Michelle Yeoh Criticizes Cate Blanchett And Gets Brutally Roasted
Michelle Yeoh shared a post critical of the Academy Awards only awarding white women for Best Actress, but took it down after she was attacked for allegedly going after Cate Blanchett.
Michelle Yeoh (Everything Everywhere All at Once) and Cate Blanchett (Tar) are both heavily favored to win the Best Actress award at the Academy Awards this Sunday, but obviously only one can win. Yeoh is now facing a bit of scrutiny for posting a Vogue article that calls out systemic racism in the film industry and subsequently deleted it because one of the slides mentions how Blanchett already has two Oscars and Yeoh winning would be a win for representation since she would be only the second POC to win in the Best Actress category. While some Twitter users are focused on the slide about Blanchett, there’s a much bigger conversation at stake here.
As this Twitter user points out, the article Michelle Yeoh posted doesn’t really have anything to do with Cate Blanchett specifically. It’s a long article that is focused on addressing the fact that non-white actors have been historically underrepresented at the Academy Awards. Yeoh winning the award for Best Actress would at least be a step in the right direction.
This user points out the same thing. Many people quickly assumed Michelle Yeoh was posting the article to encourage voters to choose her over Cate Blanchett. It’s pretty clear that it wasn’t Yeoh’s intention to target Blanchett specifically; it was just her sharing an article written by someone else about a problem in the industry she cares about.
As this user points out, Michelle Yeoh winning over Cate Blanchett would make her only the second non-white actor in 95 years to win the Best Actress award. Also, Yeoh is the first actress of Southeast Asian descent to be nominated for the award, which is another historic first for Asian representation at the Academy. Yeoh would also be only the second Asian actor nominated for the award, as Merle Oberon was nominated back in 1935.
While Michelle Yeoh likely had to delete her post because of the Cate Blanchett mention, it’s a shame that she couldn’t keep it up. It may have violated the Academy rules, so it may not have necessarily been her choice to take it down. Still, it seems pretty clear that Yeoh was advocating for more representation rather than trying to take shots at any one individual in particular.
This user helpfully wrapped up the Michelle Yeoh and Cate Blanchett conversation by providing a GIF of Yeoh saying shut up throughout the multiverse. It seems like a perfect way to respond to other users who are trying to make this out to be a feud rather than a call for the Academy to do better with their voting. Also, it’s just a solid GIF in general.
We’ll have to wait and see how the votes fall when the Oscars air on Sunday. Michelle Yeoh, Cate Blanchett, Ana de Armas, Andrea Riseborough, and Michelle Williams are up for the award. If you want to find out who wins in real-time, you’ll have to tune in to the Oscars on Sunday evening.
