Where’s the Diversity, Hollywood? 85 Years of the Academy Awards

Posted byMario J. NovoaPosted inFilm

the open book

The Academy Awards will soon unveil the very best in filmmaking in 2014. As the prediction chatter ricochets around the web, our curiosity about the level of racial and gender representation of the Academy Awards is the focus of our next Diversity Gap study. We reviewed the Academy’s entire 85-year history and the results were staggeringly disappointing, if not surprising in light of our past Diversity Gap studies of The Tony Awards, The Emmy Awards, the children’s book industry, The New York Times Top 10 Bestseller List, and US politics, where we analyzed multi-year samplings and found a disturbingly consistent lack of diversity.

Academy Award infographic Academy Award infographic (click for larger image)

Since the Academy Awards was founded 85-years ago:

  • Only one woman of color (1%) has ever won the Academy Award for Best Actress
  • Only six men of color (7%) have ever won the Academy Award for…

View original post 2,419 more words

Published by Mario J. Novoa

Mario J. Novoa is a professional film director and producer who resides in Los Angeles, California. Mario began his career in the arts in high school as an assistant director, where he learned the art of stage direction and production management. He was also the first president of the school's drama club. Victor Valley High School was part of a new program in California that taught students broadcast television and built a mulit-million dollar television studio on the campus. Taking full of advantage of working with actors and learning the technical craft of television production, he was hooked and devoted to his passion. FILM INDEPENDENT'S PROJECT: INVOLVE diversity mentoring program provided Mario the opportunity to further learn the process of filmmaking. He was introduced to screenwriter Joseph Stefano(Psycho), film editor Zach Staenberg(The Matrix trilogy) and executive producer Mark Ordesky ( The Lord of the Rings trilogy). From these gentlemen he learned a great deal about the art and business of film. Miguel Arteta mentored Mario through the length of the 6 month program. Through FILM INDEPENDENT, Mario Novoa was awarded the BARBARA BOYLE SCHOLARSHIP to attend the Producing Program at LOS ANGELES FILM SCHOOL. There he further developed his directing, producing and marketing skills. During his time at L.A.F.S, Mario produced five short films, two of which won an industry award. Mario's first internship while at school was with film director Gregory Nava (Selena, My Family) at EL NORTE PRODUCTIONS. More recently Mario has produced and directed dynamic ad campaigns for The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, Cedar Sinai Hospital, The W Hotel Hollywood, MOFILM UK. Producer: Gay Latino Los Angeles Pt. 1 & 2 with director Jonathan Menendez. As a writer/director Mario Novoa is currently in post-production on a web series called The Baby Cries.

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.