Viola Davis carries on her winning streak this award season by picking up Best Supporting Actress for her mesmerising performance in Fences at the EE British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA) on Sunday 12 February 2017.

MelanMag: Viola Davis wins EE British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA), along side Dev Patel and Ava DuVernay
Credit: Paramount Pictures

The 70th award ceremony, which took place at the Royal Albert Hall, London and hosted by Stephen Fry, saw La La Land win Best Film, with Damien Chazelle winning Director and Emma Stone receiving the award for Leading Actress.

Other big winners were Casey Affleck who won Leading Actor for his role in Manchester by the Sea, which also earned its writer/director Kenneth Lonergan the award for Original Screenplay.

Supporting Actor went to Dev Patel for Lion and Ava DuVernay’s film, 13th won the award for Documentary. The film explores race in the US criminal justice system and traces the country’s racial divide through much of the 20th century and up to the Black Lives Matter movement. Its title refers to the 13th amendment, which abolished slavery.

 

MelanMag: Viola Davis wins EE British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA), along side Dev Patel and Ava DuVernayThe BAFTAs courted controversy last year when the academy was accused of lack of representation of ethnic minorities in the 2016 awards. BAFTA announced that they planned to increase diversity across the industry, on both sides of the camera. However, not much has changed as further criticism was levelled against the academy again, following this year’s nomination announcement.

In the leading actor, actress and director fields there were no BAME nominees, with directors such as Denzel Washington for Fences (who also missed out on a leading actor nomination), and Barry Jenkins for Moonlight, overlooked.

The Oscars, which take place later this month seem to have heeded the #Oscarssowhite accusations of recent years, with almost every one of the main award categories featuring people of colour. 

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