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The Academy Awards are commonly known as the Oscars.
They are the best-known movie awards in the United States.
The Oscar has been awarded since awards since 1929.
This year at the Oscars:
An Asian women won the Oscar for best direction.
Two Black women won an Oscar for hairstyling and makeup.
It was the first time ever that a Black women with a disability was on the Oscars red carpet.
Oscar for Best Director: Chloé Zhao
Chloé Zhao accepting the Oscar for Best Director.
Chloé Zhao won the Oscar for Best Director.
The award is for her movie “Nomadland”.
Chloé Zhao is only the second woman to receive the Best Director award.
She is also the first Asian woman to win the Best Director Oscar.
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Nomadland also won the Best Picture award.
Nomadland also won the Best Picture award.
The movie is about a woman who is 60 years old.
She loses everything in the Great Recession.
Then she sets out on a journey in her van through the American West.
She experiences the life of nomads in our times.
Nomads are people who choose to not live in just one place.
They are always moving from place to place.
Watch the Nomadland trailer.
Chloé Zhao told IndieWire about her movie:
I tried to focus on the human experience.
Things that many people experience.
The loss of a loved one, or searching for home.
The movie is based on the 2017 non-fiction book:
Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century” by Jessica Bruder.
Chloé Zhao at the Drive-In Premiere of "Nomadland" last year.
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Only seven women have ever been nominated in the Best Director category:
Lina Wertmüller for “Seven Beauties” in 1976
Jane Campion for “The Piano” in 1993
Sofia Coppola for “Lost in Translation” in 2003
Kathryn Bigelow for “The Hurt Locker” in 2009 Kathryn Bigelow was the only female winner of the Best Director award till this year.
Greta Gerwig for “Lady Bird” in 2017
Emerald Fennell for “Promising Young Woman” in 2021, and
Chloé Zhao for “Nomadland’ in 2021
Oscar for Best Hairstyling and Makeup:
Mia Neal and Jamika Wilson
Mia Neal, Jamika Wilson, and Sergio Lopez-Rivera accept the Oscar for Best Hairstyling and Makeup
Jamika Wilson
Jamika Wilson and Mia Neal are the first Black women to win the Oscar for Hairstyling and Makeup.
The Oscar for Hairstyling and Makeup was introduced 30 years ago.
They won the award for their work in the movie Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.
The film is about one of the few openly lesbian, Black singers in America in the 1920s.
For Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Mia created 100 wigs in less than three weeks.
Mia Neal
While accepting the Oscar Mia Neal said:
Jamika and I stand here with so much excitement for the future.
I know that one day it won’t be unusual.
It will be normal for Black women, trans women, and Latinas to be winning the Oscar.
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Watch the Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom trailer.
The film’s costume designer is Ann Roth.
She is 89 years old.
She too made history as the oldest woman to win an Oscar.
Andraéa LaVant Is the First Black Woman With a Disability on the Oscars Red Carpet.
Andraéa LaVant with service dog Goji and the Crip Camp crew.
Andraéa LaVant is the impact producer of the documentary film Crip Camp.
An impact producer is responsible for the impact or result a movie wants to create.
Crip Camp was nominated for the Oscar in the Best Documentary category.
Crip Camp has audio descriptions in more than 90 languages.
Judith Heumann, Nicole Newnham, James LeBrecht, Sara Bolder with Andraéa LaVant and Goji
As a young person I feared drawing attention to my disability.
That is why I used to be afraid to go anywhere by myself.
Now I chuckle thinking about how I draw attention in my fancy Oscars outfit:
A sequin dress with a split.
Jewellery from head-to-toe.
A bedazzled wheelchair joystick and rims.
The documentary film Crip Camp
Watch the Crip Camp trailer.
Crip Camp is a documentary film about Camp Jened.
It was a summer camp for teens with disabilities in New York state.
The camp was held in the 1970s.
Andraéa LaVant says:
Crip Camp changes how disabled people are usually seen.
Disabled people are often just shown as charity cases.
Crip Camp shows us more truthfully as fun, active, and even sexual beings.
Crip Camp is available on Netflix and its channel on YouTube.
Follow Andraéa LaVant on Instagram: @andraealavant
*Quotes are edited to Easy to Read.*