Frances McDormand arrived in the press room after winning the Oscar for her work in Martin McDonagh's "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri," and she had just been informed of the online confusion that arose after she ended her rousing acceptance speech with two words: inclusion rider.
"I just found out about this last week _ there has always been available to everybody that does negotiation on film, an inclusion rider, which means you can ask for, and/or demand, at least 50 percent diversity, in not only the casting, but in the crew, so I just learned that after 35 years of being in the film business: We're not going back," she said to loud applause.
McDormand stopped short of saying that this year was a historic year for the idea of inclusion, instead citing the 2017 win of the indie-film-that-could, "Moonlight," as the beginning of the tide that has swept the industry.
When someone pointed out that "Three Billboards" has started a movement, with social justice billboards cropping up in Florida in the name of gun control and in front of the United Nations about the Syrian crisis, McDormand became animated.
"Recently my husband and I were in London, and we went to Tate Modern and saw an exhibition about the Russian Revolution and the propaganda that was used," she said. "Now, that revolution didn't go too well, so we don't want to think too much about that _ but red and black is a really good choice, and Martin McDonagh knew that. He was involved in the choice to use that kind of iconography."
"Billboards still work _ they still work," she said. "That's the kind of power that an image can have, and that's what we're making _ we're making powerful images."
After only five minutes McDormand, the woman of the hour, was whisked away, but not before she was asked about the impact "Three Billboards" will have in China where it was just released.
"Are they going to see it?" McDormand asked of Chinese audiences.
When she was told that so far it has only made about $1 million in box office revenue she said, "We need to get a little more people in cinemas. It is not America _ does not represent America _ but it represents a really good conversation about compassion and inclusion."
