text: Facing criticism about its overwhelmingly older, male, and white membership and increasingly vocal concerns about the film industry’s ongoing diversity problem, the Academy Of Motion Pictures Arts And Science, the honorary organization responsible for awarding the Oscars, has responded by… well, trying to add seemingly goddamn everyone it had, for one reason or another, forgotten to invite into its membership. As part of a major overhaul, the Academy sent out an unprecedented 683 membership invitations today to film industry professionals, almost half of them women, and 41% of them people of color. 
   
   The invitation list is a who’s who of Hollywood mainstays who were inexplicably not Academy members, international heavyweights, and big-deal up-and-comers. A large part of the push seems to have come on the director front, a seemingly endless scroll of invited directors that includes Catherine Breillat, Park Chan-wook, Lucrecia Martel, Julia Loktev, Abbas Kiarostami, Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Karyn Kusama, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Mary Harron, Mia Hansen-Løve, Lynne Ramsay, the Wachowskis, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, James Wan, Maren Ade, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Souleymane Cissé, Patty Jenkins, So Yong Kim, Ryan Coogler, Ramin Bahrani, and a whole lot of other people who aren’t older white dudes. (Ken Loach was also invited.) 
   
   The list of acting invitees includes Luis Guzmán, Adam Beach, Kate Beckinsale, Morris Chestnut, Idris Elba, Bruce Greenwood, Oscar Isaac, James Hong, Tessa Thompson, Greta Gerwig, Alicia Vikander, Michelle Rodriguez, Tom Hiddleston, Michael B. Jordan, Regina King, Eva Mendes, Vivica A. Fox, and Ice Cube. The whole mind-bogglingly long list can be read here, and includes three Wayans brothers. 
   
   Submit your Newswire tips here. ||||| The Hollywood buzzword of the moment has been “diversity,” thanks in large part to the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite and its creator April Reign. The former attorney and managing editor of BroadwayBlack.com first began using the hashtag on Twitter following the 2015 announcement of an all-white slate of acting Oscar nominees, and again when the same occurred earlier this year. When the likes of Spike Lee and Jada Pinkett Smith indirectly joined the #OscarsSoWhite movement, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science was prompted to react, making a commitment to diversify its ranks by doubling the number of women and people of color by 2020. Wednesday became the first chance for the organization to work toward its goal with the release of their latest list of invitees, and it’s the largest and most diverse class to date.
target: – Apparently still smarting from some of Chris Rock's Oscars barbs, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences invited 683 people—many of them women and minorities—to join in an unprecedented move Wednesday, Reuters reports. The voting group behind the Oscars is largely old, white, and male and was lambasted this year with the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite after two years in a row of all-white acting nominees. In response, the academy is attempting to—as the AV Club puts it—" add seemingly goddamn everyone it had, for one reason or another, forgotten to invite into its membership.” The actors, directors, and others invited Wednesday include Idris Elba, Eva Mendes, Oscar Isaac, John Boyega, Ice Cube, Greta Gerqig, Michael B. Jordan, Vivica A. Fox, the Wachowskis, James Wan, Luis Guzmán, Kate Beckinsale, Park Chan-wook, James Hong, Michelle Rodriguez, and not one, not two, but three Wayans brothers. Of the new invitees, 46% are women and 41% are people of color. If all 683 accept their invite, women would account for 27% of the more than 7,000 academy members (up from 25%) and minorities would total 11% (up from 8%). “I'm especially happy to be part of such a diverse group. I actually want to hang out and watch movies with most of the people on this list," Arab-German director Lexi Alexander tells the Los Angeles Times. “To be honest, I cried a few tears when I started to get congratulation tweets in Arabic.” Other invitees took to Twitter to share similar sentiments. “Excited to use my vote to nominate talent that reflects the real world we live in—DIVERSITY," tweets Brie Larson, who won best actress at this year's Oscars.