Did Oscars cold shoulder Woody Allen for sex abuse allegations?

You’d have to be a deeply cynical to find a flaw in Cate Blanchett’s portrayal of the fragile, slightly neurotic socialite Jasmine who falls into penury in Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine. And you’d have to be a cynic of the highest order to smirk at Blanchett’s award acceptance speech in this year’s Oscars.

Heartfelt, spirited and funny, Blanchett was a refreshing contrast to the disturbing, self-congratulatory tone of Matthew McConaughey’s speech as he accepted the best actor award.

Acknowledging the fact that, like every year, this year too, Hollywood has seen brilliant performances from its women, she praised each nominee for their work.

And the sense of deep camaraderie as she hollered, ‘Suck it Julia’ to Julia Roberts as the latter burst out in laughter, are stuff that make the Oscars worth watching. Despite the sense of cheer, however, you cannot overlook the fact that everyone - the ones in the auditorium and across the world glued to their TVs - were anxious to see how Blanchett addressed the elephant in the room. Also known as the director of the film that earned her the best actress Oscar, Woody Allen.

And Blanchette worked her impeccable grace to acknowledge him in a way that doesn’t discredit Allen, yet doesn’t stir up a hornet’s nest over how appropriate it is to celebrate a man battling child sexual abuse charges.

“I’m here accepting an award in an extraordinary screenplay by Woody Allen. Thank you so much, Woody, for casting me,” she said. The declaration came right at the end of the speech when the entire audience was already teary-eyed from the awesome, and possibly exhausted enough to not over-analyse Blanchett’s brief reference to Allen.

However, for the excited media watchers, Blanchett’s somewhat cold acknowledgement of Allen once again brings to fore the moral dilemma that has been thrust on Hollywood with Dylan Farrow’s claims of sex abuse against Woody Allen. Farrow, in an open letter to Allen, posted on NYT Blogs had even directly questioned Blanchett’s conscience when he asked, “What if it had been your child, Cate Blanchett?”

Though Blanchett had chosen diplomacy to respond and said she hoped the family would overcome its trials, she seems to have taken heed of Farrow’s allegations.

In fact, Blue Jasmine, a whopping success which earned $ 94.8 million worldwide against a budget of $18 million, elicited just a lukewarm response from the Oscars. Nominated in just three categories, which includes a nomination for Woody Allen in the Best Screenplay category, a lot of people would say that Allen was given the royal cold treatment in the Oscars after the allegations of sex abuse resurfaced.

Despite Allen’s weight as a director with reckoning, Blue Jasmine was neither nominated in the Best Film category, nor was Allen nominated in the best director category for a film that has been universally praised by critics and has also done great business.

However, one also has to admit that Oscars’ cold shouldering of Allen, if at all, smacks of claustrophobic amounts of diplomacy at play.

One can say Woody Allen was just quietly sidelined in a way that awards and everyone involved in it stays away from muck. However, did it make a strong statement against a worldwide epidemic that is child sex abuse? No. None of the actors, directors, writers etc - arguably a conglomerate of some of the best in the business of intellect - bothered to even touch on an issue which is not just contentious, but a horrid reality in social echelons not just their own.

They even refused to address the issue of separating creative accomplishments from a man’s personal life - something that you’d expect a living, breathing, also thinking industry like American film industry to even attempt addressing.

The Oscars could have not nominated any of Allen’s films saying that they would wait till the probe into the issue was over. On the other hand, they could have chosen to wait till the issue was resolved to take a stand on Allen and nominated him in all categories he deserved to be nominated in. It was not completely impossible for the guild to take a stand.

Instead, they chose to stand aside and wait till the wind blew over without ruffling its own feathers. Like it had done on several other occasions.  

While you can hold film industries responsible to fix the many ills in this world, it is also true that the kind and magnitude of patronage they get, they could at least attempt to iron out the confusions of its fan-dom’s moral universe. At least symbolically. The Oscars just let a great opportunity slip…