After winning the Golden Globe for his final film,
The Blues of Ma Rainey,
many fans expected the Oscar for Best Actor to return posthumously to Chadwick Boseman, who died of colon cancer in August 2020. And yet, the jury had decided otherwise: it was Anthony Hopkins, the 83-year-old British actor, who won the statuette for his role in
The Father
by Frenchman Florian Zeller, during the Oscars ceremony on Sunday.
To read also: Oscars 2021: Anthony Hopkins best actor in
The Father
A news that did not fail to make the fans of the American star of
Black Panther
react violently
.
"
We can all be angry with the way the memory and image of Chadwick Boseman has been handled,
" "
It drives me crazy to see how the ceremony didn't award him anything, he deserved more respect
" or "
Now for sure he can never win an Oscar again, it's horrible
", Can we read in hundreds of messages on Twitter. Many also expressed their incomprehension: the course of the ceremony had been upset, in order to give the award for best actor last, and many saw it as a way to pay tribute to Chadwick Boseman. Goodies with his effigy were also offered in a gift bag to all the guests.
Viewers were also annoyed by the absence of Anthony Hopkins, already winner of the statuette in 1992 for
The Silence of the Lambs:
“
The only thing you had to do was pay homage to Chadwick Boseman. And you gave the Oscar to Anthony Hopkins, who didn't even come? Ridiculous,
”regretted a user. However, the actor's agent reacted quickly, explaining that Anthony Hopkins had returned to Wales to receive his second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine. Faced with this surge of reactions, the actor himself spoke on Monday in a short video on Instagram, in which he thanked the academy for this Oscar "
which he really did not expect
". But above all,he pays homage "
to Chadwick Boseman, who was taken from us far too soon
”.
Boseman's brother reacted too, explaining to
TMZ
that he didn't think Chadwick had been snubbed, and that everyone named to the ceremony was excellent anyway.
He said he wished the best for Hopkins and his family, "because I'm sure Anthony would have done it if Chad had won."
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