He even stayed in character when offset to see how people would react to it; in hopes it would help him understand the role better.

What did you like/hate about the Oscars?

My next entry will be my fiftieth entry of The Magical Mystery Blog. If there’s anything specific you’d love to see me write about, feel free to inbox me or comment.

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