Award shows are no stranger to politics and this year’s Oscars was no different.
When “Two Distant Strangers” filmmaker Travon Free took to the stage to accept his award for best live action short film, he addressed the recent spate of police killings that have dominated headlines for several weeks now.
“Today, the police will kill three people, and tomorrow, the police will kill three people, and they say after that, the police will kill three people,” he began. “Because on average, the police in America kill three people, which amounts to about a thousand people a year.
The filmmaker continued: “Those people happen to disproportionately be Black people.”
Free, 36, then offered a James Baldwin quote: “The most despicable thing a person can be is indifferent to other people’s pain.”
Adding his own piece, Free continued: “I just ask that you … please, don’t be indifferent to our pain.”
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He also made a statement on the red carpet, wearing a Dolce & Gabbana suit lined with the names of those killed by police brutality in the United States.
In this handout photo provided by A.M.P.A.S., Travon Free attends the 93rd Annual Academy Awards in a yellow bow tie and matching black and yellow jacket lined with the scripted names of Black Americans killed by police officers.
(Photo by Matt Petit /A.M.P.A.S. via Getty Images)
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Duante Wright, Tamir Rice and Stephen Clark are among the names featured on his and his co-director Martin Desmond Roe’s jackets.
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“Two Distant Strangers,” the film that they won an award for on Sunday, chronicles an encounter between a Black man and a police officer. It has been acquired by Netflix.