Meryl Streep talks diversity at Berlin Film Festival
Corrections and clarifications: An earlier version of this story based on an AP report attributed a quote from Meryl Streep to the wrong interview question.
The ongoing conversation about diversity in the film industry reached the Berlin International Film Festival on Thursday, after remarks made by the president of the festival's jury panel: Oscar-winner Meryl Streep.
At a press conference for the festival, reporters asked the panel, Streep among them, about diversity on the jury and in the festival. In response to questions about diversity in the festival, Streep said, “Well, I’m very committed to equality and inclusion of people of all genders, races, ethnicities, religions; there should be inclusion and this jury is evidence that at least women are included – and in fact dominate – in this jury, and that’s an unusual situation in bodies of people who make decisions, so I think that the Berlinale is ahead of the game.”
Later in the press conference, an Egyptian reporter asked Streep, “There is a film that is representing Tunisia and the Arab world and Africa in the main competition. How do you see this part of the world, and is it easy for you to understand that culture, and are you following any Arab movies?” to which Streep responded at length.
“Yes, in fact I’ve just seen a film called Theeb, which I loved," she said. "I saw Timbuktu recently, but I don’t know very much about the Middle East, and yet I’ve played a lot of different people from a lot of different cultures. The thing that I’ve noticed is that there is a core of humanity that travels right through every culture. And, after all, we’re all from Africa originally; we’re all Berliners, we’re all Africans, really. We have critic on our jury, we have a director on our jury, we have actors, a photographer, cinematographer; people will be looking at different things in these films, but we’re human beings, and film is an emotional experience. We’re going to make these decisions based on what our head wants to say, but we’re first attacked in the heart.”
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The Berlin Festival jury's other members are German actor Lars Eidinger, British film critic Nick James, French photographer Brigitte Lacombe, British actor Clive Owen, Italian actress Alba Rohrwacher and Polish director Malgorzata Szumowska. This is the first year that Streep has been serving as jury president. It opens Thursday with the Coen brothers comedy Hail, Caesar. It will run through Feb. 21, with 18 films in competition for its top prize.
The diversity discussion in Berlin comes during the lead-up to the 2016 Academy Awards, which has sparked a conversation and outcry about diversity in film since, for the second year in a row, all 20 of the acting nominees announced in January were white. Director Spike Lee, actors Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith have declared their intention to boycott the Feb. 28 ceremony. As a result of the controversy, the Academy announced that it would implement sweeping changes in an attempt to diversify its membership, with the goal of doubling the number of women and people of color in its ranks by 2020.
