Sylvester Stallone has been nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar. Before stepping on stage to receive the award he consulted with African-American “Creed” movie director Ryan Coogler. Stallone says that he was 100% down with boycotting The Oscars has Coogler told him to do so. Boycotting The Oscars goes with the hashtag, #OscarsSoWhite, after a few stars such as Jada Pinkett-Smith, Will Smith and Spike Lee have lead the pack of fighting for diversity at The Oscars.
Stallone said he said to Coogler,
“I said, ‘Ryan, how do you want to handle this? Because I really believe that you are responsible for me being here. Michael Jordan, every time I look in his eyes as an actor, he’s making me better. I think he should’ve been given a lot more respect, a lot more attention.”
Coogler responded in the most respectful way saying,
“‘Sly, just go there. Try to represent the film…We feel you deserve it.'”
You have to respect him for that answer. It could have been really easy for him to be spiteful and tell Stallone not to go but he didn’t. Stallone was willing to miss out on actually accepting the Oscar had he won the award. He said,
“I said, ‘If you want me to go, I’ll go. If you don’t, I won’t.'”
Coogler reassured him that it was perfectly fine by saying,
“‘No, we want you to go.’ That’s the kind of guy he is. ‘We want you to go and respect us and stand up for the film.'”
Source: Complex
