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The Oscars are always bound to offer some snubs and surprises, and the 2021 nominations are no different. Particularly, many were surprised by the the absence of One Night in Miami in the Best Picture categories.
The Amazon Prime Video movie, which tells the story of a real-life meeting between Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown and Sam Cooke, has received three nominations in the 2021 Academy Awards. Hamilton star Leslie Odom Jr. picked up two nominations, one for Best Original Song and the other for Best Supporting Actor for playing Cooke. Kemp Powers, who adapted his own play, received a Best Adapted Screenplay nod.
Although the film also received three Golden Globe nominations earlier in the year, those included a nod for Regina King as Best Director. However, King wasn't nominated for an Oscar in this category.
Fans of the star, who won a Best Supporting Actress win in 2019 for her work in If Beale Street Could Talk, made their displeasure known on social media.
Responding to the news that Chloe Zhao and Emerald Fennell had made history by becoming the first two female directors nominated in the same year, The Root writer Michael Harriot wrote, "What a weird way to spell Regina King."
Other fans simply asked, "What does Regina King have to do to get her respect?!"
Another shared, "Regina King was robbed for Best Director."
Some further reactions included: "Yeah, I knew with all these surprises, someone was going to take the hit. Regina King and One Night In Miami did in some major categories."
"Regina King and Shaka King [Judas and the Black Messiah director] not being nominated is .. interesting."
"For the first time (yes, it has taken this long), two women earned Best Directing nominations in the same year: Chloé Zhao (Nomadland) and Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman). Lots of buzz around Regina King being snubbed here too. I guess three women was too much for the #Oscars."
If King was nominated, she would have been the first Black female director to get a nod in the category and the eighth woman ever to get an Oscars Best Director nomination. This year, four of the five nominees for Best Director were first timers, with Fennell and Zhao joined by Lee Isaac Chung (for Minari) and Danish director Thomas Vinterberg (for Another Round). David Fincher, meanwhile, was previously nominated for The Social Network and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button before being nominated for Mank this year.
As an actress, King already has an impressive number of trophies. So far, she has won one Oscar, one Golden Globe (for If Beale Street Could Talk) and four Emmys (two for American Crime and one apiece for Watchmen and Seven Seconds). She is also a seven-time NAACP Image Awards recipient.
