The sentence that got Susan Sarandon a lifetime ban from the Oscars: “I didn’t care at all”
Getting a lifetime ban from the Oscars isn’t the easiest thing to accomplish, but all it took was one sentence from Susan Sarandon for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to declare her persona non grata.
In almost a century of dishing out trophies to Hollywood’s great and good, bans are a rare occurrence, and are only handed out in the most drastic or extreme of circumstances. Roman Polanski and Harvey Weinstein aren’t allowed to attend for obvious reasons, while Carmine Caridi was expelled for pirating screeners.
Will Smith might be back eventually after he’s served his sentence for slapping Chris Rock in front of a live audience and millions of viewers around the world, but it’s safe to say that excommunicated cinematographer and registered sex offender Adam Kimmel won’t.
1993 was a big year for the Oscars, adding high-profile industry figures to its internal shit list, with three of them making the cut. Richard Gere spent 20 years in exile for having the temerity to draw attention to human rights issues in China when presenting the award for ‘Best Art Direction’, and he did the full stretch.
However, Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon did not. The pair took to the podium to present the ‘Best Editing’ prize, and used their platform to spotlight a political issue: the struggles of HIV-positive Haitians being denied entry into the United States. All it took was one sentence, and the Academy was up in arms.
“On their behalf, and on behalf of all the people living with HIV in this country, we would like to ask our governing officials in Washington to admit that HIV is not a crime, and to admit these people into the United States,” she said. Just like that, Sarandon was informed that she wasn’t welcome at the next edition of the Oscars, or any other edition after that.
“Afterwards, when the shit hit the fan, and we were banned, I didn’t care at all,” she informed The Guardian. “I got all these really racist letters, and I thought, ‘Good; I am glad I said something.'” Tinseltown is a place where words aren’t always worth the paper they’re printed on, and it wasn’t long before she was back in the organisation’s good graces.
Either that, or the Academy didn’t want to cause a scandal. Three years after being banned for life, Sarandon wasn’t only on the shortlist for ‘Best Actress’ for her performance in Sean Penn’s Dead Man Walking, but she won. The previous year, she was in absentia after being nominated for The Client, but since insiders knew that her name was being read out on March 25th, 1996, an olive branch was extended.
She got off a lot easier than Gere, which you could potentially put down to the actor never being in danger of winning a major honour. Sarandon was supposed to be gone for good, but it’s hard to name somebody as an Oscar winner without acknowledging why they aren’t there, forcing the Academy into a comedown.
